Memorable Manitobans: George Nelson Jackson (1861-1944)

Businessman.

Born at Columbus, Ontario [now part of Oshawa] on 4 June 1861, son of James Jackson and Sarah Stephenson, the family moved to just outside St. Marys, Perth, Ontario prior to 1871. At the age of 18 years he took a job in a store at Hamilton. In 1879 he began an apprenticeship in a brush and broom factory operated by Walter Woods & Company. From 1885 to 1901 he worked as a travelling salesman for the company, covering much of Ontario, and, in 1896, he established a branch at Winnipeg and became its manager. He retired from Walter Woods in 1918 to set up a manufacturer’s agency George N. Jackson & Son to make a place for his son who was returning from World War One.

He married Lucy Bowes of Hamilton, Ontario in 1886. They had a son, George Herbert Jackson. He was a Mason (Ionic Lodge, of which he was Grand Master), a member of the Supreme Council of the Scottish Rite and, in 1921, grand master of the Grand Lodge of Manitoba. He was a president of the Winnipeg Board of Trade, president of the Canadian Men’s Trust Association (later Creditel), president of the Manitoba Branch of the Canadian National Institute for the Blind, and chairman of the Manitoba Minimum Wage Board. He was active in raising funds to construct the Young United Church, and Chairman of the building committee during the construction. He was a member of the Board of Governors of Wesley College (later United College, now the University of Winnipeg), and for many years a director of the YMCA. In 1920 he accompanied his wife on her visit of almost a year of the Methodist missions in China and Japan. He was a member of Rotary Club and the Assiniboine Lawn Bowling Club.

He died at Winnipeg on 4 December 1944 and was buried in Elmwood Cemetery.

Sources:

A History of Manitoba: Its Resources and People by Prof. George Bryce, Toronto: The Canadian History Company, 1906.

We thank Robert Bowes Jackson, grandson of G. N. Jackson, for additional information used in this profile, including his photograph.

This profile was prepared by Gordon Goldsborough.

Profile revised: 13 September 2009

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