“Dr. Buller will be especially remembered because of three inventions: (1) the Buller eye-shield (composed of a watch-crystal and strips of sticking-plaster and oftenest employed to protect an unaffected eye when its fellow is afflicted with gonorrheal infection). (2) Temporary tying of the cacalieuli for the prevention of wound infection in operations on the eye-ball. (3) The Buller trial frame. Yet his inventions and investigations were very numerous and, for the most part, successful in every way. Thus, concerning his investigation into ‘Methyl Alcohol Blindness,’ conducted jointly with Dr. Casey A. Wood, De Schweintz declares the work to be ‘by far the most important contribution to the subject and one to which too high praise cannot be given.’” Scientists, members of the profession and all mankind delighted to honor him because of what he had accomplished. High above any desire for pecuniary reward was his deep interest in humanity and an earnest purpose to make his life a serviceable one to his fellowmen.
WILLIAM WATSON OGILVIE.
Foremost among those men whose life’s record seems an inseparable part of Canada’s industrial and commercial growth during the period of their activities, is that of William Watson Ogilvie, whose identification with the milling business covered a period of nearly a half century. The position of Mr. Ogilvie in this important industry was unquestionably at the head. He did more to develop it than any other man before or since his time, and the great success he achieved was fully merited.
William W. Ogilvie was born at Cote St. Michel, Montreal, February 14, 1835, of Scotch ancestry, and belonged to the Banffshire family of that name. He received his education in Montreal schools, and in entering on a business career chose that which was his by inheritance, the milling business.
His grandfather, Alexander, erected in 1801, a mill at Jacques Cartier, near Quebec, where was ground the first flour under British rule that was ever exported to Europe. This old mill was really the foundation of the immense business that was built up by W. W. Ogilvie. In 1860 he entered into partnership with his brothers, Alexander and John, grain merchants and proprietors of a mill at Lachine Rapids. The growth of the business was soon responsible for the building of the Glenora Flour Mills on the Lachine canal. The business continued to grow, and the Ogilvies erected mills at Goderich and Seaforth, Ontario and Winnipeg, Manitoba; and later, the Royal Mills at Montreal. The three brothers operated together until 1874, when the elder brother retired, and on the death of his brother, John, in 1888 the entire business management devolved upon William W. Ogilvie, whose well developed powers were entirely adequate to the demands made upon him in the further control and management of this extensive enterprise, of which he became the head. In addition to the properties mentioned, Mr. W. W. Ogilvie afterward purchased the City Mills, Montreal, and at the time of his death had accepted plans for a very large mill at Fort William. Some years previous to his demise to facilitate the administration of his western business, the Ogilvie Milling Company of Winnipeg was formed in which Mr. Ogilvie was the dominant factor. The Ogilvie Flour Mills Company, of the present, was organized in 1903 and is practically the successor of the Ogilvie Milling Company and various other interests in this line, belonging to Mr. Ogilvie’s estate.
WILLIAM W. OGILVIE
Mr. Ogilvie and his brother John were the pioneer wheat buyers in Manitoba. He had traveled through Canada’s present wheat fields years before they were cultivated and many times afterwards. From the first small shipment of five hundred bushels from Manitoba in 1876, the shipments, in Mr. Ogilvie’s lifetime, to his own mills increased until they reached the enormous total of eight million bushels of No. 1 hard wheat, all purchased by his own expert buyers from the farmers, at his seventy elevators, extending all over the wheat section of Ontario and the northwest.
In the manufacture of flour Mr. Ogilvie spent a lifetime and spared neither time, labor or expense in bringing his product to the very acme of perfection. By steady industry and indomitable energy and most of all the superior quality of his products, upheld at all cost, the business grew until it not only became the largest of its kind in the Dominion, but the most extensive flour business in the world controlled by one man.