Memorable Manitobans: Samuel Jacob Jackson (1848-1942)

Businessman, MLA (1883-1886), MLA (1886-1888), MLA (1888-1892), MLA (1892-1895), MLA (1896-1899), MP (1904-1908).

Born at Stradhally, Ireland on 18 February 1848, son of Samuel Jackson and Elizabeth Sutcliffe. Two years later, he was brought to the Brampton area west of Toronto, where his father established a dry good store. The young Jackson departed for Manitoba in 1871 via the St. Paul route. Other members of the party included John H. Bell and his wife; James, William, and Jack Harrower; John Bryce; Andy Palmer; Harry Jickling; William McDougal; R. Dent and son; Roger Bell and his wife; John Hedley; photographer James Penrose; and John Scott and his wife.

In 1872 he worked as a clerk in the Winnipeg dry good store of John Higgins but, four years later, he left Higgins to join Cue, Stobart and Company. He was then sent abroad to London to buy import goods for the retail trade. Upon his return he bought in with his old employer, becoming a partner in the firm Higgins, Young and Jackson. Their business was apparently the first to ship grain out the west to eastern Canada. Jackson maintained the partnership until he relocated to Stonewall where he bought a plot of land, and subdivided it into lots.

On 27 February 1878, he married Ida Isabel Clark, daughter of Albert H. Clark and Isabella Sifton, and sister to O. H. Clark. They had a son, F. W. Jackson.

Politics was very much in Jackson’s blood. Between 1877 and 1880 he served as an alderman in the young city of Winnipeg. He then turned to provincial politics and was returned six times to the House between 1883 and 1899, during which period he served two terms as Speaker of the House. In 1899, he was defeated by Isaac Riley. Five years later, he was elected to the House of Commons for the constituency of Selkirk.

By the time of his death on 29 May 1942 he had become one of Manitoba’s elder statesmen and an institution in the town which he had done so much to found. At the time of his death, Stonewall, with its many finally crafted buildings and its large draw kilns, had become the most concentrated social and industrial expression of the Interlake limestone landscape.

More information:

Scratching the Ancient Ground of Manitoba’s Interlake: Stonewall and its Quarry Park by Graham A. MacDonald
Manitoba History, Number 33, Spring 1997

Sources:

A Political Manual of the Province of Manitoba and the North-West Territories by J. P. Robertson, Winnipeg: Call Printing Company, 1887.

J. A. Gemmill (editor), The Canadian Parliamentary Companion, 1887. Canadiana.org.

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

“S. J. Jackson, early day speaker, dies”, Winnipeg Tribune, 1 June 1942. [Manitoba Legislative Library, Biographical Scrapbook B9, page 114]

This profile was derived, in part, from the above article by Graham A. MacDonald.

Profile revised: 18 December 2011

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