Jean Newman

Who is Jean Newman?

Jean Newman was a municipal politician in Toronto, Canada. She served as Controller budget chief and was the first woman to run for Mayor of Toronto.

Newman was born in El Paso, Texas where he father, a railroad employee, was stationed. The family returned to Canada when she was three months old and she grew up in Toronto. She attended Oakwood Collegiate Institute and the University of Toronto and married a fellow student T. Campbell Newman in 1925. T. Campbell Newman was a chemistry student who went on to be an expert in explosives and played an import role during the Second World War.

She serving as a housewife for several years, and worked with the Woman's Christian Temperance Union. She ran for school board in 1950 and was elected. In 1954 she moved to city council where she was elected to represent Ward 9. In 1956 she became the first woman elected to the powerful Board of Control. She won the most votes of the four controllers elected, and thus gained the powerful budget chief position. She again topped the polls in the 1958 election and announced her intention to run for mayor, challenging incumbent Nathan Phillips. In the 1960 mayoral election Newman placed third behind Phillips and former mayor Allan Lamport. In 1962 she ran for the Liberals in a by-election in the provincial riding of Eglinton. The riding was staunchly Tory, and while the election was close Newman lost to Progressive Conservative Leonard Mackenzie Reilly.