Introduction

The Commander. His title in the naval service has been used as the nickname for Harry Steele in the years since, as he built what became Newfoundland Capital Corporation from just an idea into the successful business it became. Although Harry became an entrepreneur relatively late in life, once he started on his quest, he made a success of himself in a hurry. In fact, Joey Smallwood, the first premier of Newfoundland and Labrador, once said of Harry Steele, “I never knew anyone to come so far so fast.”

Harry Steele’s start was as modest as they get. He was born in 1929 in Musgrave Harbour, an outport on Newfoundland’s Atlantic coast. It is a place with one of the most beautiful beaches in all of Newfoundland, an out-of-the-way place sought after by tourists today, but when Harry was a child the remoteness of the village meant that the only way in was by boat. Times were rough in the 1930s, and the community lived on fishing and work in the woods. The school there had two rooms, one upstairs and one downstairs, and taught everything from the first grade through to the last year of high school.

When Harry left his hometown, he walked out through the bush that surrounded the village to the railway tracks that he picked up in the nearby town of Lewisporte. Not only was there no road into his village, there was no direct rail line to Musgrave Harbour either.

Harry’s first job outside Musgrave Harbour involved digging ditches and performing other manual labour on the roads in Deer Lake in western Newfoundland. Then Joey Smallwood came to the rescue. The premier of Newfoundland created a scholarship program for Newfoundlanders who wanted to be teachers. Harry seized the opportunity and enrolled in Memorial University. He also joined the University Naval Training Division (a program set up by the Royal Canadian Navy to develop officers for the navy, which was short of men during the war). He needed both scholarships to survive. Although he did graduate from the teacher training program, Harry never did teach school. Instead, he joined the Royal Canadian Navy as a junior officer.

By the time he entered the navy full-time, Harry was married to Catherine Thornhill, an educated woman who taught music in St. John’s. The young married couple went to England, where Harry trained as a communications specialist at a Royal Navy school. He learned about codes and radio frequencies, the foundations of military intelligence. He also learned about secrecy: the importance of keeping secret the knowledge he had of military intelligence operations. Harry Steele entered the world of the Cold War, where a critical job of the Royal Canadian Navy was to listen to the Russianlanguage transmissions of the Soviet fleet in the North Atlantic. Harry took secrecy seriously. To this day he will not speak of his work during that time except to say, “I read other people’s mail.”

He spent time at sea, on a variety of warships: a large cruiser, an aircraft carrier, frigates, and other types of vessels. He travelled the world, taking in many sights and different cultures. He saw poverty in West Africa and the opulence of diplomatic life in Washington, D.C., where he worked in naval intelligence.

Harry’s last posting with the Royal Canadian Navy was as commander of the base at Gander, Newfoundland, where he served for four and half years. Gander was a key NATO base during the Cold War — among other things, the base there kept an eye on submarine traffic in the North Atlantic and intercepted and deciphered radio messages from the Russian vessels in the nearby ocean.

Around this time, Harry became fascinated with the stock market, and he began to make investments, pooling knowledge and money with his brother-in-law Roland Thornhill. He was an astute student of markets, a natural. And his wife, Catherine, had a sharp eye for real estate. She discovered The Albatross Hotel in Gander and, together with Harry, bought it and made a success of it. It is the foundation of Steele Hotels today.

Harry left the navy in 1974, riled by the amalgamation of Canada’s armed forces by Lester Pearson’s Liberal government — an action that resulted in the loss of many military traditions. The end of Harry’s military career resulted in the beginning of a new chapter in his life.

Harry began his civilian career working for Eastern Provincial Airways (EPA). The Newfoundland-based airline had its operations and head office in Gander, so Harry was already familiar with its people and operations. He worked only briefly at the airline, however, leaving after a year. His decision to depart seemed a good one, since EPA was on the ropes. Shortly thereafter, though, he had a change of heart about the airline. He learned that the Crosbie family, the owners of the company, was looking for a way out. The airline’s stock price was in the basement and the Crosbies were looking to cut their losses. Harry had been picking up a sizeable number of shares since he joined the company, and at this point, he decided that he could turn the airline around. So, Harry mortgaged everything he and Catherine had and bought the airline. He was forty-nine years old.

“EPA Changes Hands … But It’s Still a Newfoundlander” screamed the St. John’s Daily News headline on November 22, 1978, when Harry bought the airline.

He ran the airline the same way Harry Steele, naval commander, would run a ship or a military base: keeping operations tight. To make the company profitable, it was crucial that costs be cut. The firm’s team found a way to reduce the fuel burn of EPA’s Boeing 737s by 10 percent, saving a million and a half dollars a year.

The company’s other cost-cutting measures were not so obvious. One example: Eastern Provincial Airways was the first airline in Canada to become non-smoking. This change resulted in a healthier atmosphere during flights, but it also meant that the ashtrays didn’t need to be cleaned after short hops. Under The Commander, EPA had the lowest cost structure in Canada.

Increasing revenue while reducing costs was a struggle, and Harry Steele fought some fierce battles in his efforts to accomplish both. The big airlines, Air Canada and CP Air, blocked his plans to expand to Montreal and Toronto; he won. Unions blocked his drive for reasonable hours and lower costs. He won that fight too.

Eventually, CP Air bought Eastern Provincial. That deal provided the capital for the growth of Newfoundland Capital Corporation (NCC), a company that Harry had established to Clarke Transport; Halterm, a company with container operations in the port of Halifax; a trucking company; a firm providing ferry service on the St. Lawrence River; and Oceanex, a shipping company serving ports from Montreal to St. John’s and Halifax. NCC had operations on land, at sea, and in the air. On top of all that, Harry Steele personally owned Universal Helicopters, hotels in Gander, and fishing camps in Newfoundland and Labrador. Harry’s friend and business associate Seymour Schulich says Harry fished for business as much as he did for salmon.

Harry Steele’s deep connections to corporate Canada meant Newfoundland Capital had a blue ribbon board of directors. Harry’s business acumen was admired and sought across the country, and he joined many boards, including those of PWA (Pacific Western Airlines), Dundee Bancorp, Fishery Products International, and his dear friend Craig Dobbin’s CHC (Canadian Helicopter Corporation).

Along the way, Harry invested in newspapers, magazines, and radio stations. In the 1990s there was a total re-think and re-organization of NCC. Clarke Transport, Halterm, Oceanex, and all the related transportation businesses were sold. The newspapers and magazines went too. That left a pure media play, 101 radio stations across Canada. Newcap Radio was sold in 2018.

On April 29, 1992, then governor general Ray Hnatyshyn invested Harry Steele as a member of the Order of Canada. In his comments during the ceremony, Hnatyshyn remarked: “Although he remains modest about his career achievements, this Newfoundlander had a distinguished naval career before becoming one of the leading entrepreneurs in the Maritimes. He is a generous employer and community-minded citizen whose support of various local causes in the areas of education, health care and the arts is well-known.”

Along with his Order of Canada, Harry has received many other awards, including alumni of the year at Memorial University.

Joey Smallwood was right about Harry Steele. He came so far so fast. He did it through hard work and the discipline that he learned as a young man in Musgrave Harbour and as an officer in the Royal Canadian Navy. He is one of Newfoundland’s most celebrated entrepreneurs and a man who has given back much to the place where he was born.