From: The Encyclopedia of Canada's Peoples/Bulgarians/Mariela Dakova
Early Bulgarian settlement in Canada coincided with a growing economy in Ontario and Quebec, and only a few immigrants went further west. At the beginning of the century there were perhaps fewer than a hundred Bulgarian farmers in the west. Among the first were Dimo Deleff, Carl Doncheff, John Doneff, T. Mineff, and Todor Toneff from the Shumen area in northeastern Bulgaria. After 1908 Bulgarians went west mostly as railway workers. There is hardly a railway line in Canada that Bulgarians have not worked on. Boris Baidakoff operated the first locomotive in the Powell River area, when the Michigan and Puget Sound Railway line was opened about 1908. Dimitar Stoyanoff and Veliko Evanoff were foremen for the Canadian National Railways at Hulatt, British Columbia.
Before 1939 most Bulgarians came to this country rather young and poor and became unskilled labourers on roads and railways, and in building construction, mines, factories, and mills. Many found themselves jobless during the Depression, and some returned home.
In Ontario, the Bulgarian community in Berlin (Kitchener) was formed in 1907; the biggest hotel was owned by Stefan Christoff, a Bulgarian from Tâ rnovo. In 1911 about 300 Bulgarians lived in Cochrane. In the 1920s–30s about 500 Bulgarians worked in industrial plants in Hamilton where they also set up twelve small shops and restaurants. At the same time about 200 Bulgarians resided in Welland and ran fourteen shops there. Bulgarians worked in paper manufacturing in Thorold; in 1933 their numbers there reached about 200. Small communities settled in Niagara Falls, Port Colborne, and Windsor.
The largest group settled in Toronto, from 1902. In March 1911 Toronto had just under 1,100 Bulgarians. In 1921 Naroden glas (People’s Voice) reported 200 Bulgarian families in town, living mainly on Yonge Street. In 1933 there were about 750 families and 400 singles, with the majority from Gabresh and Zhelevo near Kastoria in northern Greece and from the Tâ rnovo region of central Bulgaria. After World War II, as well as after 1989, Bulgarians from the Plovdiv, Shumen, and Sofia areas joined them.
Bulgarians in Toronto started businesses in services and trade and set up several cafeterias, which served as meeting places. Small food shops, bakeries, and restaurants were also opened. In the 1930s there were about twenty barber’s and twenty shoe-repair shops, about fifteen each of billiard rooms and tailor and dressmaking shops, two watch-repair shops, a printing shop, a photographer’s shop, a tobacco firm, a real estate office, a shipping agency, and, nearby, some poultry farms. Lambro Andreev’s eight apartment properties housed about 175 families. At the same time about 150 Bulgarians lived in Montreal, where they opened a few restaurants and some tailor shops and billiard halls.
Bulgarian craftsmen continued their work in Canada. Many barbers and shoemakers, bakers and confectioners, fur dressers and tailors, painters and photographers continued to practise their trades, as did some builders, carpenters, and glaziers. Few of the many farmers among them became farmers in Canada. Seeking immediate income, and not having money and time to invest, most settled in big cities.
The 1931 census found eighty-three Bulgarians in British Columbia, 175 in the prairies, and 142 in Quebec, but 2,235 in Ontario; 2,149 Bulgarians lived in cities of over 10,000 people, and only 512 in the country or in small towns. Among the more successful Bulgarian immigrants from this period were the priest and physician Dimitar Malinchev (Hieromonak Theophilact, later Dr D. Malin), who made a great contribution to the cultural identity of the Bulgaro-Macedonian ethnic group, and the Toronto lawyer Ivan Grudeff (John Grudeff).
During World War II and the subsequent establishment of communism in Bulgaria, many intellectuals left for Canada, slightly modifying the geographical distribution of Bulgarians in Canada. Between 1941 and 1981 some 240 settled in British Columbia, about 130 in Alberta, and 100 in Quebec, while the number reported in Ontario dropped by about 600. The professional status of the newcomers made them mobile.
Many in this second wave of immigration had secondary or university education and professional training. It became common for the second generation to earn university degrees and become doctors, lawyers, engineers, teachers, managers, and real estate agents. Many achieved professional status in Canada in the 1950s and 1960s.
The last wave of Bulgarian immigrants, most with at least high school education, was generally young – about 1,000 men and 800 women. One half of them settled in Quebec. In 1981 there were only 300 Bulgarians in Quebec; in 1991, 1,230. Some of this wave settled in Ontario, Alberta, and British Columbia.
Among the group were about a hundred artists and actors, most of whom settled in Montreal. A recent survey of over 200 families in this city showed that not less than 70 percent had completed university studies. Of those, 50 percent were engineers, architects, or specialized technicians, and 30 percent had other professions. There were also many artists, musicians, actors, and film professionals.
