Part 30

Pierre-Chrysologue Lacasse, who follows the profession of notary in Montreal, is widely and favorably known in this city. He enjoys a representative clientele and his practice is extensive as he has gained a wide reputation on account of his extensive knowledge, which is based on a thorough education. The Lacasse family is an old and distinguished one in Canada, the first ancestor to come to this country being Antoine Lacasse, also called Casse or Cassé, who came to this country from Douai (French Flanders) about 1650, or more correctly, between 1639 and 1665. This statement is based upon a reference made in an appendix to the History of Canada by Abbé Ferland. The paternal grandfather, François Lacasse, was born at St. Vincent de Paul (Jesus Island) and the forefathers were born in the same parish. The maternal grandfather, Joseph Brissette, was a native of St. Cuthbert, of the county of Berthier, where his ancestors also were born. The father of our subject, Narcisse Lacasse, was born on February 5, 1821, of the marriage of François Lacasse with Thérèse Bastien and died on December 27, 1892. He was a notary, receiving his commission on June 15, 1849. The mother, Mathilde Brissette, was born on November 1, 1820, a daughter of Joseph Brissette and Marie Lavoie. She died in Montreal on August 29, 1911, at the advanced age of nearly ninety-one years. The father followed his occupation in the parish of Ste. Elizabeth, in the county of Joliette, where his wife was born.

Pierre-Chrysologue Lacasse was born on January 7, 1866, at Ste. Elizabeth, county of Joliette, in the province of Quebec, and in the acquirement of his education attended the model school of Ste. Elizabeth, also receiving private tuition. In furtherance of his knowledge he then attended Joliette College, now known as the Seminary of Joliette, and Laval University at Montreal, graduating with the Bachelor of Arts degree from the latter institution in 1885. From the same institution he received his degree of LL. B. in 1891. However, on June 3, 1890, he had already been commissioned a notary and has followed that profession ever since. On January 29, 1891, he was admitted to the study of law for the profession of advocate. His professional reputation is of the very highest character and he has also extensively engaged in real estate and in dealing in bank and insurance stock. Among important estates which he has handled as testamentary executor were those of John Pratt, Thomas Philippe Barron, L. C. Gravel and others.

The position conceded him by the profession is evident from numerous important official and semi-official positions which he has held. He was elected a member of the board of notaries for the district of Montreal in 1897, 1900, 1903, 1906, 1909 and 1912. He was a member and afterwards president of the committee of discipline and also of the committee of surveillance of said board and a member and afterwards president of the commission for the admission to the study of the notarial profession, which position he now holds. In his political views he is independent, giving his support to measures and candidates as dictated by his judgment. His religious faith is that of the Catholic church. Mr. Lacasse was connected with military life during a few years as lieutenant in Company 4, Eighty-third Battalion of Infantry of Joliette.

A man of wide experience and with a wide outlook upon life, he is interested along lines of endeavor that touch upon the progress of the city and can always be found among those who loyally support any movement undertaken for public betterment. He is highly respected and esteemed in the city where he is widely known and enjoys the confidence and good-will of the foremost citizens of Montreal.

ARTHUR A. BROWNE, M. D.

The tendency of the age is toward specialization and the professional man who achieves distinction usually concentrates his efforts not upon the broad field of his profession but upon some particular branch thereof, and thus develops a proficiency which he could not otherwise hope to attain. Such was the record of Dr. Arthur A. Browne, educator and practitioner, who gained eminence as an obstetrician. He practiced for more than forty years in Montreal, entering upon the active work of the profession in early manhood. He was born in Eastern township, in 1848, and was descended from Irish parentage, and of a family whose name figures prominently in military circles. His more specifically literary course was completed by graduation from McGill with the Bachelor of Arts degree in 1866. A year or two thereafter was devoted to business but feeling that a professional career would prove more congenial, he entered upon the study of medicine and was graduated M. D., C. M., in 1872. He then spent a year abroad, during which time he investigated the methods of eminent physicians and surgeons of the old world, after which he opened an office in Montreal. The usual experiences of the professional man were his. He had to work his way upward in face of competition with men who had long been in the profession and had well established reputations. The conscientious care which he gave to the cases entrusted to him at length won him recognition and his practice grew until it became one of the largest in the city. As time passed he concentrated his efforts more largely upon obstetrical diseases until he gained a wide and most enviable reputation in that field, his opinions coming to be regarded as authority upon many involved and intricate questions relating thereto. In 1883 he was appointed professor of obstetrics at McGill University, succeeding the late Professor Duncan MacCallum, at the same time taking charge of the University Maternity Hospital. Three years later, however, owing to his growing practice, already extensive, and his distaste for the drudgery of teaching, he resigned his professorship. Yet, he was always intensely interested in McGill and her welfare, and no function held by the medical department was thought to be complete if Dr. Browne was absent. He was not only thoroughly informed concerning his chosen calling but possessed a fine literary mind and his broad reading made him one of the best informed men on general literature among the practitioners of medicine and surgery in Montreal. He was a student of the classics, and all these things had influence to make him a noble-minded man, whose life exemplified the high principles which constituted the basis of his character. He possessed an artistic taste that found expression in his intense admiration of the beautiful in both art and nature. Moreover, keen sympathy was one of his strongly marked traits and featured as one of the elements of his success. He might well be called “the beloved physician,” for his cheery presence as well as his scientific skill brought comfort and assurance to many households. He inspired and encouraged his patients and thus assisted them far on the road to recovery.

In Montreal, in 1878, Dr. Browne was married to Miss Jane Labatt, of London, Ontario, and their children were: H. Dalzell, of Montreal; R. Russell, of Bassano, Alberta; Captain G. Sackville Browne, of B Battery, Royal Canadian Horse Artillery, of Kingston; and F. Dora.

Dr. Browne held membership with the Masonic fraternity and in his life exemplified the beneficent spirit of the craft. He had passed the sixty-second milestone on life’s journey when his death occurred January 26, 1910. His eminent ability gained him honor, his kindliness and consideration won him gratitude and friendship; and thus it is that his memory is cherished and remains as a blessed benediction to all who knew him.

THOMAS MCDOUGALL.

Important corporation and financial interests have felt the stimulus of the enterprise, keen business insight and intellectual force of Thomas McDougall, who is known in literary as well as financial circles. He was born at Three Rivers, P. Q., May 21, 1843, a son of the late John McDougall, a merchant of Three Rivers, who sat in the Canadian parliament from 1851 until 1854 and a brother of the late Hon. Justice McDougall of Aylmer, P. Q. For many years Thomas McDougall was in the service of the Quebec Bank and was agent of that institution in 1870. Later he became manager at Montreal and in 1894 was made assistant general manager, from which position he was advanced to that of general manager in December of the same year. He continued actively in control of the extensive and important financial interests that came under his guidance until 1909, when he resigned but remained a director of the bank. With him close reasoning has become habitual, and he has therefore found ready solution for difficult and involved financial problems. He was chairman of the clearing house at Montreal and was active in the meeting of bankers, convened to revise the banking act in 1890. In 1898-9 he was president of the Canadian Bankers Association, which indicates his place of prominence and influence in the moneyed circles of the country. He is still a member of the advisory board of the Scottish Union & National Insurance Company, is vice president of the Shawinigan Water & Power Company and a director of the Asbestos Corporation of Canada.

In many public connections outside the field of business and finance his name has figured prominently and his labors have been effectively and helpfully felt. In 1908 he was the general treasurer of the Quebec tercentenary committee. He possesses literary taste in high degree. He has written on banks, bankers and banking, being the author of a well known article entitled, T. Pomponius Atticus, a Roman Banker.

Mr. McDougall was married at Three Rivers, P. Q., to Miss Helen Baptist, a daughter of the late George Baptist. His religious connection is with the Presbyterian church and in club circles he is well known as a member of the St. James Club of Montreal and the Quebec Garrison Club of Quebec. His social qualities and marked ability along many lines as well as his important business interests have gained him the prominence which is today his.

JEAN BAPTISTE DAVID LEGARE.

Jean Baptiste David Legare, one of the most successful real-estate promoters in the city of Montreal, was born in the parish of Sillery, near Quebec, June 7, 1865. Fortune did not smile on him for many years. His father having died when the son was an infant of but three months, he was reared in the home of his maternal grandfather, F. Cote, of St. Foy. While there he acquired his elementary education and later attended the academies at Sillery and Quebec. Manifesting laudable ambition from early youth, at the age of eighteen years he began business life as a clerk in the general store of Louis Bourget in Quebec. Subsequently he was employed in the wholesale dry-goods houses of P. Garneau and William McLimont & Sons in Quebec. Later he became a representative of large grain and flour mills and also became proprietor of a wine and vinegar manufactory in Quebec. Fate was against him and he failed for seventy-two thousand dollars. This would have utterly discouraged and disheartened many a man of less resolute spirit, but an optimistic nature would not allow Mr. Legare to acknowledge defeat and still held before him the promise of later success. He then engaged in promoting various undertakings in Quebec, but still the results were not such as were desired.

In 1908 Mr. Legare came to Montreal and continued in the promoting business, making a specialty of real estate. This proved to be the turning point in the career of Mr. Legare and he has since gradually but surely advanced to the goal of success. In the past five years he has made over three hundred thousand dollars and when the sum he had acquired was sufficient to cancel all of his indebtedness he made a special journey to Quebec for that purpose. Mr. Legare says that through all of the dark days, when the storm clouds gathered about him that threatened disaster and defeat, it was his wife’s encouragement and her faith in his future that buoyed him up and made possible his ultimate prosperity.

The principal companies which Mr. Legare has successfully promoted during the past five years are: The Greater Montreal Land Investment Company, Limited; and The Chateauguay Garden City Company, Limited. He was also the promoter of the town of Chateauguay. He is the owner of twenty-seven lakes on the seigniory of Mille Isles and the water rights pertaining thereto. A strong man physically and mentally, his optimistic temperament makes him an ideal promoter. The various business enterprises which he has promoted during his career have contributed a great deal toward the development of the natural resources of the Dominion.

Mr. Legare was married in Quebec, in 1891, to Alda Garneau, daughter of Charles Garneau, ex-sergeant of arms of the Quebec assembly. Upon the maternal side she is descended from the De Villers and the De Lachevrotiere families, both being of the noblest families of France. Mr. and Mrs. Legare are parents of a daughter, Yvonne, who was married in 1913 to Dr. Rene Turcot, and they reside in Quebec.

JOHN ALEXANDER GORDON, D. D.

One of the greatest individual forces in the promulgation of Baptist doctrines in Canada, a man who has worked long and earnestly in the promotion and spread of Baptist principles, giving of his unusual talents, his great energy and tireless labor to the cause, is Rev. John Alexander Gordon, for fourteen years pastor of the First Baptist church in Montreal and now the incumbent of the chair of pastoral theology at Brandon Theological College, active in the work of the foreign missionary societies and in the spread of temperance doctrines throughout the Dominion.

Dr. Gordon is of Scottish ancestry and was born in Uigg, Prince Edward Island. He acquired his early education in the public and high schools of his native province and in Acadia University, graduating with the degree of B. A., and acquired his theological training in the Newton Theological Seminary in Newton, Massachusetts. He was ordained to the Baptist ministry in 1875 and has since been prominent and active in the work of the Baptist church. He received the honorary degree of M. A. from Acadia College in 1894 and the honorary degree of D. D. from the same institution in 1904. Previous to his ordination he had been engaged in the mercantile and commission business at Montague, Prince Edward Island, and his first ministerial charge was as pastor of the church in that community. He was afterward called to Milton church, Yarmouth, Nova Scotia, where he remained from 1880 to 1885, after which he went to St. John, New Brunswick, serving as pastor of the Leinster Street Baptist church, and from there went to the First Baptist church, Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, remaining there until 1893, when he became pastor of the Main Street Baptist church at Charlottetown. In 1899 he was called to Montreal as minister of the First Baptist church of this city, a position which he held until June, 1913, when he accepted the chair of pastoral theology at Brandon Theological College. Dr. Gordon has been found most earnest, zealous and consecrated in his work and has been carried forward by the force of his ability and the extent of his interests into important relations with religious work of many kinds, notably that of the local branch of the Lord’s Day Alliance, of which he is vice president; the Prisoners’ Aid Association, of which he is also vice president; the Grand Ligne Missionary Society, of which he is president; and the Maritime Baptist Union. No individual has done more powerful or effective work than he in the propagation of Baptist doctrines or in the promotion of the church’s interests for he was in 1906 appointed a member of the committee on Church Union and two years later was one of the promoters and a member of the committee which organized the Baptist Union. He is a governor of Acadia University and is especially interested in the work of the Foreign Mission Board of Ontario and Quebec, of the British and Foreign Bible Society and the Moral and Social Reform Council. He has written a “History of the First Baptist Church of Montreal,” published in 1906, and in August, 1908, entered a vigorous protest against the celebration of high mass on the Plains of Abraham as a part of the tercentenary celebration.

Dr. Gordon married at Kingsborough, Prince Edward Island, Margaret Ford, eldest daughter of the late John Ford, and to them were born five sons: John, a resident of Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island; Dr. Alvah H., of Montreal; Peter W., of Calgary; Herbert F., of Winnipeg; and Walter H., city editor of The Gazette of Montreal. Dr. Gordon has been a lifelong temperance worker and reformer and has accomplished a great deal of excellent work along this line, being uncompromising in his attitude toward the liquor evil and battling against it always to the extent of his great ability. In Montreal he is known as a man whose actions conform closely to his principles and whose energy, aggressiveness and untiring activity have been elements in the accomplishment of great and lasting work.

CHARLES HENRY GOULD.

Charles Henry Gould, librarian of McGill University and president of the American Library Association, 1908-09, is son of Joseph G. and Abigail (DeWitt) Gould, the latter a daughter of the late Jacob DeWitt, M. P., of Montreal. Born in Montreal on the 6th of December, 1855, Charles H. Gould pursued his education in the city schools through successive grades until he completed the high school course, after which he entered McGill University and was graduated B. A. with first rank honors in 1877, also winning the Chapman medal in classics. Through the succeeding scholastic year he devoted some time to post-graduate work in physics. With the completion of his education he entered business circles, in which he continued for several years. He afterward took up the study of library economy and also spent some time in travel before entering upon his present connection as librarian of McGill University. For twenty years he has filled his present position with eminent ability, having entered upon his duties in September, 1893. He was made governor’s fellow in 1891. There is no Canadian, perhaps, who has made a more thorough study of the work and opportunities of the librarian than has Charles Henry Gould, and realizing the deficiencies of many who undertake the librarian’s task, he founded the McGill School for Librarians in 1904. His prominence in his chosen field is indicated in his election to the first vice presidency of the American Library Association for 1907 and 1908 and his subsequent election to the presidency for 1908-9. He has continued his labors at McGill although offered the appointment of associate librarian of the public library of Brooklyn, New York, in 1908, and that of librarian of the Toronto public library. A fellow of the American Library Institute, he belongs to the Champlain Society, was president of the Bibliographical Society of America 1912-13 and is a member of other bodies which have for their basis the promotion of scientific and literary knowledge. He is also a member of the University Club, and the Canada Journal names him as a loyal and valuable citizen.

DONAT BRODEUR, K. C.

Specializing in the field of civil and commercial law, Donat Brodeur has gained recognition as a man capable of handling intricate and involved legal problems. He is a native of Montreal, born in March, 1863. His preliminary education was acquired in St. Mary’s Jesuit College, with the later professional course in Laval University, from which he was graduated with the degree of B. C. L. with the class of 1887. He was called to the bar at the beginning of the succeeding year, and since that date he has practiced his profession continuously in this city, now covering a period of a quarter of a century. Each year has found him in a point in advance of that which he occupied the previous year both in knowledge and in the nature and importance of his practice. He is a well known writer on legal subjects and a frequent contributor to legal periodicals. He has also lectured on law topics before the Canadian Accountants Association and the Chamber of Commerce. He has ever been a student of his profession, constantly broadening his knowledge by wide reading and research, and the care and precision with which he prepares his cases constitute a strong element in his success.

Attractive social qualities are the basis of his personal popularity, making him a valued member of different social organizations.

ROBERT FOWLER.

Robert Fowler, a merchant, was born in Montreal, November 17, 1851, and died in April, 1903. He was a son of Robert J. Fowler, who was born in England in 1818 and was educated there. He was brought up in the cathedral, having from the age of ten years made his own way, becoming a choir boy in the church. In 1847 he crossed the Atlantic going to Sorel, Canada, with Sir Benjamin Levine and his staff, to teach the daughters music. In 1849 he came to Montreal and was the first instructor of the city to hold musicales. For forty years he was professor of music in the normal school and at different times was organist in nearly all of the churches of the city. He could play any instrument and was recognized as the best instructor in music, by far, of his day. He was also known to some extent as a composer and, in a word, his musical talent was highly developed, while his professional labors and influence were an element in promoting and cultivating musical tastes and standards in the city. His was an artistic nature. He wielded the painter’s brush with skill and he was, moreover, a great naturalist. He took deep interest in the city’s improvement and in all projects for civic betterment. He held membership in Christ Church Cathedral, renting a pew there for thirty-five years. His life thus became a potent force in the artistic and moral progress of the city. He was married in Weymouth, England, to Miss Annie Wadsworth and they became the parents of five children, who reached adult age but only one, Annie, is now living. The others were William, Susan, Robert and John Henry. The death of the father occurred March 14, 1900, and the mother passed away in 1911.