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John Robert Cooke

Canadian politician

Correspondence, annotated notebooks and portrait silhouettes prepared for research
People and ideasInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionMar 29, 2026
Entity authorityQ6255095 ↗
Source-derived summary

John Robert Cooke (September 1, 1866 – August 14, 1934) was a political figure in Ontario. He represented Hastings North in the Legislative Assembly of Ontario from 1911 to 1934 as a Conservative member.

He was born in Rawdon township in 1866, the son of James Cooke, and was educated there. In 1888, Cooke married Emma Wickens. He was named to the Ontario Hydro Electric Power Commission in 1923, and served as chairman of the commission from 1931 to 1934. Cooke served in the province's Executive Council as a minister without portfolio from 1923 to 1930

He died of injuries sustained after suffering a heart attack while driving and crashing in August 1934.

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “John Robert Cooke” is canadian politician. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through John, Robert and Cooke, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewA productive starting point for separating a subject’s documented career from later reputation and commemoration. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1866, 1934, 1911, 1888—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1866-09-01. For this dossier, John, Robert and Cooke is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “canadian politician” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

The entry’s evidential value lies in the named roles, institutions and publications that can be tested against primary documentation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Mar 29, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q6255095. 2 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 2 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1866, 1934, 1911 and 1888.

Critical limits

Public reputation and documentary evidence do not always develop together; absence from a summary is not evidence of historical absence. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Read biographical claims against dates, named institutions and the cited references. Distinguish a subject’s later reputation from evidence produced during their lifetime.

Best used for
  • Establishing names and roles
  • Building a first chronology
  • Locating cited institutions
Verify next

Personal papers, civil or court records, institutional files and the scholarship cited by the source.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “John Robert Cooke”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow John Robert Cooke primary sources, John Robert Cooke archive and John research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “John Robert Cooke”?
  2. Which primary records establish identity, chronology and institutional ties?
  3. How has the subject’s reputation changed across later accounts?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “John Robert Cooke” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.