Mr. William E. Raney

This oral history interview with William Edgar Raney provides insights into his distinguished legal career, particularly his long tenure at Ontario Hydro where he served as General Counsel from 1967. Raney came from a prominent legal family – his grandfather William Edgar Raney Sr. was a former Attorney General of Ontario, and his father Edgar Fraser Raney practiced with Mills & Mills. The interview covers his family’s ancestral roots tracing back to French Huguenots, his childhood during the Depression, and the family’s move to Dunnville in 1939.

Raney’s career at Ontario Hydro spanned several decades and included significant responsibilities in administrative law, expropriation matters, power contracts, and major international financing activities in Europe and Japan during the early 1970s. He was involved in important projects including the St. Lawrence Power Project hearings and arbitrations in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Despite his professional success, Raney reflects on his career with mixed feelings, expressing uncertainty about whether he was truly suited for law while acknowledging his achievements and the financial security his position provided for his young family.

This description was written by AI and may contain some inaccuracies.