Biography[edit]
Eric Nagler was born in Brooklyn, New York on June 1, 1942 to two schoolteachers,[2] Mr. and Mrs. Harold Nagler.[3][4] His family were Jewish[5] atheists.[6] Initially, Nagler was a folk musician in the United States, performing in the Greenwich Village folk scene.[7][5] In 1966 he marched through Mississippi with Martin Luther King Jr., encouraging people to register to vote.[8] In May 1968[4] he married fellow musician Martha Beers,[3] daughter of Bob and Evelyne Beers of the folk group the Beers Family.[6] Eric Nagler studied at Queens College and Albany State University,[3] and earned a Master's degree in child psychology.[6] He worked for the New York Department of Education, teaching special needs children.[6] Due to their conscientious objection to the Vietnam War, the couple moved to Toronto in 1968 in order to “avoid” the draft.[6] Upon relocating to Canada, he worked as a psychologist, and began work on a doctorate at the University of Toronto.[3] In 1972, Nagler returned to the United States to stand trial for draft evasion; he was acquitted.[9][6] Around 1971, Eric and Martha owned a guitar/folk-music store on Avenue Road in Toronto called the Toronto Folklore Centre.[5] The couple later moved to a cabin in Killahoe, Ontario, and toured together as a folk duo across the United States and Canada.[10][11] The couple divorced in 1977. Since 1991 Nagler has lived with his partner Diana Buckley in the hills of Mulmur, near Shelburne, an hour north of Toronto, Ontario, and home of the Annual Canadian Championship Fiddling Contest.
In the 1970s and 1980s Nagler performed on Sharon, Lois, and Bram's albums,[12][13] toured with the trio,[14] and was a regular guest star on the Elephant Show since its premiere in 1984.[12][15] In 1991–1996, he starred in a children's TV show called Eric's World,[16] which aired on the Canadian provincial networks (TVOntario, Knowledge Network, SCN, and Access) and Family Channel.
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