Black, John H. (1866-1935)
John H. Black was a lawyer based in Morden, Manitoba who was a trusted friend to and advocate for the Old Colony Mennonites in the region. Black often assisted the Old Colony with legal matters and was a point person in the Manitoba Old Colony’s effort to sell their land during their 1920s migration to Mexico.
Black was born on 15 July 1866 in Kildonan, Manitoba to John Black and Henrietta Ross. His father was a Presbyterian minister, the first to serve in Canada west of the Great Lakes. His mother was the daughter of a fur trader and his Okanagan wife. Black practiced law in Morden from 1891 until his death on 3 January 1935 with the law firm established ten years earlier by J. B. McLaren, later known as McLeod, Black, and McAuley. Black was active in the local community and served for many years as an elder and leader of the Men's Bible Class in the Presbyterian and later the United church.
Black had a good relationship with many individual Old Colony Mennonites and frequently provided legal services for them and their institutions. When the provincial government attempted to close the network of private elementary schools the Mennonites ran and force their children into English language, secular public schools, Black’s law firm “faithfully served the interests of [the] Old Colony Mennonites in [the] prolonged conflict” that ensued.[1] When the Old Colony decided to leave Manitoba and move to Mexico over the school issue, they turned to Black again to assist them with the migration.
The Old Colony hoped to sell all of their Manitoba land in a single block sale, which would allow them to redistribute resources among their community and also allow the leaders to exert social control over the emigration. However, such a sale faced many impediments (it never in fact materialized) and the Old Colony was in need of assistance. They therefore appointed Black in 1921 to be their exclusive agent to sell their land in a block sale. A sign of their trust in him was that they gave him sole authority to negotiate the price of the sales. Black worked diligently at achieving a sale for over three years, long past the point when it was clear that conditions made such a sale impossible.
Black assisted the Old Colony in other ways during this challenging time in their history. On 5 March 1924 he represented those Mennonites who had faced heavy fines for refusing to send their children to public schools before Manitoba’s Minister for Education and obtained for them a ten month reprieve from prosecution, thereby giving them some time to put their affairs in order for emigration. Black's firm also procured Certificates of Naturalization for emigrating Mennonites and assisted many individual Old Colony members with land sales when it realized that a single block sale was not forthcoming. The Manitoba Old Colony leadership also persuaded Black to take charge of the assets in their Waisenamt, which put him in regular contact for many years with Mennonites in Mexico who had outstanding accounts. When it later became apparent that the finances of the Waisenamt were irredeemably underwater, Black reportedly oversaw the bankruptcy proceedings with compassion and integrity. For many years after the emigration, Black acted as (and others perceived him as) the Mexican Old Colony Mennonites’ representative.
In 1926 Black visited the Old Colony Mennonites in Chihuahua, primarily, he wrote, in order to enjoy the intercourse of his many friends who had departed from Manitoba. When he returned he wrote a letter to the Morden Times explicitly to counter the negative view held by many of those Mennonites who had emigrated. Bruce Wiebe comments that the letter “speaks for itself and clearly reveals his appreciation for and positive relationship with the Old Colony Mennonites.”.[2] Black remained in close personal communication with the Mennonites in Mexico for the rest of his life.
See Also
Notes
Bibliography
Ens, Adolf. Subjects or Citizens? The Mennonite Experience in Canada, 1870-1925. Ottawa: University of Ottawa Press, 1994. Pp. 126-127, 183.
Lechner, Bernice et al. Morden; Mort Cheval; Pinancewaywinning; Lake Agassiz. Morden Centennial Committee, 1981. P. 154.
Werner, Hans. “Old Colony and Russlaender Land Transactions.” Preservings 45 (Fall 2022): 23-28.
Werner, Hans. "Restoring the Commons: Land Deals and the Migration of Manitoba Mennonites to Mexico in the 1920s." Agricultural History 87, no. 4 (Fall 2013): 452-472.
Wiebe, Bruce. “A Letter from John Henry Black.” Preservings 28 (2008): 10-13.
Wiebe, Bruce. “The Move to Mexico: The Sale of Three West Reserve Villages.” Preservings (2010): 35-46.
| Author(s) | Gerald Ens |
|---|---|
| Date Published | 2025 |
Cite This Article
MLA style
Ens, Gerald. "Black, John H. (1866-1935)." Global Anabaptist Mennonite Encyclopedia Online. 2025. Web. 19 Jan 2026. https://gameo.org/index.php?title=Black,_John_H._(1866-1935)&oldid=180498.
APA style
Ens, Gerald. (2025). Black, John H. (1866-1935). Global Anabaptist Mennonite Encyclopedia Online. Retrieved 19 January 2026, from https://gameo.org/index.php?title=Black,_John_H._(1866-1935)&oldid=180498.
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