View source for Karl Kenneth Homuth

{{Short description|Canadian politician and manufacturer}}
{{Use Canadian English|date=January 2023}}
{{more citations needed|date=May 2018}}
[[File:Karl Homuth at Long Branch Small Arms plant.jpg|thumb|right|Homuth firing a gun on the range of the Small Arms plant in [[Long Branch, Toronto|Long Branch]], 1942]]

'''Karl Kenneth Homuth''' (December 12, 1893 &ndash; March 15, 1951) was a [[Canadian]] manufacturer and political figure in [[Ontario]].<ref name="parl">{{Canadian Parliament links|ID=12421|nolist=yes}}</ref>

He was born in [[Preston, Ontario]],<ref name="parl"/> the son of Otto Homuth and Charlotte McDowell,<ref name="johnson">{{cite book |title=The Canadian Directory of Parliament 1867-1967 |last=Johnson |first=J.K. |year=1968 |publisher=Public Archives of Canada}}</ref> and was educated there and in [[Galt, Ontario|Galt]]. He joined [[George Pattinson]]'s textile manufacturing company in 1910. In 1917, he left that firm to work in his father's company, taking over its operation in 1928 after his father's death.<ref name="fame"/> In 1914, he married Minnie A. Rahn.<ref name="johnson"/> Homuth served on the town council for Preston from 1917 to 1919.<ref name="fame">[http://www.city.cambridge.on.ca/cs_pubaccess/hall_of_fame.php?aid=78&cpid=0&scpid=0&did=0&sid=0&ssid=0&tp=0&grid=0 Hall of Fame, City of Cambridge]</ref>  He died of complications of [[lung cancer]] in his Ottawa home on March 15, 1951.<ref name="johnson"/>

Homuth's father was a Liberal and Karl defied him by running as a [[Labour candidates and parties in Canada|Labour candidate]] in the [[1919 Ontario general election|1919 provincial election]], was elected as the Member for [[Waterloo South]] and supported the [[United Farmers of Ontario]]-Labour government of [[E.C. Drury]]. He was one of the few Labour MLAs who survived the [[1923 Ontario general election|1923 provincial election]] that routed Drury's government and was the only Labour MLA returned in the [[1926 Ontario general election|1926 provincial election]] in which he broke with his colleagues in what by then was known as the Progressive Party over the issue of [[wikt:temperance|temperance]].

Homuth supported Conservative Premier [[George Howard Ferguson]]'s proposal to liberalise Ontario's [[prohibition]] laws during the 1926 election in which liquor policy was the principal issue (the Conservatives consequently did not run a candidate against him) and continued to support Ferguson's government after the election ultimately joining the Tories and successfully running for re-election as a Conservative in the [[1929 Ontario general election|1929 provincial election]] before resigning in 1930 to unsuccessfully seek the federal seat of [[Waterloo North]] for the federal Conservatives. He went on to sit in [[House of Commons of Canada]] from 1938 to 1951 representing Waterloo South for the [[Conservative Party of Canada (historical)|Conservative Party of Canada]], then [[National Government (Canada)|National Government]] and finally [[Progressive Conservative Party of Canada|Progressive Conservative]] member.

Homuth died in office in 1951. The ensuing [[by-election]] returned [[Howie Meeker]], a then-active [[National Hockey League]] player who would go on to have notable careers as a coach, manager and broadcaster.

==Electoral record==
{{1949 Canadian federal election/Waterloo South}}
{{1945 Canadian federal election/Waterloo South}}
{{1940 Canadian federal election/Waterloo South}}
{{1938 Canadian federal by-elections/Waterloo South}}

== References ==
* {{Ontario MPP biography|id=karl-kenneth-homuth}}
{{reflist}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Homuth, Karl Kenneth}}
[[Category:1893 births]]
[[Category:1951 deaths]]
[[Category:Progressive Conservative Party of Canada MPs]]
[[Category:United Farmers of Ontario MLAs]]
[[Category:People from the Regional Municipality of Waterloo]]
[[Category:20th-century members of the Legislative Assembly of Ontario]]
[[Category:Members of the House of Commons of Canada from Ontario]]
[[Category:20th-century members of the House of Commons of Canada]]