cially necessary when applied to those years when the diary was
written by Mr. King's own hand. Much of the diary is handwritten,
but growing volume and increased pressure on time eventually forced
Mr. King to dictate his diary from day to day.

The preparation of a biography made the arrangement of material
an unavoidable and urgent task; for its bulk and variety and lack of
system inevitably restricted its usefulness. In June, 1954, the Literary
Executors (following a suggestion in Mr. King's will) signed an agree-
ment with the Government of Canada under the terms of which the
King papers were placed immediately in the custody of the Dominion
Archivist: they are to become the property of the Crown on the
twenty-fifth anniversary of Mr. King's death ( July 22, 1975). The
diary, again in accordance with Mr. King's wishes, was not included
in the transferred material. My gratitude to the staff of the Archives
for the filing and sorting of the papers is obviously enormous, and it
is even greater to those research students who have been working with
me more directly to promote the writing of the book. These have
lightened my labours beyond measure by supplying me with extensive
memoranda and comments on certain topics in Mr. Mackenzie King's
life and on numerous political, social, and economic trends which have
exerted powerful influences upon it. It is the simple truth to say that
without such able assistance this book could not have been written
nor could so generous a use of the unique material at hand have been
at all possible.

Adequate thanks to all my helpers cannot be contained in a preface,
but some acknowledgment of their very extensive labours must be
attempted. The papers generally were filed and catalogued under the
supervision of Professor F. W. Gibson, who was directly responsible
for originating the system, and he was assisted throughout by Miss
Jacqueline Côté. The dreary task of deciphering the written diary
and supervising the transfer of its extensive contents to typescript was
undertaken by Mr. Fred A. McGregor. It was a most trying assign-
ment, carefully and painstakingly performed.

The preparation of memoranda, from which a large part of the text
was prepared, was entrusted to a number of research students for
varying periods of time. The one whose contribution was the greatest,
whose memoranda ranged over the widest field, and whose part in the
preparation of the manuscript was the most extensive was again Pro-

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