James Eayrs

James George Eayrs (born 1926) is a retired Canadian historian, who won the Governor General's Award for English-language non-fiction at the 1965 Governor General's Awards for his book In Defence of Canada: From the Great War to the Great Depression. The book, which examined Canadian military and defence policy during the period between World War I and the Great Depression, was the first in a multi-volume series on Canadian military history, and was followed by In Defence of Canada, Vol. 2: Appeasement and Rearmament (1965), In Defence of Canada: Peacemaking and Deterrence (1972), In Defence of Canada: Growing Up Allied (1980) and In Defence of Canada: Indochina, Roots of Complicity (1983).

A professor of history at the University of Toronto and later at Dalhousie University, he was awarded the Canada Council Molson Prize in 1984 and was named a fellow of the Royal Society of Canada.

His wife, Elizabeth Eayrs, served on Toronto City Council from 1972 to 1978.