THE MAKING OF A RADICAL IMMIGRANT

Caccia explores mid-20th-century Canadian history through the lens of a communist immigrant in this biography.

Born in 1901 outside Rijeka, Edvard (Edo) Jardas joined the thousands of other Croatians who emigrated to Canada in the aftermath of World War I. Recruited by agents of Canadian railway companies seeking cheap labor, Jardas initially found work as a lumberjack in British Columbia. Full of youthful charisma, he quickly emerged as a militant proponent of trade unionism as a member of the Communist Party of Canada. In the 1930s, he served as the editor of a Croation-language communist newspaper and fought against fascists in the Spanish Civil War, where he lost a leg. After the conclusion of World War II, he returned to his motherland in Eastern Europe (which was now a part of communist Yugoslavia led by his personal hero, Josip Broz Tito), where he would serve in various roles in the regional Communist Party, including a stint as mayor of Rijeka. While Jardas’ personal story is full of intrigue and told in fascinating detail, what truly stands out is the author’s skill at connecting the man’s biography to a larger consideration of Canadian communism, immigration, and working-class politics. The work effectively uses Jardas’ experiences, particularly with international communist networks and Canadian trade unionism, to inform a broader commentary on mid-20th-century history. A central theme in much of Jardas’ own writing is his disdain for nationalism, which he saw as a bourgeois invention—he distinguished this from his love of his homeland, which he viewed as “a natural, innate feeling of belonging.” The author, a historian, supports her text with more than 400 footnotes and a 20-page bibliography. Caccia’s writing style is accessible, and the book includes maps, photographs, newspaper clippings, and other engaging visual elements.

A well-researched, compelling history of a lesser-known figure in Canadian history.