The trail of the swinging lanterns : $b a racy, railroading review of transportation matters, methods and men — John Shaqi
The trail of the swinging lanterns : $b a racy, railroading review of transportation matters, methods and menCopeland, John Morison
History
The trail of the swinging lanterns : $b a racy, railroading review of transportation matters, methods and men
Copeland, John Morison
Railroads -- Canada
A cardinal qualification, noticeable in the majority of leaders in
Law and Commerce, is the ability to cast aside the superfluous, bare
a proposition and promptly discern the gist of the matter; this
qualification W. H. Biggar possesses, combined with a clear, well
ordered mind and a splendid memory for facts and precedent. It won him
the confidence of the late John Bell of Belleville, former General
Counsel of the Grand Trunk Railway and his legal acumen soon became
exact and expanded by contact with the ripe experiences in railway
jurisprudence of his senior who took the young lawyer into partnership
giving him charge of their civil practice. His penchant for deductions
explains his skill as a billiardist and one time enthusiastic lawn
bowler at home and on the greens at Niagara-on-the-lake, when he
was President of the Ontario Bowling Association. He is decidedly
deliberate towards all appeals for his opinion on any topic, does not
make snap decisions and would never be caught in the fix of the man who
jumped at the conclusion of a departing ferry boat and fell into the
harbor.
In the capacity of General Counsel for G.T.R.-G.T.P.R., he has dealt
with many weighty railway corporation matters and affairs of national
import and--no doubt, participated prominently with Sir Wilfrid Laurier
and his cabinet in governmental and financial endorsation of the Grand
Trunk Pacific Railway past and present.
Not long ago his interpretations of the intentions of certain clauses
respecting the Government’s attitude towards the sale of bonds of the
western section of the N.T.R., were sustained by the Privy Council
at London and that body’s vindication of Mr. Biggar’s insight was
equivalent to an immense saving in favor of the “G.T.R.”
With the strain of business he intersperses a lively participation in
golf, always evinces a keen interest in good sport and when a younger
man in Belleville owned and raced his yacht “Iolanthe” on Lake Ontario
and across the bay beside his birthplace. He was also a bit of an
angler and could pink the bull’s eye at rifle ranges. Many a time,
when a boy, have I seen him galloping past in the saddle accompanied by
(Justice) R. C. Clute, the late U. E. Thompson, then City Ticket Agent
of the G.T.R., Thomas Ritchie, T. S. Carman, publisher of the “Ontario”
and the late Senator Harry Corby. A gentleman of the old school, Will
Biggar was as prompt to perceive the charwoman’s courtesy as he would
be to acknowledge the gracious inclination of the city’s first lady.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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