THE FINE ART OF
GIVING

Former SU president, John Lefebvre, believes
the opportunity to give back ‘a blessing ’

Story by Tom Maloney
Photos by David Borrowman

Here’s a man embodying the spirit of a generation. One moment, he’s speaking intensely about eradicating political global tyranny, and in the next, slipping on his gumboots to stand ankle-deep in the Pacific Ocean and strum the mandolin; one moment plotting to save old-growth forest in China from clear cutting loggers, and in the next, whimsically tinkling “M-i-c … k-e-y, M-o-u-s-e” on a William Knabe & Co. piano, circa 1904.

In this bright front room of a modest house with spectacular views, he’s surrounded by black-and-white photos of his musical, philosophical and political influences, the cultural heroes of his generation: Bob Dylan, John Lennon, Jimi Hendrix, Neil Young, Tom Waits and other rockers from the 1960s and ’70s. A lawyer by trade and frustrated musician by passion, John Lefebvre became a founding minority partner in NETeller six years ago. In that speck of time, the company specializing in Web-based money transfers mushroomed from a mere notion to more than $2 billion in market capitalization. NETeller, listed on the London Stock Exchange, boasts a user base of two million customers worldwide (and zooming, daily) and 1,700 merchant clients. Lefebvre, who was barely getting by on cash borrowed from friends a decade ago, has since built a fortune in the hundreds of millions.

“All I had to do was survive,” he says, a touch of irony followed by a trademark soft chuckle.
In his mid-40s Lefebvre dived headlong into midlife crisis, quitting law to spend his early mornings busking in Calgary’s C-Train stations, hoping to cultivate enough change from commuters for meals.

“He was rather offended that any lawyers he knew would look away when they saw him on the street,” recalls his mother, Louise Lefebvre. “He came home one day, his daughter (Emily) was staying with him at the time, and he said, ‘Mom, don’t worry about us, we know how to live. You should have seen the supper we had tonight!’ Well, he’d done a gourmet potato. It took me a terribly long time to realize that no matter what he wants to do, he’s going to do well at it. ”

Lefebvre never did get to play his guitar on MTV but these days, if you happen to be cruising by a whitewashed waterfront house on Salt Spring and notice a somewhat shaggy, blonde-going-grey-haired, laidback-looking man strumming his music nearby the docked yacht, well, go ahead and hang on to that pocket change. Lefebvre is getting along just fine, thanks, and in no need of spare quarters now. He will, though, accept the eye contact and a smile, with appreciation.

A University of Calgary law graduate and former student council president, Lefebvre is living his dream at age 53: “I thought for a long time that to be a philanthropist would be the greatest career possible. Then it came to me, now I get to do it, and that’s a blessing. ”

Among other carefully considered endeavours such as the establishment of a Vancouver think tank in the Dalai Lama’s name, Lefebvre is intent on boosting Calgary’s cultural community, starting with a $1.2 million-plus donation to U of C’s fine arts faculty. Lefebvre wanted to give back to his alma mater, and feels the U of C professional faculties are already well-supported. Plus, he believes the city’s arts scene is running way too far behind business in terms of priorities. And on a big-picture level, he truly believes humanity would be “more compassionate” if we took time out to indulge in the arts, to hear what artists are telling us. Then, there was the nostalgic memory of finding blissful escape in Craigie Hall for a few precious minutes on occasion, while spending the better part of a decade on campus. “They let me play the pianos there while I was an undergrad and in law school,” he explains.

So, for a man filling his home with original oils, bronzes and sculptures; for a man intent on doing his bit to make the world a more peaceful place, sponsorship of the fine arts made perfect sense.

“ Art is the language of human feeling and understanding,” Lefebvre says, while seated on a wooden Muskoka chair, overlooking the serene waterfront. “It is the international language, the way you and I communicate what it feels like to be a human being with another person in the jungle. Art is a way for people to step up and express themselves as human beings. Every time you do that, it makes you a better person. And every time you hear or see the expression of somebody else, it touches you, and you become a better person. Cultured people are compassionate people. ”

While indulging himself by buying a beach home in Malibu (before, the agent said, Jennifer Aniston could trump his offer), driving a custom-made BMW that would surely be the envy of many of those eye-averting lawyers, and turning each room of his Salt Spring seaside home into a gallery unto its own, John Lefebvre never forgets. He speaks fondly of playing at the Whitehorn station, where people from different cultures would give him welcome feedback, and their toonies, too.

“ He knows what it is like to be a struggling artist, living off the dollars tossed in a guitar case,” says his friend and fellow law graduate Mike Greene. “And he knows it’s donations from lucky people like him that help developing artists survive. He lives life as an art more than a science. If someone is supposed to get lucky it ’s good that it was him because he is so generous.”

Lefebvre got knocked down a few times before finding the end to his means, but he always bounced back. It’s fairly obvious where his determination came from. At age three, his father, a military man, died of asphyxiation in a snowstorm. His mother (nee, Theresa Louise Cullen) returned to Calgary from the east with her three young children in tow, returned to school, graduated from U of C with an education degree to become a teacher, picked up her master’s from Gonzaga University in counseling, then worked at the school she had attended as a youth, St. Mary’s Girls’ School, before completing her career at Bishop Grandin.

“ After his dad died, I had a few pretty slow years there,” recalls Louise, who remains a Calgary resident. “Any time the kids were acting up, all I had to do was go to the piano and they’d come and sing. John would be the first there; he’s had a love of music forever. ”

Music, says the son, “has always been my salvation.” Lefebvre also attended St. Mary’s before finishing high school at Bishop Grandin. His mother insisted on piano lessons and sent him to Toronto for three successive teenage summers to St. Michael’s summer school, giving him the opportunity to hang out nights at Yorkville’s music/hippie scene, listen to the Beatles relentlessly, and sleep in bunkbeds placed beside the cathedral’s pipe organ. “They were allowed to start practising at 6 a.m., ” he recalls ruefully.

He played drums in the basement of his home and turned an old washtub into a “bass-fiddle thing,” his mother says. His first gig came at the Summit Hotel on 4th Street, at age 19.

Later, between undergrad studies and admission to U of C’s law school, Lefebvre dedicated a couple of impassioned years to student politics. During his 1978/79 term as council president, he guaranteed editorial independence to the Gauntlet student newspaper—meaning editors could rip into him, without fear of grant reprisal—did the same for the CJSW FM radio station, opened what is now the Den, and started the fund for the MacEwan Student Centre.

As a lawyer, he moved from beginning at a respected firm to establishing a storefront clinic in Sunnyside. At the time, he and his partner had to defend the clinic against charges of then-prohibited advertising. “You want to be your own boss, and you come to find out that you never get to the bottom of the files on your desk, and they become your boss, ” he says.

From there, he worked out of his home for a while. “One of the reasons I didn’t get dragged into the downtown, upper-crust, law-circle thing is, I never really did concede to working the long hours, as much as I could have or maybe should have,” he says. “It was always more compelling for me to get home to see my daughter. ”

Weary of arranging mortgages, he tried to import leather for sale out of a shop on 17th Avenue before delving into music, playing an acoustic brand of self-dubbed “heavy wood” on the streets and in coffee houses. The concession to those long hours arrived upon return to legal work, to earn the money to pay back his friends. Eventually, he hooked up with a former client who is now chairman of NETeller.

The friend had launched an online casino in Costa Rica and while there, realized the offshore casinos needed a more efficient money transfer system. The credit card companies didn’t like dealing with the casinos, and the casinos didn’t like paying the exorbitant commissions or dealing with the credit card fraud.

With the help of a whiz programmer, he launched a Web database that functions principally as middle man, gaining a percentage off each transaction. The casinos pay NETeller a smaller commission than the credit card companies, yet NETeller provides much greater security against fraud. Lefebvre saw his once-in-a-lifetime opportunity and joined as a minority equity partner. He moved to Costa Rica, and a man once averse to long days turned in relentless 18-hour marathons to build the business. Today, NETeller headquarters on the Isle of Man in the U.K., maintains the IT operation in Calgary, handles transactions for an estimated 90 percent of the world’s online gaming sites and, in 2004, netted $33 million on $83 million in sales.

“ He tries to convince me that the wealth was luck but I know that he is a smart man,” says Jim Hoggan, longtime friend, owner/operator of a PR agency with offices in Calgary and Vancouver, and company on a recent visit to see the Dalai Lama in Tucson. “He doesn’t strike you as ambitious but he is one of those people who knows that hard work brings the luck. ”

Lefebvre moved back to Canada last February, ready to get on with more ‘60s-ish pursuits. He’s combining with Vancouver businessman Victor Chan to under-write the Dalai Lama’s Centre for Peace and Education in Vancouver, supporting the David Suzuki Foundation, backing the West Virginia-based Future Generation’s successful campaign to preserve the ecologically vital Four Great Rivers section of Tibet and thinking of funding an educational chair on human rights.

Oh, and producing a movie too, about the life of Constantine. So intent about conducting his philanthropy pointedly and properly, he asked U of C law graduate Geoff Savage to oversee his charitable foundation and become his most trusted right-hand man. Says Savage: “The buzz word around here is, ‘unbelievable.’”

For all his newfound pursuits, one thing that lights up Lefebvre’s face is his pet project in his newly adopted town. With Savage, he is renovating the Vesuvius Pub. After lunch at a café overlooking the ferry dock, Lefebvre walks with a visitor next door to the boarded-up pub, his eyes gleaming and expression joyous as he discusses plans to return live music to an establishment once reputed for promoting new artists.

He’s thinking about asking Neil Young to open the joint next summer but it won’t be long, we suspect, before Lefebvre’s playing a little heavy wood himself in the pub, jamming with the young guys and living the moment.