John Caswell Davis

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For other persons named John Davis, see John Davis (disambiguation).

John Caswell Davis (August 19, 1888 – October 25, 1953) was a Canadian senator.

Born in Montreal, Quebec, after graduating in civil engineering from McGill University he moved to Saint Boniface, Manitoba, where the experience of his Montreal upbringing fostered his assimilation among the local French and Metis. He married Priscilla Emmerling Guilbault in about 1916 (Emmerlings and Guilbaults had been peripherally involved in the Riel Rebellion). Their union produced four children: Edward James (1919-2003); Yvonne (b. 1921); Lucille (1923-1995); and Patricia (b.1931).

Bilingual and bicultural, John Caswell Davis's political abilities were appreciated as a bridge for unifying the dominant English speaking population with a local French culture intent on asserting itself politically and culturally. John Caswell Davis entered the senate in 1949 and died in office in 1953 while only 63 years old.

Among his other talents he excelled as an artist, working in watercolor, pen and ink, and pastels, expertly capturing the landscape of the prairies and mountains of western Canada. A caricaturist par excellence, he was also committed to documenting vanishing Aboriginal Canada, which he accomplished with an almost unparalleled brilliance. His fondness for Native Canada is evident in numerous superb portraits created while attending pow wows and Indian gatherings all over the west.