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981 recordsStructured records (JSON) ↗
Sir William Price, about 1924 (Fonds Dubuc).
CA-K853Economy & trade

Sir William Price, from lumber to pulp and paper

William Price joined his family’s lumber business in 1885 and took control in 1899, when it was close to failing. To diversify, he bought a pulp mill at Jonquière and helped lead the shift from lumber to pulp and paper, a sector in which Canada became a world leader by the 1920s. His mill at Kénogami was for years Canada’s top newsprint producer.

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Photo: Fonds Dubuc · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
Charles Sherwood Noble, 1918.
CA-K845Economy & trade

Charles Noble and the Noble Blade

Charles Sherwood Noble, farmer, inventor and entrepreneur, showed the farming potential of the drought-prone Palliser Triangle. During the Great Depression he worked with the Dominion Experimental Farm to promote dry-land farming methods, and in 1936 invented the Noble Blade, a cultivator that cut weeds at the roots without disturbing the soil, greatly reducing erosion. His company became Alberta’s largest maker of such implements.

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Photo: unknown (Life time: 1910s) · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
William Aberhart, 1920 (Curlette Studio).
CA-K840History

William Aberhart, Social Credit premier of Alberta

William “Bible Bill” Aberhart, a Calgary high school principal and evangelical preacher, led the founding of Alberta’s Social Credit party and became premier in 1935, winning re-election in 1940. He used radio to reach audiences first as an evangelist and then as a politician.

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Photo: Curlette Studio · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
Adam Shortt, about 1920.
CA-K837Institutions

Adam Shortt, economist and historian

Adam Shortt, born near London, Ontario, founded the department of political economy at Queen’s University and advised governments. In 1908 he joined the first Canadian Civil Service Commission. In Ottawa he worked with Dominion Archivist Arthur Doughty to build the national archives’ collections, and from 1913 to 1917 the two co-edited the historical series Canada and Its Provinces.

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Photo: Bain News Service, publisher · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
William Henry Pope, 1873 (William James Topley).
CA-K836History

William Henry Pope, Island advocate of Confederation

William Henry Pope, born at Bedeque, Prince Edward Island, became Colonial Secretary in 1859 and represented Queen’s County in the Assembly from 1863 to 1867. A strong supporter of Confederation, he was a delegate to the Charlottetown and Quebec conferences of 1864. He became a judge of Prince County in 1873.

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Photo: William James Topley · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
Robert Harris, C.M.G., R.C.A. (Archives of Ontario).
CA-K835Culture & sport

Robert Harris, painter of the Fathers of Confederation

Robert Harris, born in Wales, came to Prince Edward Island in 1856 and studied art in Charlottetown, Boston, London, Paris and Rome. One of Canada’s leading portrait painters and a long-time teacher, he was an original member of the Royal Canadian Academy and its president from 1890 to 1903. He is best known for his painting of the Fathers of Confederation.

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Photo: Unknown photographer; Archives of Ontario · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
Edward Blake, portrait.
CA-K832History

Edward Blake, Ontario premier and Liberal leader

Edward Blake, a lawyer born in Middlesex County, Upper Canada, and a leading member of the Canada First movement, was the second premier of Ontario (1871–72). In 22 years in the House of Commons he was Minister of Justice under Alexander Mackenzie and led the federal Liberals from 1880 to 1887. A constitutional authority, he later sat in the British Parliament as an Irish Nationalist.

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Photo: Ewing · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
Sir William Gage, about 1910.
CA-K831Culture & sport

W.J. Gage, publisher and fighter against tuberculosis

William James Gage, born near Brampton, joined the publisher Adam Miller and Co. in 1874 and in 1880 reorganized it as W.J. Gage and Co. Specializing in educational books, it became one of Canada’s most successful publishing houses. A philanthropist and pioneer in the fight against tuberculosis, Gage founded several free hospitals and sanatoria.

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Photo: Unknown author · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
Andrew Archibald Macdonald, 1892 (William James Topley).
CA-K829History

Andrew Archibald Macdonald, note-taker at Quebec

Andrew Archibald Macdonald, a Prince Edward Island merchant and shipbuilder, sat in the Legislative Assembly and Council. He attended the Charlottetown and Quebec conferences of 1864, and his notes from Quebec are one of the few original records of that conference. After the Island joined Confederation he became its Lieutenant-Governor and was later named to the Senate.

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Photo: William James Topley · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
Philippe Aubert de Gaspé, 1863.
CA-K826Culture & sport

Philippe Aubert de Gaspé, author of Les Anciens Canadiens

Philippe Aubert de Gaspé, son of the seigneur of Saint-Jean-Port-Joli, gave up his legal career because of debt in 1822. In long retirement he gathered anecdotes and popular traditions that became the basis of his historical novel Les Anciens Canadiens (1863). That novel and his Mémoires (1866) are landmarks of Canadian literature and valued sources for historians and folklorists.

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Photo: Jules-Isaïe Benoît · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
Louis St. Laurent, 1948 (George Nakash).
CA-K820History

Louis St. Laurent, prime minister

Louis St. Laurent, born in Compton, Quebec, was a leading corporate lawyer before entering politics as Minister of Justice in 1941. He served as Secretary of State for External Affairs and then as Prime Minister from 1948 to 1957. A strong advocate of national unity, he helped shape the new Commonwealth, signed the United Nations Charter and promoted NATO.

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Photo: George Nakash · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
Joseph E. Atkinson, 1910s (City of Toronto Archives).
CA-K818Culture & sport

Joseph Atkinson of the Toronto Star

Joseph E. Atkinson became managing editor of the Toronto Star in 1899 and its majority owner by 1913. He sought to make the paper a tool of social reform, and his innovations changed Canadian journalism and made the Star the country’s largest-circulation newspaper by the 1930s. He left his fortune to the Atkinson Charitable Foundation, which supports cultural, medical and educational institutions in Ontario.

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Photo: Unknown photographer; City of Toronto Archives · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
Ernest Lapointe, portrait (J. Russell & Sons).
CA-K817History

Ernest Lapointe, statesman

Ernest Lapointe, born at Saint-Éloi, Quebec, was a federal Cabinet minister from 1921 to 1930 and from 1935 to 1941. He played an important part in governing the country and in its move toward autonomy, and represented Canadians in national, imperial and international affairs. He died in Montréal and is buried in Rivière-du-Loup.

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Photo: J. Russell & Sons · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
Albert Peter Low, 1897 (William James Topley).
CA-K816Places & geography

A.P. Low, explorer of Labrador and the Arctic

Albert Peter Low of Montréal joined the Geological Survey of Canada in 1882. In 1884 he made the first scientific survey and map of Lake Mistassini, and in the 1890s explored much of the interior of Ungava and Labrador, noting its iron deposits. He commanded the first Arctic patrol, aboard the Neptune in 1903–04, and became Director of the Geological Survey in 1906.

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Photo: William James Topley · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
James J. Hill, 1916 (Pach Bros.).
CA-K811Economy & trade

James J. Hill, railway builder

James Jerome Hill, born near Rockwood, Upper Canada, moved to St. Paul, Minnesota, in 1856. He organized the Red River Transportation Company linking St. Paul and Winnipeg and by 1878 was building a railway empire. A CPR board member from 1880 to 1883, he became a major competitor, organized the Great Northern system by 1889, and built many feeder lines to the Canadian border.

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Photo: Pach Bros. · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
Édouard-Gaston Deville, 1914.
CA-K808Places & geography

Édouard Deville, Surveyor General and photogrammetry pioneer

Édouard-Gaston Deville, a former French Navy hydrographer, came to Canada in 1874, took part in the Dominion survey of the North-West, and became Surveyor General in 1885. A pioneer of photogrammetry, he used it to map the Canadian Rockies between 1888 and 1896 and earned an international reputation for his writing, instruments and map reproduction methods. Mount Deville in Yoho National Park bears his name.

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Photo: Unknown author · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
George Coles, 1865 (William Notman).
CA-K807History

George Coles, premier of Prince Edward Island

George Coles, a native Prince Edward Islander, represented Queen’s in the House of Assembly from 1842 to 1868. Co-founder of the Liberal Party with Edward Whelan and a strong advocate of responsible government, he became premier when it was granted in 1851 and held office three times. A Father of Confederation, he attended the Charlottetown and Quebec conferences of 1864.

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Photo: William Notman · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
Thomas Heath Haviland, 1879 (William James Topley).
CA-K805History

Thomas Heath Haviland, Island Father of Confederation

Thomas Heath Haviland, born in Charlottetown, represented Georgetown in the Prince Edward Island legislature and held posts including Colonial Secretary and Speaker. A delegate to the Quebec Conference of 1864, he was one of three who arranged the Island’s entry into Confederation in 1873. He was then named to the Senate, and later became the province’s Lieutenant-Governor.

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Photo: William James Topley · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
Col. Sam Hughes, 1905 (William James Topley).
CA-K801History

Sir Sam Hughes, Minister of Militia

Sam Hughes, soldier, journalist and Member of Parliament for Lindsay from 1892 to 1921, helped create a distinctly Canadian army. As Minister of Militia and Defence from 1911 to 1916, he raised the Canadian Expeditionary Force that fought in the First World War and was knighted, but disputes with colleagues and subordinates forced him from Cabinet in 1916.

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Photo: William James Topley · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
Daniel David Palmer, portrait.
CA-K796Culture & sport

D.D. Palmer, founder of chiropractic

Daniel David Palmer, raised in Port Perry, Ontario, was self-educated and interested in spiritualism and alternative medicine. Working as a magnetic healer in the United States, he promoted the theory that spinal alignment could restore health. Despite legal and financial setbacks, he wrote on chiropractic treatment and founded schools, and he is recognized as the founder of chiropractic.

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Photo: Unknown author · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
John Wilson Bengough, 1900.
CA-K795Culture & sport

J.W. Bengough, cartoonist of Grip

John Wilson Bengough of Toronto was a cartoonist, journalist, poet and lecturer working in several literary and visual forms. In 1873 he founded Grip, a weekly humour magazine where many of his best-known cartoons first appeared. He later drew for the Montreal Star and the Globe, and published A Caricature History of Canadian Politics (1886) and two books of poems.

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Photo: Unknown author · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
John Kinder Labatt, about 1864.
CA-K794Economy & trade

John Kinder Labatt and the London brewery

John Kinder Labatt, born in Ireland, came to Canada in 1834 and farmed near London, Ontario. In 1847 he bought into Samuel Eccles’ London brewery and in 1854 became its sole owner; under his son and grandson it grew into one of Canada’s largest. He also helped establish London’s early financial institutions and promoted local roads and railways.

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Photo: The Labatt Brewing Company Archival Collection · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
Dr. Wilfred Grenfell, about 1900.
CA-K793Institutions

Sir Wilfred Grenfell, doctor to northern Newfoundland and Labrador

Wilfred Grenfell, an English-born doctor and minister, gave 50 years of service to the people of northern Newfoundland and Labrador. He and those he inspired brought medical, spiritual and material aid to fishers and coastal residents, and he raised funds for projects such as the hospital at St. Anthony. The International Grenfell Association, founded in 1912, carried on his programs.

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Photo: Bain News Service, publisher · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
Cyril Genik, portrait.
CA-K791History

Cyril Genik and Ukrainian settlement in the West

During the first wave of Ukrainian immigration (1896–1914), Cyril Genik helped thousands of Ukrainians settle in the western provinces. Named an immigration agent soon after reaching Winnipeg in 1896, he was the first Ukrainian in the federal civil service, and for 18 years advised newcomers while strengthening the community’s cultural life.

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Photo: Unknown author · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context