This is a list of notable German Canadians .
Philip Michael Ondaatje is a Sri Lankan-born Canadian poet, fiction writer and essayist.
Imre Kertész was a Hungarian author and recipient of the 2002 Nobel Prize in Literature, "for writing that upholds the fragile experience of the individual against the barbaric arbitrariness of history". He was the first Hungarian to win the Nobel in Literature. His works deal with themes of the Holocaust, dictatorship, and personal freedom.
Cambridge is a city in the Regional Municipality of Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, located at the confluence of the Grand and Speed rivers. The city had a population of 138,479 as of the 2021 census. Along with Kitchener and Waterloo, Cambridge is one of the three core cities of Canada's tenth-largest metropolitan area.
The Regional Municipality of Waterloo is a metropolitan area of Southern Ontario, Canada. It contains the cities of Cambridge, Kitchener and Waterloo, and the townships of North Dumfries, Wellesley, Wilmot and Woolwich. Kitchener, the largest city, is the seat of government.
Sir Adam Beck was a Canadian politician and hydroelectricity advocate who founded the Hydro-Electric Power Commission of Ontario.
Comparative literature studies is an academic field dealing with the study of literature and cultural expression across linguistic, national, geographic, and disciplinary boundaries. Comparative literature "performs a role similar to that of the study of international relations but works with languages and artistic traditions, so as to understand cultures 'from the inside'". While most frequently practised with works of different languages, comparative literature may also be performed on works of the same language if the works originate from different nations or cultures in which that language is spoken.
Waterloo County was a county in Canada West in the United Province of Canada from 1853 until 1867, then in the Canadian province of Ontario from 1867 until 1973. It was the direct predecessor of the Regional Municipality of Waterloo.
German Canadians are Canadian citizens of German ancestry or Germans who emigrated to and reside in Canada. According to the 2016 census, there are 3,322,405 Canadians with full or partial German ancestry. Some immigrants came from what is today Germany, while larger numbers came from German settlements in Eastern Europe and Imperial Russia; others came from parts of the German Confederation, Austria-Hungary and Switzerland.
Péter Esterházy was a Hungarian writer. He was one of the best known Hungarian and Central European writers of his era. He was called a "leading figure of 20th century Hungarian literature", and his books were considered to be significant contributions to post-war literature.
Emanuel Otto Hahn was a German-born Canadian sculptor and coin designer. He taught and later married Elizabeth Wyn Wood. He co-founded and was the first president of the Sculptors' Society of Canada.
Jacob George Hespeler was a German-Canadian businessman. He is best known as the founder and namesake of the town Hespeler, Ontario, which since 1973 has been a neighbourhood in the amalgamated town of Cambridge, Ontario.
Jacob Gaukel Stroh was a local historian of Waterloo County, Ontario.
Ward Hamilton Bowlby was a Canadian lawyer and politician. He served as reeve of Berlin from 1865 to 1868.
William Hespeler, born Wilhelm, was a German-Canadian businessman, immigration agent, and member of the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba. He served as Speaker of the Legislature and as honorary consul of Germany to Winnipeg and the Northwest Territories. He was awarded the Order of the Red Eagle for his services to Germany.
The Berliner Journal was a German-language weekly-newspaper published in Berlin, Canada, from 1859 to 1918. The newspaper was founded by the German immigrants Friedrich Rittinger and John Motz, who operated the paper together through most of its existence until their sons – William John Motz, Herman Rittinger and John Adam Rittinger – took over the operation at the turn of the century.
Friedrich Gaukel, also known as Frederick Gaukel, was a German-Canadian farmer, distiller, and innkeeper. He was born in Württemberg in what is now the Federal Republic of Germany. He immigrated first to Pennsylvania in the United States and later to Waterloo Township in Upper Canada, now the Canadian province of Ontario. He was instrumental in the early growth and establishment of Berlin, Ontario, of which he has been described as a "prominent founder". He operated an early tavern and inn near the site of the later Walper Hotel at the corner of King Street and Queen Street in downtown Kitchener. His donation of land to build a county courthouse and jail allowed Berlin to become the seat of Waterloo County, accelerating its urban development and growth toward becoming a city.
John Adam Rittinger was a Canadian German-language-newspaper proprietor, editor and Pennsylvania-German humorist. In 1875, he and Aaron Eby purchased Walkerton, Ontario's German-language newspaper, the Walkerton Glocke. Affectionately known by locals as the "Glockemann", Rittinger was both a shrewd businessman and a popular writer. He became the paper's sole owner in 1878, renaming it Die Ontario Glocke in 1882. A staunch conservative, he used the editorial column to comment on domestic political issues, advocating for the National Policy, individual freedoms and the teaching of the German language in Ontario schools while opposing prohibition and nativism. When the Glocke amalgamated into Berlin, Ontario's Berliner Journal in 1904, he became the Journal's editor-in-chief, a position he held until his death in 1915.
John Motz was a Canadian politician, German-language newspaper proprietor, sheriff and tailor. Born near Mühlhausen in the Province of Saxony, Prussia, he immigrated to Berlin, Canada West in 1848. In 1859, he and fellow immigrant Friedrich Rittinger founded the Berliner Journal, a German-language newspaper based in Berlin. Motz served as its editor for the next forty years before retiring in 1899, becoming the honorary sheriff of Waterloo County, a position he held until his death in 1911.
Der Deutsche Canadier was a German-language weekly newspaper published in Berlin, Canada West, from 1841 to 1865. The Canadier was founded in January 1841 by Heinrich "Henry" Eby, son of Berlin's founder Benjamin Eby. It was among Upper Canada's first German-language newspapers and was the only one published in British North America from September 1841 through January 1848, during which time it was widely read across Canada.
He was born in Cornwallis Township, Nova Scotia, to a family of Germanic origin.
His paternal grandfather had emigrated from Germany to Detroit, where he had invented the first process for the mass production of gelatin pill capsules.
a refugee from Nazi Germany
His parents were ethnic German farmers who escaped from Russian-controlled Ukraine in 1911 for Canada.
His mother was Scottish and his father, a German immigrant, experienced discrimination during the First World War.