The Canada Company was a large private chartered British land development company, incorporated by an act of British parliament on July 27, 1825, to aid the colonization of Upper Canada. The Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is the supreme legislative body in the United Kingdom and British overseas territories The Province of Upper Canada (French Province du Haut-Canada) was a British colony located in what is now the southern portion of the Province of Ontario Canada Company assisted emigrants by providing good ships, low fares, implements and tools, and inexpensive land. Scottish novelist, John Galt, was the company's first Canadian superintendent. John Galt ( May 2, 1779 – April 11, 1839) was a Scottish Novelist The government of Upper Canada sold the company 10,000 km² of land for 341 000 pounds. Slightly less than half of the land that was purchased comprised what would become the Huron Tract, located on the eastern shore of Lake Huron, the remainder, located in other areas of Upper Canada, became Clergy reserves under the control of the Clergy Corporation. Lake Huron, bounded on the west by the US state of Michigan, and on the east by the province of Ontario, Canada, is one of the five Great Clergy Reserves were tracts of land in Upper Canada reserved for the support of " Protestant Clergy " by the Constitutional Act of 1791 The Clergy Corporation, or the Clergy Reserve Corporation of Upper Canada existed to oversee manage and lease the Clergy reserves of Upper Canada. Galt selected Guelph, Ontario as the company's headquarters. The company surveyed and subdivided this massive area, built roads, mills, and schools and advertised it to buyers in Europe. The company then assisted in the migration of new settlers, bringing them to the area by means of a boat, which the company also owned, on Lake Ontario. Lake Ontario is one of the five Great Lakes of North America.
The company's mismanagement and corruption, and its close alliance with the Tory elites, known as the Family Compact was an important contributing factor to the Upper Canada Rebellion in 1837. In the political tradition of some English-speaking countries, the term Tory has referred to a variety of political parties and Creeds since it was This article is about a group in nineteenth century Canadian history The Upper Canada Rebellion was along with the Lower Canada Rebellion in Lower Canada, a rebellion against the British colonial government in 1837 and 1838
The company was dissolved on December 18, 1953.
Bibliography
H. B. Timothy, 1984. The Galts, a Canadian odyssey,Toronto: McClelland and Stewart. McClelland & Stewart is a Canadian publishing company It was founded in 1906 as McClelland and Goodchild by John McClelland and Frederick Goodchild both originally employed ISBN 0-7710-8457-9
Online References
- Canada Company fonds at the Archives of Ontario
- Moving Here, Staying Here: The Canadian Immigrant Experience at Library and Archives Canada
See also
- British-American Land Company, the Lower Canada equivalent of the Canada Company