Ted Byfield

Byfield was born into a Unitarian family in Toronto, Ontario, in 1928 as the son of Caroline ({{nee}} Gillett) and Vernon "Vern" Byfield, a reporter for the Toronto Telegram and Toronto Star.{{Cite web|url=https://rrj.ca/sympathy-for-the-old-devil-2/|title = Sympathy for the Old Devil | [ ] Review of Journalism : The School of Journalism|date = 2 March 2000}}{{Cite web|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=J7BnAAAAMAAJ&q=%22EDWARD+BARTLETT+BYFIELD+(+Par+:+Vernon+%26+Caroline+(+Gillette+)+Byfield+)%22|title = Freeman Families of Nova Scotia and Their Ancestors and Descendants and Allied Families: A Genealogy with Biographical Sketches|year = 1986}}{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=psIC_9QLJD0C&dq=%22Son+of+Vern+Byfield+,+a+reporter+for+the+Toronto%22&pg=PA237|title=West-words: Celebrating Western Canadian Theatre and Playwriting|isbn=9780889772359|last1=Day|first1=Moira Jean|year=2011|publisher=University of Regina Press }} During WW2 Byfield attended Lakefield College School for two "unforgettable years. The place established the first positive values of my life--moral, mathematical, literary--and introduced me to the Christian faith."{{Cite book| last = Van Maren| first = Jonathon| title = Prairie Lion: The Life & Times of Ted Byfield| url=https://www.amazon.ca/Prairie-Lion-Life-Times-Byfield/dp/1778107249 |date=12 August 2022 |publisher=Christian Heritage Press }} Byfield then moved with his parents to Washington, D.C. in 1945 at the age of 17.

He began his journalism career as a copy boy for the Washington Post. He returned to Canada in 1948 and worked at the Ottawa Journal and Timmins Daily Press and married Virginia Byfield.{{Cite news|url=https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/formidable-editor-ginger-byfield-left-an-indelible-mark/article19897780/|title=Formidable editor Ginger Byfield left an indelible mark|newspaper=The Globe and Mail|language=en-US|date=1 August 2014|access-date=28 August 2020 |first=Peter Shawn|last= Taylor}} In 1952, the Byfields moved from Toronto with their two children under two, to Winnipeg where Ted Byfield began working at the Winnipeg Free Press. Covering Winnipeg city hall news, he once "crawled into an air conditioning duct in order to eavesdrop on a secret city council meeting enabling him to get a scoop on a funding scandal".

While a political reporter for the Winnipeg Free Press Byfield was enlisted by recently-elected MLA Stephen Juba in a bid for mayor. Juba's win was "the upset of the decade in Winnipeg municipal politics. Once his man was in power Ted made great use of his favored status. In particular, he enlisted the mayor’s support for a personal project he had just begun – a weekend boys’ club. The effect, of course, was to give the project instant credibility. But more importantly, it got the kind of publicity no money could buy."{{Cite book| last=de Candole| first=Richard| title=Toughest School in North America| url=https://www.amazon.ca/Toughest-School-America-Richard-Candole/dp/B0B1LYZYB5 |date=17 May 2022 |publisher=Independently Published |ISBN=979-8449758873}}

In 1952, Ted Byfield underwent a profound religious conversion. Inspired by the writings of Christian apologists, such as Dorothy L. Sayers, C.S. Lewis, and G. K. Chesterton, the couple committed to living their Christian faith fully.{{Cite news| title = Virginia Byfield |series=Obituary|date=24 July 2014 |newspaper = The Edmonton Journal| access-date = 29 August 2020| url = https://www.legacy.com/amp/obituaries/edmontonjournal/171840945}} Through the St. John's Cathedral choir, Ted Byfield became part of a cell or group of seventeen men, which included Frank Wiens, that shared similar beliefs. They founded what they first called the Dynevor Society, and later the Company of the Cross, a lay Anglican order{{cite news |title=School sued after 26 years |first=Daryl |last=Slade |newspaper=Calgary Herald |date=8 February 2003}} affiliated with the Anglican Church of Canada. The boy's choir at St. John's Cathedral became a club, then a weekend residential school starting in 1957, and finally, in 1962, a full-time "traditionalist" Anglican private boarding school for boys.{{Cite magazine| last = Cosh| first = Colby| title = The greatest story Ted Byfield ever told|magazine = Maclean's|access-date = 28 August 2020| date =12 April 2013| url = https://www.macleans.ca/uncategorized/the-greatest-story-byfield-ever-told/}} The Company of the Cross had acquired the abandoned Dynevor Indian Hospital in Selkirk, north of Winnipeg where they held their weekend schools. The cell officially changed their name from Dynevor to the Company of the Cross under the Manitoba Societies Act.

In 1962, Byfield and five other members of the Company{{Cite news| last = Byfield| first = Ted| title = Do our new-found ideas on children maybe explain the fact we can't control them?| magazine = Alberta Report|publisher=United Western Communications| date = 21 October 1996}} opened the first in a series of St. John's full-time boarding schools for boys "dedicated to the reassertion of Christian educational principles"—Saint John's Cathedral Boys' School. The school operated intentionally on "traditional" methods. They used mathematics textbooks from pre-World War II advancing from "arithmetic to calculus" with constant testing. Ginger Byfield taught French "developed from French-Canadian history." They watched hockey on the French channel. Byfield taught history which required that students read copiously from Thomas Costain to Francis Parkman. In 1973 parents were paying $1700 a year tuition.

"Without real challenge and real adventure," said Byfield in a 1968 CBC TV documentary on why the school promoted such a challenging physical education program, "we will never produce real men."{{cite AV media |year=1968 |title=Frontier School|publisher=Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC Television)|people=John Foster (narrator) John Lackie (executive producer) Myron Kupchuk (camera) Noboru Shimuzu (editor) Bill Horton, David Hodgkinson (sound) Allan Pennie (lighting direction)|url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eggZYb-6Fjg}}

A 1974 National Film Board documentary described the St. John's Cathedral Boys' School as "one of the most demanding outdoor schools in North America." Upon arrival at the school, the new boys, 13- to 15-years old, undertook a 2-week canoe on the English River (Ontario) from Ear Falls to Lake Winnipeg. In the spring there is a second longer canoe trip starting from Grand Portage to the school covering 900 miles (1,440 kilometers) with 55 portages. "The boys stand up to it (the New Boy canoe trip) according to the individual boy," said Byfield, "and this is a very difficult thing to determine. For instance, we have eminent success with youngsters who are physically ill-coordinated. For the youngster who has never succeeded in anything physically, often this causes them to have terrible inhibitions and fears. If they go through a canoe trip, when they get back they've done something, and this does enormous things for their confidence."

By spring, most senior students will have travelled at least 300 miles (or 500 kilometers) on snowshoes. Each week every boy will spend his Wednesdays snowshoeing significant distances, the seniors covering about 30 miles (50km), intermediates about 23 (37km), and juniors 15 (24km). "We find that of all the programs that the school operates this one is almost without doubt the most effective," asserts Byfield, "because on that snowshoe team the boy, while he's a member of a group, is entirely dependent on his own resources. He has two legs, and those are the two legs that are going to carry him. In no sense can he lean on anybody else's legs."

In order to open a second school—Saint John's School of Alberta—the Byfields moved to Edmonton. The new school property, which was thirty kilometres west of Edmonton, near Stony Plain, Alberta had "110 hectares of bush, park and farmland". At first, their schools operated under the auspices of an Anglican bishop.{{cite news|title=St. John's/Company of the Cross Annual Report |year=1971 |author=Company of the Cross |quote=In legal fact the company is ... operated under the auspices of an Anglican bishop. Since the bishops renew the members in the company's service annually, they could presumably dissolve the company by refusing to admit new members.... Each time the one of the company's activities raises public question or controversy ... the bishops find themselves assailed with the same questions: Are these people part of the church, or are they not, and if they are what controls does the church have over them?}} The school practiced corporal punishment, and was eventually sued by an ex-student, Jeffrey Richard Birkin, who alleged that he was "forcefully exposed to experiences on the trip that put his life, health and safety at risk."{{Cite web|title=Calgary Herald Article on St. John's of Alberta Lawsuit|url=https://www.bedard.com/level1/stjohns/albertalawsuit.html|access-date=2021-12-26|website=www.bedard.com}}

By 2003, the school had about 130 students and 30 staff members. It remained open until 2008. In the school's early years, Ted Byfield taught history and Virginia (Ginger) Byfield taught "French, English grammar and literature." A third Company of the Cross school —Saint John's School of Ontario—was established at Claremont, Ontario in 1977 and closed in 1989.{{Cite news| title = Review: No act of God| access-date = 29 August 2020 |date=15 June 2002| url = https://www.theglobeandmail.com/arts/no-act-of-god/article755289/ |first=M. T. |last=Kelly|newspaper=The Globe and Mail}}{{Cite book| publisher = Harper Flamingo Canada| isbn = 978-0-00-200037-6| last = Raffan| first = James| title = Deep waters: courage, character and the Lake Timiskaming canoeing tragedy| location = Toronto| date = 2002}}{{Cite book| first = Scott |last=Sorensen| isbn = 978-0-9672983-0-6| title = Kipawa River Chronicles: Adventures in the North Woods| date = May 1999|publisher=Scott Sorensen }}{{Cite news| title = History Through Our Eyes: June 13, 1978, canoe trip tragedy|date=13 June 2019 | newspaper = The Gazette|location=Montreal| access-date = 28 August 2020| url = https://montrealgazette.com/news/local-news/history-through-our-eyes/history-through-our-eyes-june-13-1978-canoe-trip-tragedy}} It was from this school that one of Canada's greatest boating tragedies occurred. Twelve boys and a staff member died of drowning and hypothermia on a canoe trip on 11 June 1978 on Lake Temiskaming.

In an Alberta Report 21 October 1996 article, Byfield denounced "new-found" ideas on educating boys. By 1996, SJCS graduates were staff members at the St. John's School of Alberta near Warburg, Alberta where its program is evolved from the "Manitoba endeavour."

In the early years, all employees of the Company of the Cross—which included school and magazine staff, earned a dollar per day, plus room and board. The St. John's Edmonton Report news magazine staff lived in communal fashion entirely occupying a three-story walk-up apartment block on 149 Street and 91st Avenue in Edmonton, called "Waverly Place," where they "attended morning and evening chapel services."

{{main|Alberta Report}}

In 1973, along with about a dozen St. John's Alberta school staff, Byfield first began publishing St. John's Edmonton Report from a new building extension of the Genesee, Alberta school. This provided Byfield with the means to "combine his love of the news business with his desire to proselytize." He used the Report to "rail against homosexuals, abortionists, human rights commissions and public education." This was the precursor of the Alberta Report. In 1977, they launched the St. John's Calgary Report. In 1979 they merged the Edmonton and Calgary Reports into the Alberta Report.

The earlier model of The Company of the Cross, which included communal living and a meagre salary was not a successful business model. With the formation of the Alberta Report, Byfield shifted to a commercial enterprise model with staff receiving regular wages. It was during that time that Alberta and the federal government entered into their "energy wars." Byfield took on the role as the "guru of regional discontent" and his magazines fed a growing sentiment of Western Canadian discontent and alienation. He dared suggest "western separatism", emulating the province of Quebec's threats. By 1987, the Report's circulation in Alberta reached a record average of 53,277 a week. They attempted to establish Western Report as a regional Western Canadian version, but this wasn't succeeding, so they confined Western Report to Saskatchewan and Manitoba and launched a new provincial news magazine for British Columbia.

Byfield's newsmagazine had an Achilles heal, in that it depended on getting its magazines delivered every week by Canada Post. However, by "the summer of 1981, the unionized workers at Canada Post walked off the job for the fourth time in seven years... Never one to accept failure, Byfield quickly came up with a response: the Alberta Report Postal Emergency Service. Delivery boys were recruited from local Catholic schools..."{{Cite web| last = Taylor| first = Peter Shawn|date=22 January 2022|title=The Passing of a Prairie Lion Ted Byfield, 1928-2021 |url=https://c2cjournal.ca/2022/01/the-passing-of-a-prairie-lion-ted-byfield-1928-2021/ |website=C2C Journal }} Because Canada Post held a monopoly on postal services, Byfield loudly declared on his own specially-designed stamp, "René Magritte-style, 'This is not a postage stamp,' and featured a pattern of tiny one-fingered salutes, presumably aimed at Liberal Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau."

Often criticized as a bastion of rednecks, the editorial staff of Alberta Report was in reality composed of writers and editors who were often not Christian and not conservative, including a young left-leaning Jewish writer (now Canadian Senator) Paula Simons who has jokingly referred to herself as Ted's illegitimate daughter.{{cite web |last1=Simons |first1=Paula |title=An Alberta Report Girl |url=https://edmontonjournal.com/news/local-news/an-alberta-report-girl |website=Edmonton Journal |date=15 September 2011}} According to Calgary Sun columnist Rick Bell, "the Alberta Report newsroom was not buttoned-down. You’d see folks of all political stripes and all persuasions and all lifestyles including a copy-editing, chain-smoking Maoist."{{cite web |last1=Bell |first1=Rick |title=Bell: Ted Byfield, he changed the course of my life |url=https://calgarysun.com/opinion/columnists/bell-ted-byfield-he-changed-the-course-of-my-life |date=27 December 2021}}

They used the B.C. portion of the Western Report list to start British Columbia Report in 1989, while simultaneously launching an $1.1-million initial public offering on the Vancouver Stock Exchange in 1990. In addition to covering news from a conservative viewpoint, the Report magazines challenged the prevailing news and commentary about crime, homosexuality, abortion, and public education. In a 20 December 1993 article Byfield wrote that, "We do not think government is a good thing. We do not believe government on anything like the present scale is even a necessary thing. We believe government, or what it has turned into, to be an actively evil thing."

He advocated that the Senate of Canada be reformed to what he termed a Triple-E (elected, equal, and effective) chamber of parliament.{{cite web |last1=Taylor |first1=Peter Shawn |title=Influential Alberta Report publisher Ted Byfield gave voice to a nascent Reform Party |url=https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/article-influential-alberta-report-publisher-ted-byfield-gave-voice-to-a/ |website=The Globe and Mail |access-date=17 July 2024 |date=11 January 2022 |quote=He was responsible for popularizing slogans such as “Triple-E Senate” (which he coined)}}

Byfield's son, Link Byfield, succeeded him as editor and publisher. The Alberta Report{{'s}} circulation never again reached the peak it reached in the mid-1980s and continued to decline. Vincent Byfield, who had worked at the magazines from the start as a boy at age eight in 1973 and went on to manage B.C. Report in 1989, left in 1996. In 1997 all remaining subscribers were consolidated. Vincent later became a member of the UCP board of directors, serving as Edmonton Director.

On January 26, 1998, an article on residential school denialism, entitled "Canada's Mythical Holocaust" was published in Byfield's Alberta Report, saying that "many teachers and graduates" were "still proud of the schools and the services they provided" through the Canadian Indian residential school system. The article blamed "white liberal guilt about cultural assimilation, on the transformation of residential schools "into symbols of shame.".{{cite magazine |title=Canada's Mythical Holocaust |magazine=Alberta Report|volume=25|number=6|date=January 26, 1998}}{{Cite Twitter |last=Bueckert |first=Michael |user=mbueckert |title=Here's how Byfield's Alberta Report covered residential schools in 1998 (by this time the paper was run by his son, Link):Canada's Mythical Holocaust: Ottawa's $350 million apology for the 'horrors' of Indian residential schools is rooted more in fiction that fact|date=December 25, 2021 |access-date=March 27, 2024 |number=1474473266244947968}} The Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement (IRSSA) recognized the damage inflicted by the residential schools. The 2006 IRSSA's C$1.9-billion compensation package for all former IRS students,{{citation |url=http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/a-timeline-of-residential-schools-the-truth-and-reconciliation-commission-1.724434 |title=A timeline of residential schools, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission |work=CBC News |date=16 May 2008 |access-date=4 June 2015 }} was the largest class action settlement in Canadian history.{{rp|1}}

In 2003, "Alberta Report" ceased publication.

Ted Byfield has written a number of books beginning in 1965 with Just Think Mr. Berton.{{Cite book| last = Byfield| first = Ted| title = Just Think, Mr. Berton| url=https://thechristians.com/product/just-think-mr-berton-a-little-harder |date=1 January 1965 |publisher=The Company of the Cross }} In 1983 a collection of Byfield columns was published as The Deplorable Unrest in the Colonies.{{Cite book| publisher = Ted Byfield/Alberta Report| last = Byfield| first = Ted| title = The deplorable unrest in the colonies| location = Alberta| date = 1983 | isbn = 9780968987384|oclc=70306113}} In 1984, frustrated with inaccurate existing roadmaps, Byfield assembled the Atlas of Alberta,{{Cite book| last = Byfield| first = Ted| title = The Atlas of Alberta|url=https://www.amazon.ca/THE-ATLAS-OF-ALBERTA/dp/B0067RKAGY/|date=1984 |publisher=Alberta Report }} a 160-page hardbound compilation of both historical and modern highway and city maps, including every urban center in the province with a population of 5,000 or more.

In his 1998 The Book of Ted, Epistles from an Unrepentant Redneck, he published a collection of his "back-page" Alberta Report articles, where he championed "balanced budgets, back-to-basics education and tougher sentences for young criminals".{{Cite book| last = Byfield| first = Ted|url=https://www.amazon.ca/Book-Ted-Epistles-Unrepentant-Redneck/dp/B0092AWETE|title=The Book of Ted, Epistles from an Unrepentant Redneck|isbn=0968337201 |publisher=Keystone Press |date=1 January 1998}}

Starting in the early 1990s, Byfield published a series of twelve volumes on the history of Alberta entitled Alberta in the 20th Century: A Journalistic History of the Province.{{Cite book| edition = First Printing| publisher = United Western Communications Ltd.| isbn = 978-0-9695718-2-7| last = Byfield| first = Ted| title = Alberta in the 20th century: A journalistic history of the province in 12 volumes| location = Edmonton| date = 1994 }}{{Cite book |editor-first = Moira J. |editor-last=Day| first = Moira J. |last=Day| title = West-words: Celebrating Western Canadian Theatre and Playwriting |isbn=978-0889772359 |publisher=Canadian Plains Research Center Press, University of Regina|location=Regina, Saskatchewan|date=20 July 2011 |chapter=Alberta Reports vs. Prairie Report: the City of God vs. The City of Man on the Canadian Prairies, 1973-2003 |pages=214–245}} United Western Communications (which owned Alberta Report) began publishing the history book series in 1991 and the series was completed in 2003. Chapters in the first volumes included contributions by Paul Bunner and Paul Stanway, who both played key roles in completing the final volumes.{{Cite book |volume=1 |title=The Great West Before 1900 |publisher=United Western Communications |isbn=0969571801 |url=https://www.amazon.ca/Alberta-20th-Century-Journalistic-Province/dp/0969571801/r |series=Alberta in the 20th Century}}

{{Cite book |volume=2 |title=The Birth of the Province / 1900-1910 |publisher=United Western Communications |isbn=096957181X |url=https://www.amazon.ca/Journalistic-History-Province-Alberta-Century/dp/096957181X |series=Alberta in the 20th Century}}

{{Cite book |volume=3 |title=The Boom and The Bust - 1910-1914 |publisher=United Western Communications |isbn=0969571828 |url=https://www.amazon.ca/Alberta-Century-Journalistic-History-Province/dp/B001Q4ZA86 |series=Alberta in the 20th Century}}

{{Cite book |volume=4 |title=The Great War and Its Consequences / 1914-1920 |publisher=United Western Communications |isbn=0969571836 |url=https://www.amazon.ca/Alberta-Journalistic-Province-Consequences-1914-1920/dp/0969571836 |series=Alberta in the 20th Century}}

{{Cite book |volume=5 |title=Brownlee and the Triumph of Populism / 1920-1930 |publisher=United Western Communications |isbn=0959571841 |url=https://www.amazon.ca/Alberta-20th-Century-Brownlee-1920-1930/dp/0959571841 |series=Alberta in the 20th Century}}

{{Cite book |volume=6 |title=Fury and futility: The onset of the Great Depression / 1930-1935 |publisher=United Western Communications |isbn=0969571860 |url=https://www.amazon.ca/Fury-Futility-Depression-1930-1935-Alberta/dp/0969571860 |series=Alberta in the 20th Century}}

{{Cite book |volume=7 |title=Aberhart and the Alberta Insurrection / 1935-1940 |publisher=United Western Communications |isbn=0969571844 |url=https://www.amazon.ca/Alberta-Century-Aberhart-Insurrection-1935-1940/dp/B00A96PLQI |series=Alberta in the 20th Century}}

{{Cite book |volume=8 |title=The War That United The Province / 1939-1945 |publisher=United Western Communications |isbn=0969571887 |url=https://www.amazon.ca/Alberta-20th-Century-Province-1939-1945/dp/B003AK5KYI |series=Alberta in the 20th Century}}

{{Cite book |volume=9 |title=Leduc, Manning & The Age Of Prosperity / 1946-1963 |publisher=United Western Communications |isbn=0969571895 |url=https://www.amazon.ca/Alberta-20th-Century-Manning-Prosperity/dp/B00LTYF222 |series=Alberta in the 20th Century}}

{{Cite book |volume=10 |title=The Sixties Revolution & The Fall of Social Credit / 1964-1970 |publisher=United Western Communications |isbn=0973076003 |url=https://www.amazon.ca/Alberta-Century-Sixties-Revolution-Social/dp/B00A96P3R0 |series=Alberta in the 20th Century}}

{{Cite book |volume=11 |title=Lougheed and the War with Ottawa / 1971-1984 |publisher=History Book Publications |isbn=0973076003 |url=https://www.amazon.ca/Alberta-20th-Century-Eleven-0973076003/dp/B00CC2MNSG |series=Alberta in the 20th Century}}

{{Cite book |volume=12 |title=Alberta Takes The Lead / 1984-2000 |publisher=History Book Publications |isbn=097307602X |url=https://www.amazon.ca/Alberta-20th-Century-Twelve-1984-2000 |series=Alberta in the 20th Century}} For Alberta's centennial anniversary in 2005, Canwest Media published with Paul Stanway a single-volume compendium of the complete series entitled Alberta in the 20th Century a Journalistic History of the Province - the Albertans: from Settlement to Super Province 1905 -2005.{{Cite book |volume=13 |title=The Albertans: From Settlement To Super Province / 1905 -2005 |publisher=CanMedia Inc. |isbn=0973653035 |url=https://www.amazon.ca/Alberta-Century-Journalistic-History-Province/dp/0973653035 |series=Alberta in the 20th Century}}

In 2020, Chris P. Champion, social studies curriculum advisor to the Alberta Education Minister, Andriana LaGrange, strongly supported the inclusion of Byfield's history series as required reading for Grade 11 social studies, calling it a "comprehensive analytic narrative of the Province in the context of historians' debates and Canadian and world history". Champion said that these volumes would "increase students' knowledge of the past and provide counterbalance to the prevailing, politicizing social justice tendency that has already gone too far."

In 1999, Byfield planned on starting a "40-volume book series on the history of Christianity."{{Cite web| last = Bergman| first = Brian|date=25 January 1999|title=Ted Byfield (Profile) |url=https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/ted-byfield-profile |website=The Canadian Encyclopedia |publisher=Historica Canada}} Their first volume, The Veil Is Torn A.D. 30 to A.D. 70 Pentecost to the Destruction of Jerusalem, was published in 2002.{{Cite book| last = Byfield| first = Ted| series = The Christians: Their First Two Thousand Years |title=The Veil Is Torn A.D. 30 to A.D. 70 Pentecost to the Destruction of Jerusalem|volume=1 |date=1 January 2002 |isbn=0968987303}} By 2005, the Christian History Project had already invested $3.5-million and sales of the first volumes were slow. In order to raise funds to complete the series, Byfield created the Society to Explore and Record Christian History (SEARCH) as charities, with one in Alberta and the other in Virginia. They raised enough in donations to complete the series. Byfield completed the final 12th volume ("The High Tide and the Turn / AD 1914 to AD 2001 / A New Christendom Explodes into Life in the Third World") in 2013 through the Society to Explore and Record Christian History.{{Cite book |volume=1 |title=The Veil is Torn / AD 30 to AD 70 / Pentecost to the Destruction of Jerusalem |url=https://thechristians.com/product/veil-is-torn/ |publisher=Christian History Project | pages=288 |isbn=978-0968987308 |series=The Christians: Their First Two Thousand Years|year=2002 }}

{{Cite book |volume=2 |title=A Pinch of Incense / AD 70 to 250 / From the Fall of Jeruasalem to the Decian Persecution |url=https://thechristians.com/product/the-christians-v02-a-pinch-of-incense/ |publisher=Christian History Project |isbn=978-0968987315 | pages=288 |series=The Christians: Their First Two Thousand Years|year=2002 }}

{{Cite book |volume=3 |title=By This Sign / AD 250 to AD 350 / From the Decian Persecution to Constantine Era |url=https://thechristians.com/product/the-christians-v03-by-this-sign/ |publisher=Christian History Project |isbn=978-0968987322 | pages=288 |series=The Christians: Their First Two Thousand Years|year=2003 }}

{{Cite book |volume=4 |title=Darkness Descends / AD 350 to AD 565 / The Fall of the Western Roman Empire |url=https://thechristians.com/product/the-christians-v04-darkness-descends/ |publisher=Christian History Project |isbn=978-0968987339 | pages=288 |series=The Christians: Their First Two Thousand Years|date=16 May 2024 }}

{{Cite book |volume=5 |title=The Sword of Islam / AD 565 to AD 740 / The Muslim Onslaught all but Destroys Christendom |url=https://thechristians.com/product/the-christians-v05-the-sword-of-islam/ |publisher=Christian History Project |isbn=978-0968987346 | pages=288 |series=The Christians: Their First Two Thousand Years|year=2004 }}

{{Cite book |volume=6 |title=The Quest for the City / AD 740 to AD 1100 / Pursuing the Next World, They Founded this One |url=https://thechristians.com/product/the-christians-v06-the-quest-for-the-city/ |publisher=Christian History Project |isbn=978-0968987360 | pages=288 |series=The Christians: Their First Two Thousand Years|year=2004 }}

{{Cite book |volume=7 |title=A Glorious Disaster / AD 1100 to AD 1300 / The Crusades: Blood, Valor, Iniquity, Reason, Faith |url=https://thechristians.com/product/the-christians-v07-a-glorious-disaster/ |publisher=Society to Explore And Record Christian History |isbn=978-0968987377 | pages=278 |series=The Christians: Their First Two Thousand Years|year=2008 }}

{{Cite book |volume=8 |title=The Renaissance / AD 1300 to AD 1500 / God in Man |url=https://thechristians.com/product/the-christians-v08-god-in-man/ |publisher=Society to Explore And Record Christian History |isbn=978-0968987384 | pages=288 |series=The Christians: Their First Two Thousand Years|year=2010 }}

{{Cite book |volume=9 |title=A Century of Giants / AD 1500 to AD 1600 / In an Age of Spiritual Genius, Western Christendom Shatters |url=https://thechristians.com/product/the-christians-v09-a-century-of-giants/ | pages=342 |publisher=Society to Explore And Record Christian History |isbn=978-0968987391 |series=The Christians: Their First Two Thousand Years|year=2010 }}

{{Cite book |volume=10|title=We the People/ AD 1600 to AD 1800 / Democracy, Christendom's Unintended Achievement|url=https://thechristians.com/product/the-christians-v10-democracy-christendom-s-unintended-achievement/ | pages=276 |publisher=Society to Explore And Record Christian History |isbn=978-0986939600 |series=The Christians: Their First Two Thousand Years|date=June 2011}}

{{Cite book |volume=11|title=Unto The Ends of The Earth / AD 1800 to AD 1914 / Despite rising disbelief, the faith advances as never before |url=https://thechristians.com/product/the-christians-v11-unto-the-ends-of-the-earth/ | pages=302 |publisher=Society to Explore And Record Christian History |isbn=978-0986939617 |series=The Christians: Their First Two Thousand Years|date=17 May 2024 }}

{{Cite book |volume=12 |title=The High Tide and the Turn / AD 1914 to AD 2001 / A New Christendom Explodes into Life in the Third World |url=https://thechristians.com/product/the-christians-v12-the-high-tide-and-the-turn/ | pages=436 |publisher=Society to Explore And Record Christian History |isbn=978-0986939624 |series=The Christians: Their First Two Thousand Years|year=2013 }}

In 2013, with The Christians completed, Byfield turned his focus to increasing the influence of SEARCH by introducing an online journal with current interest topics.{{Cite news|first=Joseph |last=Brean| title = Ted Byfield completes a modern, right-wing, popular history of Christianity| newspaper= National Post|date=30 March 2013| access-date = 28 August 2020| url = https://nationalpost.com/holy-post/ted-byfield-completes-a-modern-right-wing-popular-12-volume-history-of-christianity}} Byfield served as president and chairman of SEARCH from 2007 until his death in 2021, whereupon his son Vincent, who had managed SEARCH since 2011, took over.{{Cite web| title = The Benedict Option Part I: The clash of Church and State |work=The Bridgehead| access-date = 28 August 2020| date = 18 April 2017|first=Jonathon |last=Van Maren| url = https://thebridgehead.ca/2017/04/18/the-benedict-option-part-i-the-clash-of-church-and-state/}}{{Cite web|url=https://books.thechristians.com/content/4-about-search|title=About SEARCH, the Society to Explore And Record Christian History|website=Books.TheChristians.com|language=en-US|access-date=2014-08-01}}

Following the September 11 attacks, Ted and Virginia Byfield left the Anglican church, which had adopted a "modernistic theology" that the Byfield's considered to be "simply heretical." They converted to the Orthodox Church in America, a stricter form of Christianity. They were motivated to convert by the 11 September attacks, and a "sense of a growing conflict between Christianity and Islam." This concern also inspired them to work on a history of Christianity.

Byfield was one of the inspirations behind the founding of the Reform Party of Canada, was the keynote speaker at their inaugural meeting of the Reform Party in Winnipeg and coined the phrase "The West Wants In."

In a 1999 review of 'Byfield's 1998 publication, The Book of Ted, Epistles from an Unrepentant Redneck, said that the role of Ted Byfield—and by extension, the Alberta Review—in the creation of the Reform Party was similar to William F. Buckley and the National Review—"before there was Ronald Reagan there was Barry Goldwater, before there was Goldwater there was National Review, and before there was National Review there was William F. Buckley."{{Cite web| title = Ted Byfield has never abandoned principles|first=Paul |last=Tuns| access-date = 28 August 2020 |date=22 August 1999| url = https://www.theinterim.com/features/book-review/ted-byfield-has-never-abandoned-principles/}}

Ted Byfield won Canada's National Newspaper Award in 1957 for Breaking News (formerly Spot News Reporting).{{Cite web|url=https://nna-ccj.ca/award-archives/list-of-winners-since-1949/#2|title=National Newspaper Award Winners since 1949|website=nnj-cca.ca|language=en-US|access-date=2022-01-03}}

On 19 October 2017, Betty Unger, Senator of Canada from Alberta, who was appointed in 2012 by then-Prime Minister Stephen Harper, awarded Byfield, along with thirteen other Albertans, a Senate 150th Commemorative Medal for significant contributions to his community.{{Cite web|url=https://bettyunger.ca/senate-medal-award-recipients/|title=Fourteen Albertans to receive a Senate 150th Medal in recognition of significant contributions made to their communities – Betty Unger, Alberta Senator|website=bettyunger.ca|language=en-US|access-date=2018-05-22}} Other recipients included Ralph Sorenson, who served in the Legislative Assembly of Alberta as a member of the Social Credit caucus in the official opposition from 1971 to 1975.

Byfield and his wife Virginia (born 1929), who predeceased him in 2014, had six children, two of whom, Philippa and Link, predeceased their father.{{cite encyclopedia|url=https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/ted-byfield-profile |first=Brian |last=Bergman|title=Ted Byfield |encyclopedia= The Canadian Encyclopedia |date=17 March 2003 |access-date=28 August 2020}} Ted Byfield died at his home on 23 December 2021, at the age of 93.{{cite news |title=Ted Byfield, iconic Alberta conservative publisher, dies at 93 |url=https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/ted-byfield-death-alberta-report-1.6297563 |access-date=24 December 2021 |publisher=CBC News |date=24 December 2021}}

The fictional journalist, Dick Bennington in Frank Moher's 1988 play Prairie Report, is widely considered to be based on Ted Byfield.{{Cite book|editor-first = Moira J. |editor-last=Day | first = Moira J. |last=Day |title = West-words: Celebrating Western Canadian Theatre and Playwriting |isbn=978-0889772359 |pages=336 |publisher=University of Regina Press|date=20 July 2011 |chapter=Alberta Reports vs. Prairie Report: the City of God vs. The City of Man on the Canadian Prairies, 1973-2003}}

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Category:1928 births

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