Manuscript Collection MS COLL 00785 (Downsview Offsite) - R.T Frankford Papers

Robert Timothy Stansfield Frankford was born 1 August 1939 in Nottingham England and was the son of Margaret (born Little), an English Quaker mother, and Walter, a Viennese Jewish father. He did his medical training at the University of London (England) atSt. George's Hospital Medical School. He emigrated to Canada in the late 1960s and settled in Toronto.
Best known as a champion of the right to health care and access to health care, Frankford’s concerns extended to other issues, including racism, homelessness, and inequality in all its forms. A long-time admirer of the work of Jane Jacobs, he advocated for more liveable cities, and he worked at this and other issues at many levels and in many ways. He was known for his advocacy of universal primary care registration, capitation payment for physicians, and working as a primary care doctor in a team together with other health care professionals.
Frankford was elected as an MPP for Scarborough East as a member of the New Democratic Party from 1990 to 1995. He also worked for his country, his province, his city, his community, his neighbourhood and his profession by volunteering his time to be a member of committees, councils, boards, and non-governmental organizations with missions focused on the good works in which he believed.
When he left the Ontario Legislature, he worked for three years as Attending Physician at Seaton House and during and after that time worked on behalf of the homeless in Toronto. He had a special long-term interest in the plight of foreign-trained professionals, doctors and others, and he mentored foreign-trained doctors seeking to practice their professions in Ontario. Since his days as an MPP, when he first encountered the Sickle Cell Association of Ontario, he remained involved with them and had attended a telephone conference meeting a little more than 48 hours before his death.
Frankford died 1 August 2015 at the age of 75.