Lt. Dwight E. Dolan

It’s sometimes a bit of a struggle to locate information on the many Canadian combat photographers who served during WWII, but just sometimes information is provided by a kind visitor to the website.

Such was the case during my search for additional information regarding Lt. Dwight E. (Joe) Dolan, a still combat photographer for the Canadian Army Film Unit (CFPU). Help arrived in the form of an email from André Rivest, a ‘Graphiste journaliste’ for La Presse, a French-language daily newspaper published in Montreal;

“Dwight E. Dolan was also the official photographer of the Montreal Royals, a baseball team in the International League where Jackie Robinson played. I don’t know much about Dolan except that he was the official press photographer of the Montreal Royals of the International baseball league in the fifties. He had done a LOT of photos of the Royals. He was there late forties and beginning of fifties. He had been replaced by the famous David Bier in the second half of this decade.”

Emboldened by this little tidbit of information, I continued to dig a little bit deeper into what more I could find regarding Lt. Dolan, and the more I dug…the more surprised I became by what I found…

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Dwight Dolan was born into a very large family. His father, Lawrence James Dolan was born in Hartford Conneticut, in 1873, and married Marion Helen Dolan (Lynch), of Montreal, who gave birth to 12 children.¹https://www.geni.com/people/Lawrence-Dolan/6000000051870884050. See also, The Ottawa Citizen, Weekend Magazine, VOL. 11, No. 39, Saturday, September 30th, 1961.

Born in Montreal on April 8th, 1915, Dwight Dolan would make his schools honours list on December 24th, 1930.²THE GAZETTE, MONTREAL, WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 24, 1930, page 7. Dwight would become the only photographer of his 11 brothers and sisters.³The Ottawa Citizen, Weekend Magazine, VOL. 11, No. 39, Saturday, September 30th, 1961. His brother Robert Emmett Dolan would go on to Hollywood to write and produce Bob Hope and Bing Crosby movies.⁴EN VILLE  – Montreal, February 1, 1964, From the Heart by Mike Gutwillig.

Seven years later, at the age of 22, Dwight Dolan would be studying at the University of Florida,⁵THE GAZETTE, SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 1, 1941 (page 21) and listed as a staff photographer for two local newspapers; The Orlando Reporter-Star, ⁶The Reporter-Star, March 17 (EVE ED.), April 19, 1937.and The Orlando Sunday-Sentinel-Star.⁷The Sunday-Sentinel-Star, April 18, 25th, and March 28, 1937. Dolan would be hired before he had ever sold a picture — the editor having been im­pressed by some snapshots he had taken with a $3 camera.⁸The Ottawa Citizen, Weekend Magazine, VOL. 11, No. 39, Saturday, September 30th, 1961.

On October 4th, 1940, The Montreal Daily Star would announce the engagement of Miss Gaby Boisvert, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Boisvert, to Mr. Dwight E. Dolan, son of Mr. and Mrs. Lawrence J. Dolan.⁹The Montreal Daily Star, Friday, October 4th, 1940

In 1941, Dwight Dolan would enlist in the Canadian Army and join one of his brothers, John Dolan, as commissioned officers in the U.S. and Canadian Armies;

“Brothers Join Different Armies – The commissioning in the United States Army last week of second Lieut. John Dolan of 3762 St. Andre street, Montreal, makes two brothers who are serving as commissioned officers in the U.S. and Canadian Armies. Lieutenant Dolan’s brother is Lieut. Dwight Dolan of 3823 Berri street, a photographic officer on the General List of the Canadian Army, who is now under orders for overseas duty. The U.S. Army Dolan graduated at Army Administration Officer Candidate School No. 3 at Gainesville, Fla., March 10, and has been posted to Headquarters of the 1st Service Command at Boston. He is now home on leave. Lieut. Dwight Dolan, who joined the Canadian Army in 1941, Qualified for his Canadian commission at Gordon Head, B.C., last summer.”¹⁰The Montreal Daily Star, Monday, March 15th, 1943.

But before Dwight would become further engrained as a ‘famous Montreal Photographer’,¹¹EN VILLE  – Montreal, February 1, 1964, From the Heart by Mike Gutwillig. Public Relations documents would reveal that Lt. Dwight E. Dolan, would be called overseas to fill the need for more French Canadian personnel within the Canadian Army Public Relations Group;

“MESSAGE FORM: TO DEFENSOR – FROM CANMILITARY – DATE 2 AUG 43 PARA II. DESIRABILITY FRENCH CANADIAN PUBLICITY APPRECIATED. FOLLOWING STEPS ALREADY TAKEN TO OBTAIN: CAPTAIN PLACIDE LABELLE FRENCH CANADIAN PRO, LIEUT D E DOLAN FRENCH SPEAKING PHOTOGRAPHER, AND MAURICE DESJARDINS C P FRENCH CANADIAN REPORTER DESPATCHED U K TO MEDITERRANEAN THEATRE BEPORE OPERATION BEGAN. DOLAN IN SICILY WITH TANK BRIGADE.“¹²Public Relations files, Library & Archives Canada

From what I have been able to gather from the Canadian Public Relations files, only the following personnel were officially identified as bilingual; Capt. Placide Labelle, PR Officer; combat stills photographers; Lt. J.E. DeGuire, and Lt. D.E. Dolan. CP (Canadian Press) War Correspondents; Bill Stewart, and Doug Amaron, and from the CBC; Marcel Ouimet, and Maurice Desjardins.

“FAMEUX photographe – (translated by the author from the original French) Lieutenant DWIGHT DOLAN, French-Canadian photographer formerly attached to the “Star”, now at the Italian front with the Mt-Royal Fusiliers, had the honour of a long interview with the famous English General Sir BERNARD MONTGOMERY, Chief of the eighth army. The English General offers to come and visit Canada after the war. Lieutenant Dolan’s family, his young son and Mrs. Dolan (nee Gabrielle Boisvert) reside in Montreal.“¹³LA PATRIE, SAMEDI 30 OCTOBRE 1943, page 18

On July 13, 1943, Lt. Dolan, would take part in the Sicily landings with the First Canadian Tank Brigade, along with;

PR Officer Capt. H.A Hyman; War Correspondents, Mr. W.A Wilson, and Mr. L.S.B. Shapiro; Cameraman, Sgt. Stollery (cine), and Pte. L/ Baskier (driver).¹⁴Public Relations files, Library & Archives Canada

“Only Dolan arrived in Sicily during active combat, accompanying the First Canadian Tank Brigade and, since the formation was held in reserve, he produced little for publication. The brigade contained no Francophone regiment, although the Three Rivers Regiment operated as “functionally bilingual;” the Royal Twenty Second, “the Vandoos,” with the First Division, was the only Francophone regiment in Sicily.“¹⁵The Information Front: The Canadian Army, Public Relations, and War News during the Second World War, by Timothy John Balzer, University of Victoria. A copy for Mr. Balzer’s dissertation can downloaded as a PDF HERE.

In the gallery below, I have highlighted some of the photographs taken by Lieut. Dwight E. Dolan, located online within the Canadian Army Numerical Albums.

All 110 Canadian Army Numerical Albums are now available online to the general public. The series of albums consist of contact sheets printed from the original b&w negatives, of Canadian Army photographs shot during World War II, 1941-1946. For many years I had been aware of these albums while working as a Film Conservator at Library & Archives Canada (LAC). At the time, these albums were some of the most in demand finding aids for WWII images stored at LAC. Known to staff as the ‘pizza boxes’, the Army numerical albums were stored in acid free custom made containers. To learn more about the Albums, please visit my post, HERE.

In the following series of three negatives below, Lt. Dolan takes a couple of photographs of his two Film Unit lensemen; Sgts. Alan Grayston (black beret) and Jack Stollery (side cap). Not to be excluded, Lt. Dolan is caught in front of his own camera, (far left image), while Sgt. Grayston, although not credited, takes the shot of Lt. Dolan, wearing no hat, posing alongside movie cameraman, Sgt. Jack Stollery. On his right leg, Lt. Dolan rests Sgt. Grayston’s Bell & Howell, 35mm Eyemo cine camera, presumably until he gets his own Graflex Speed Graphic still camera back in return.

Click on the image to enlarge…

In the gallery below, are photographs shot by Lt. Dolan, also part of Army Numerical Album 62 (shown here using screen grabs of the album being accessed on the LAC website). The page reveals images taken of the damage to the Catania Aerodrome, on the eastern port in Sicily. The first image in the gallery reveals a group of images of damaged airplanes, followed by two examples of how a couple of these images were quickly cleared by censors and ‘radiophotoed’ back to HQ, to be picked up by interested newspaper publishers in the U.S. In many cases during the war, photographic images were not properly credited to the photographer, or branch of the Canadian Armed Forces. In each of these cases, the newspaper publisher credits the Canadian Army Film Unit, but not the photographer.

In this series of images, also from Album No. 62, is a set of Lt. Dolan photos, featuring Sgt. Russell McPhee, from the Pointe-Saint-Charles neighbourhood of Montreal;

Caption: “Sgt. Russell McPhee, 39, of Macdaline St., Point St. Charles, Montreal, P.Q., is shown in these pictures. This is the chap who was responsible for building a bridge under continuous shellfire, mortar fire and machine gun fire at Leonforte. It was the building of this bridge that enabled Canadians to capture the town. McPhee has been recommended for the Military Medal. He Is a member of 3 Fd Coy RCE. On this roll are snaps of him being interviewed by (Canadian War Correspondents) Shapiro and Munro. The balance are snaps of Sgt. McPhee with Gen. Montgomery and Gen. Simmonds, taken on the occasion of one of Montgomery’s frequent visits.” From Army Numerical Album 62, page 8.  (Photographer No. 3, Roll 39, Lieut. Dolan. Cdns in Sicily, 3 Aug, 43).

Later that year, in October, 1943, Sgt. Stollery, and Lieut. Dolan, on one of their assignments, would stumble across a jeep trailer which had been abandoned on the roadside by the British;

“Yesterday when Joe Dolan and Sgt. Stollery came over here, they brought a trailer for us to use here (PR Camp), it is a British made trailer, and a perfect one for the geep(sp), they took it away from some Italians who were using it. Evidently the British had just left it by the road side, anyway we now have a perfect trailer, and will it ever come in handy…we’ll now be able to keep all our film stock etc. right with us, and not have to worry about getting it on a truck every time there is a move.”¹⁶Public Relations files, Library & Archives Canada

By January of 1944, Lt. Dolan would arrive for a period of time in Algiers, before being sent back to Italy,

“Public Relations War Diary, January 1944 – Lieut. Dwight E. Dolan, Film and Photo Section, arrived by sea from BIZERTE after three months duty with Canadian Public Relations at AFHQ (Allied Force Headquarters), ALGIERS.”¹⁷Public Relations files, Library & Archives Canada

On February 8th, 1944, Lieut. Dolan and Sgt. Andersen of the Film & Photo Section would arrive from San Vito, working on a hospital story…along with them came tragic news;

“Lt. Rowe killed, Lt. McDougall and Pvt King slightly wounded…These were the first battle casualties of Canadian Public Relations in this war. Lieut. Rowe and Lieut. McDougall were two of the most skilled photographers, the former still, the latter cine, in the Canadian Army.”¹⁸Public Relations files, Library & Archives Canada

Soon after, in March, 1944, Lt. Dolan, would return to London,

“TO: A.D.P.R. / C.M.H.Q. – Lieut.D.E.Dolan has returned to this country and is being despatched to Canada immediately. Lieut. J.H. Smith is expected to arrive in U.K. Shortly. Replacements for these officers will be proceeding to Italy in the very near future. The reason for the recall of these two photographic officers was to provide a nucleus of experienced personnel for No.2 CFPU. Dolan’s despatch to Canada means that there will only be one experienced officer available. Signed (J.E.R. McDougall) Capt., Cdn Film and Photo Section, P.R. Services.“¹⁹Public Relations files, Library & Archives Canada

Prior to shipping out, Lt. Dolan would be instructed by Capt. J.E.R. McDougall, Officer Commanding for the Canadian Film & Photo Section, to turn over all his photographic equipment before leaving London for Canada. His list of ‘battle’ equipment would include; a Speed Graphic ; Leica ; Super Ikonta ; AND a Rolleiflex film camera.²⁰Public Relations files, Library & Archives Canada

“Canadian Troops “Smashers” – Two sergeants are back in the Dominion after long service over­seas and they expect to be called on to do their part in the loan. They are Sgt. Paul Belley of Montmagny, Que., a member of the famous “Van Doos”—the Royal 22nd Regt.—Who fought in Sicily and Italy, and Sgt. C. M. Padget of Toronto, a 48th High­lander who was detached to serve as a photographic darkroom expert in C.M.H.Q.. Britain. They were accompanied by Lieut. Joe Dolan of Montreal, a photographer with the Canadian army film unit who pictured the war in Sicily and Italy.”²¹Canadian Troops “Smashers” Says Wife On Arrival, by The Canadian Press, Ottawa Citizen, April 4th, 1944.

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Now back on ‘civvie street’, Mr. Dolan, would waste little time re-establishing himself at his photography business in Montreal, and thanks to the information from André Rivest of La Presse, it’s now known that Mr. Dolan had taken on the job as the official photographer for the Montreal Royals baseball team.

By 1949, Mr. Dolan, would also continue to ply his trade as a newspaper photographer. A photo credit for a shot taken by Dwight E. Dolan of Robert A. Bryce, newly elected president of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, would make the Toronto Daily Star²²The Toronto Daily Star, Thurday, October 27th, 1949, page 16.

In a strange incident earlier that year, Mr. Dolan would be out with his photography class of 11 students and stop in front of Notre Dame, on Place D’Armes. After instructing the students to pose for an informal picture, he asked if any of them had something to read…

“One student had pulled out the magazine and was reading it when a constable came on the scene, looked at the magazine and told the group ‘follow me.’ They followed him to the station. No questions were asked and no reason given for the detention. After some minutes their names and addresses were taken and they were told they were free to leave. None of the policemen on duty could explain the action. The group was not booked and no charges of any kind were even intimated.”²³The Gazette, Montreal, Wednesday, April 27, 1949.

It would be revealed months later, that they were taken in because one of the students had been reading from a copy of the New Republic.²⁴The Daily Sun-Times, Owen Sound, Ontario, Thursday, June 16, 1949. Given the times, it’s possible the constable saw the student and the magazine in a totally different light than that of a photographer, who was simply looking for a prop to help compose a group picture.

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Still actively searching for more information on Dolan’s short stint as official photographer for the Montreal Royals baseball team, I tried in vain to see if I could possibly locate an image of Jackie Robinson that might have been shot by Dolan.

I searched the internet, and scoured through a lot of images of photos, but many of them either did not have a photo stamp credit on the back of the print, or failed to credit the photographer altogether. It also could be that by this time, photographer, Daivd Bier, would have taken over the duties with the ball-club as the official photographer. Maybe someone reading this would come across one?

Nearly ready to abandon that search, I would come across a website using the search terms, “dolan montreal royals”, and in the results I came across the ‘X’ account (formerly known as Twitter) for Weingarten’s Vintage;

“Ck out this ultra rare 1947 Montreal Royals pre-rookie Roy Campanella Type 1 #photo – the image, taken by Dwight Dolan was used for his rookie card.” (Click on the images below to enlarge)

Photos courtesy – Weingarten’s Vintage @weingartensvint Follow Type 1 photos: An expert and collector of original photography with a focus in, but not limited to, sports seeking to help promote the hobby.

This led me to run an online image search for ,“roy campanella montreal royals”, that led me to the Heritage Auctions website, which revealed a listing for the Campanella rookie card, crediting Dwight E. Dolan, and also matched the baseball card from Weingartens Vintage.

Heritage Auctions required a sign-in account before I would be allowed to see that the card sold for $3,840.00 US, on Feb 25, 2018. It was then sold again on Aug 30, 2020, for $6600.00 US, with the owner now accepting any future bids on the card for $17,000 US or more! Mr. Dolan would have been very surprised.

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In what seemed like a never-ending search for anything on Dolan, I eventually stumbled across several references of images crediting Dwight Dolan as photographer. A few of them are listed below, with some surprising finds…

THE MONTREAL DAILY STAR, AUGUST 9, 1950, PAGE 26;

THE MONTREAL DAILY STAR, AUGUST 21 1950, PAGE 29;

“Shooting” Ol’ Satch – Dwight Dolan, who took some pictures of the colored teams yesterday at the Stadium, said that he found Satchel Paige one of the most polite and obliging athletic figures he ever photoed…The Satchel made no wise-cracks said little and proved to be very friendly…”The greater they are, the grander they are,” chorused the cameramen.”

LE PETIT JOURNAL, 30 MARS 1952, PAGE 83;

“Here is one of the first photos we received from Vero Beach. From left to right, Bill Hunter, Jim Pendleton, Forrest Jacobs, Walter Fiala, Jim Gilliam and Rocky Nelson. All are infield players whose ambition is to be part of the regular lineup of the Royals, who open their season on April 16 in Syracuse. — (Photo Dwight Dolan)” (caption translated by the author)

THE OWEN SOUND SUN-TIMES, AUGUST 31, 1955;

Many of Dwight Dolan’s photographs would also be featured in the WEEKEND Magazine²⁵SEE: WEEKEND Magazine Vol. 6, No.2, The Montreal Star January 14, 1956, — WEEKEND Magazine Vol. 6, No.9, The Ottawa Citizen, March 3, 1956,– WEEKEND Magazine Vol. 7, No. 10, The Ottawa Magazine, March 9, 1957,– WEEKEND Magazine Vol. 8 No. 26, The Ottawa Citizen, June 28, 1958,– WEEKEND Magazine Vol. 10 No. 10, The Montreal Star, March 5, 1960,– WEEKEND Magazine No. 15, The Ottawa Citizen, April 11, 1964. Weekend was a long-running Canadian magazine and newspaper supplement. The Montreal Standard was founded in 1905 as a weekly newspaper and was purchased by the Montreal Star in 1925. In 1951 the Standard was relaunched in magazine format as Weekend Picture Magazine serving as a newspaper supplement for the Montreal Star and eight other local newspapers across Canada.^[1] Eventually shortening its name to Weekend, the magazine, printed using the rotogravure process,^[1] included features writing, cultural and entertainment reporting, cartoons by Doug Wright, colour advertising and photographs and recipes among other items….In 1959 a French-language edition, Perspectives, was launched.^[3] – Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weekend_(magazine) For this post, I selected two WEEKEND Magazine examples of some of the famous personages to sit, or in one case, ‘skate’ in front of Dwight Dolan’s camera…

WEEKEND MAGAZINE, VOL. 9, NO. 20, THE MONTREAL STAR, MAY 16, 1959;

WEEKEND MAGAZINE, VOL. 9, NO. 37, THE VANCOUVER SUN, SEPT. 12, 1959;

Although I did not locate this next photo within any of the Weekend Magazine issues, I simply had to include this team photograph shot by Dwight Dolan of his home-town Montreal Canadiens for the 1955-56 season, complete with his stamp on the back of the print. For more information click on the photo to go to the Classic Auctions website…

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At this stage in his career, Mr. Dolan would be riding the crest of his successful photography business in Montreal, and by now had established himself as one of the most pre-eminent photographers in Canada and around the world. Mr. Dolan, would attend PHOTOKINA 1960, ‘a trade fair held in Europe for the photographic and imaging industries‘.

“The exhibition would feature a special tour held by Lufthansa, and escorted by photographer Dwight Dolan, from Montreal, Sept. 24 for 15 days and includes visits to other German cities.” ²⁹The Financial Post, AUG 20, 1960, page 12

Mr. Dolan would also be elected for membership “…in the exclusive American Society of Magazine Photographers,” ³⁰The Gazette, April 5, 1960, page 4. Only the third Canadian to do so at the time.

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In the next couple of years, Mr. Dolan would be offered two amazing, once in a lifetime opportunities; to travel to Africa with Cardinal Paul-Emile Léger, (featured in many of the Weekend magazines supplements); and as Head of the Photography Division for Expo ’67.³¹https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expo_67

“Un Compagnon De Voyage Peu Ordinaire Le Cardinal Paul-Emile Leger – An Unusual Travel Companion Cardinal Paul-Emile Leger

Photographer DWIGHT DOLAN speaks to MICHELINE STOEK (excerpt)

Mr. Dwight Dolan, coordinator of photography at the Exposition ’67 company, is one of the most eminent photographers in the metropolis. For a long time he was the official photographer in Montreal for Time, Life and Fortune magazines. He ran his own photography business, which he abandoned last December (1963) to accept the important position he was given offered him at the Expo. Before assuming his new role, he accompanied Cardinal Leger to Africa, where he produced an excellent color photographic report for the Star magazine section and the Perspectives weekly supplement.” ³²En Ville – The Business Family Paper, 19 September 1964. (translated by author for this article)

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“Expo 67: The Biggest Photo Job – 155,000 Pictures In ’65 –And More This Year by Sandra Dolan.

(excerpt) The Canadian Corporation for the 1967 World Exhibition needs hundreds of photographs daily — pictures for exhibitors wanting to see how work on their pavilions Is progressing; pictures for the many Expo ambassadors who have fanned out around the world to publicize the fair, pictures for newspapers, magazines and television stations in the 70 nations that are to take part in Expo; and pictures for Canadian Government em­bassies, consulates and tourist bureaus in foreign lands.

As Dwight Dolan, the Expo corporation’s co-ordinator of photography says: ‘’It’s the biggest damn picture business you’ve ever seen.’’

On site, the whole operation is held together by Mr Dolan, a veteran of close to three decades of professional pho­tography in Montreal, and his assistant, Pat Landry, work­ing within the framework of Expo’s Photo Centre.

Their job is defined as “to determine, plan and supervise the photographic needs of the corporation,” and “to control the photographic budget of all branches of the corporation.”

The end results of their work — the photographs and film — are distributed through Expo’s Public Rela­tions Department with which the Photo Centre works in close co-operation.

But when these visiting cameramen do take their pic­tures, it’s up to Messrs. Dolan and Landry to help them to get the kind of photos they want.

Another Integral part of the Expo Photo Centre is a pro­jection service. Four men make slides from the pictures and, in co-operation with the corporation’s Speakers’ Bureau, arrange the slides and film necessary to tell the story of Expo to audiences of all kinds and all sizes.

The photographers who work on the Expo contract seem to agree. They’re enjoy­ing the work as such, and then there’s the added satis­faction of knowing that their pictures are being seen all around the world.

Their pictures will be the ones you’ll see on Expo post­cards and other souvenirs and they’re the one being sent out to all corners of the world every day as the story of the Canadian world fair is told in pictures as well as words.”³³The Gazette, Friday, September 30, 1966, General News, page 8.

“Of course, it’s an exhaust­ing job,” Mr. Dolan says. “But show me a more challenging job in photography, a job which takes in the whole aspect of photography the way that this one does.”

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Mr. Dwight Dolan, and his family would eventually move to Ottawa, and after what has to be an amazing career in Canadian photography, would sadly pass away on December 7th, 1996.³⁴D6 The Ottawa Citizen, Sunday, December 8,1996

Special thanks to André Rivest, of La Presse, for reaching out to me regarding Mr. Dolan’s early years as photographer for the Montreal Royal’s baseball team.

Should you have any additional information on Mr. Dolan, and his career as a professional photographer, or on any other combat photographers of the Canadian Armed Forces during WWII, please contact me at, webmaster @ canadianfilm.com.

© Dale Gervais 2023