George Albertus Cox

George Albertus Cox (May 7, 1840 – January 16, 1914) was a very prominent Canadian businessman and a member of the Canadian Senate.

He was born in Colborne, Upper Canada in 1840. He began work as a telegraph operator for the Montreal Telegraph Company and became their agent in Peterborough, Ontario. In 1861, he became an agent for the Canada Life Assurance Company. He served 7 years as mayor of Peterborough and accumulated much real estate in the Peterborough area. In 1878, he became president of the Midland Railway of Canada, later leasing it to the Grand Trunk Railway. In 1884, he founded the Central Canada Loan and Savings Company. He moved to Toronto in 1888 and became president of the Canadian Bank of Commerce in 1890.

During the 1890s, he was involved in the purchase of the Toronto Globe and the Toronto Evening Star. In 1896, he was appointed to the Senate of Canada by Sir Wilfrid Laurier. In 1898 Cox and Edward Rogers Wood incorporated the National Trust Company in Toronto that became the Scotia Trust in 1997 and part of the Bank of Nova Scotia. In 1900, he became president and general manager of Canada Life Assurance. In 1901 Cox established investment dealer Dominion Securities Corporation Limited, today a part of the Royal Bank of Canada.

By this time, he controlled many of the important Canadian companies in the insurance and finance sectors. His companies helped finance the Canadian Northern Railway, the Crow's Nest Pass Coal Company and a major utility company in Brazil. Cox was one of the few Canadian millionaires of his era. A number of the young men who got their start in Cox companies, such as William Thomas White, James Henry Gundy, Edward Robert Peacock, and Frank Porter Wood (20 year younger brother of Edward Rogers Wood).

He was also a member of the Executive Committee of the Victorian Order of Nurses, a founding member of the Canadian Red Cross and an active member of the Methodist Church.

He died in Toronto in 1914 and was buried in the Mount Pleasant Cemetery, Toronto.

External links

* [http://www.biographi.ca/009004-119.01-e.php?&id_nbr=7304 Biography at "the Dictionary of Canadian Biography Online"]
* [http://www.parl.gc.ca/information/about/people/key/bio.asp?Language=E&query=2092&s=M Federal Political Biography from the Library of Parliament]