Salazar Wood Carving
Wood carving of Portuguese dictator António Oliveira Salazar. Carved around the base are Salazar’s name; his years of birth and death (1889 & 1970) – also inscribed on a metal chip tacked on the back; and the author’s signature and date “G. Lebre. 1999.”
Audio caption
Date: 1999
Creator: Guilherme Francisco Lebre
Place of origin:
Toronto, Ontario
Guilherme Francisco Lebre was born into a family of farmers on March 6, 1932, in Santa Catarina da Serra, near Fátima, in central mainland Portugal. In 1956, Lebre migrated to Canada, where he arrived by plane on November 29. In February of the following year, he found his first job in an uranium mine near Elliot Lake, close to the north shore of Lake Huron in Ontario. During his first four days there, Lebre and three co-workers slept in a rented car that they left running all night in order not to freeze to death.
After 18 months, Lebre went back to Portugal to marry Maria Adelaide da Fonseca, in 1958. The couple moved to Toronto shortly after, where Lebre began working as a bike mechanic. After working in three different repair shops, he opened his own, in 1994, which was called Queen’s Bike Shop, located on 1537-A Queen St. West. After he retired in 1998, Lebre dedicated himself to carving wooden statuettes.