Earl was born in 1936 in Toronto Canada and moved to Victoria in the 1940s. As a storyteller, he will happily tell you of his life’s adventures and how he openly welcomes risk. His parents taught him the value of a hard day’s work and the importance of resilience. These lessons saw him successfully graduate as a Chartered Accountant while working full time and raising three kids. They also helped him to build not one, but several successful businesses.

In 1962, Earl founded Large & Company, a small business offering professional auditing, income tax and consulting services. The business expanded to include the construction and ownership of several grocery stores and malls, a wholesale food company, a lumber supply company and the development of various commercial and residential properties.

Always ahead of his time, Earl saw another business opportunity to open the first data center on the island. Large & Co. offered data processing services to many clients including all of the school boards in B.C. This area of the business later expanded and Datatech Systems was born – the first third-party field engineering company in the world.Through its 36 branches spread across Canada, Datatech provided exclusive computer maintenance and repair services to the Canadian divisions of companies such as Honeywell, Hewlitt Packard, RCA, Apple, G.E., and Dell, to name a few. The Canadian Department of National Defence was also supported by Datatech, worldwide.

At 58 years old, Earl decided to ‘slow down’. He sold Datatech, moved away from all other parts of the business and decided to concentrate on residential in-fill development within Greater Victoria. In July 2020, after operating this branch of Large & Co. for 26 years, Earl handed the CEO reins to his daughter Kim Colpman. Earl is now focusing on his new passion as a poet and author. His life and stories are wrapped up in his new book ‘Living Large’, (release date Sept 2021)