Toronto, CA – April 28, 2026 – University of Toronto Press announces the publication of L. R. “Red” Wilson: A Canadian Journey – Lessons in Life, Leadership, and Legacy, by historian Dimitry Anastakis, with a foreword by the Right Honourable David Johnston, former Governor General of Canada. This sweeping biography traces the extraordinary life of Lynton Ronald “Red” Wilson (1940 – 2026), a business leader, civil servant, philanthropist, and nation-builder whose influence on Canada’s public and corporate life spanned more than six decades.
Raised in postwar Port Colborne, Ontario, Red Wilson’s journey carried him from a small-town paper route to the highest levels of both government and business. His career bridged public service and enterprise: from trade commissioner and deputy minister at Queen’s Park and in Ottawa, to CEO of Redpath Industries Ltd., chairman of Bell Canada Enterprises, board director at Nortel and CAE, and architect of the landmark Competition Policy Review Panel that reshaped national industrial strategy.
Through extensive archival research and Red’s own letters, Anastakis reveals how Wilson’s values of commitment, humility, duty, optimism, and love of country, guided a life devoted equally to performance and principle. His leadership formed the blueprint for a uniquely Canadian model of capitalism: socially responsible, globally minded, and unafraid of ambition.
In 2012, Wilson began a series of handwritten reflections for his children and grandchildren, which he called his “letters home.” They were about what makes a meaningful life, and those pages became the moral framework of this book, encompassing lessons about family, mentors, curiosity, character, luck, and Canada
itself.
“My cause is Canada,” Wilson wrote. “And the support of those projects and institutions which are dedicated to its continuing success.”
Historian Anastakis expands these reflections into a full narrative set against the transformation of postwar Canada, from industrial nation to digital economy, and showing how Wilson’s defining principle, drawn from Tennyson’s Ulysses, shaped every chapter of his life: “To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.”
About the Author
Dimitry Anastakis is Professor and L.R. Wilson/R.J. Currie Chair in Canadian Business History at the University of Toronto in the Department of History and the Rotman School of Management, where he teaches about business, the state and politics, globalization, and automobility. He has published twelve books and edited collections, including five books on aspects of the Canadian auto industry in North America including Dream Car: Malcolm Bricklin’s Fantastic SV1 and the End of Industrial Modernity.
Publication Details
L. R. “Red” Wilson: A Canadian Journey – Lessons in Life, Leadership, and Legacy
By Dimitry Anastakis and Foreword by the Rt. Hon. David Johnston
Published by Aevo UTP, an imprint of University of Toronto Press
ISBN 978-1-4875-8173-2 / Hardcover / 528 pp / $39.95 CAD
Available now wherever books are sold.