Alexander Begg (May 7, 1825 – March 19, 1905) was a Scottish-Canadian teacher, civil servant and journalist.
He came to
Belleville,
Upper Canada
The Province of Upper Canada () was a Province, part of The Canadas, British Canada established in 1791 by the Kingdom of Great Britain, to govern the central third of the lands in British North America, formerly part of the Province of Queb ...
in 1846 and taught in public schools in neighbouring towns until 1850, when he helped found the ''Bowmanville Messenger'',
Oshawa
Oshawa is a city in Ontario, Canada, on the Lake Ontario shoreline. It lies in Southern Ontario, approximately east of downtown Toronto. It is commonly viewed as the eastern anchor of the Greater Toronto Area and of the Golden Horseshoe. It ...
's first newspaper. He later founded papers including the Brighton ''Sentinel'' and the Trenton ''Advocate'' and would go on to write for the ''Toronto Daily Mail'' as a correspondent in the West.
After starting a ranch in Alberta with one of his sons in 1882, Begg joined his other son as a reporter for the ''
Daily British Colonist'' in
Victoria
Victoria most commonly refers to:
* Queen Victoria (1819–1901), Queen of the United Kingdom and Empress of India
* Victoria (state), a state of Australia
* Victoria, British Columbia, Canada, a provincial capital
* Victoria, Seychelles, the capi ...
.
In 1872 he had been Ontario's emigration commissioner in
Glasgow
Glasgow is the Cities of Scotland, most populous city in Scotland, located on the banks of the River Clyde in Strathclyde, west central Scotland. It is the List of cities in the United Kingdom, third-most-populous city in the United Kingdom ...
. In BC he continued to work to encourage emigration from
Scotland
Scotland is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It contains nearly one-third of the United Kingdom's land area, consisting of the northern part of the island of Great Britain and more than 790 adjac ...
and the provincial government made him commissioner in charge of settling a community of
crofter
A croft is a traditional Scottish term for a fenced or enclosed area of land, usually small and arable, and usually, but not always, with a crofter's dwelling thereon. A crofter is one who has tenure and use of the land, typically as a ten ...
-
fishermen
A fisherman or fisher is someone who captures fish and other animals from a body of water, or gathers shellfish.
Worldwide, there are about 38 million commercial and subsistence fishers and fish farmers. Fishermen may be professional or recr ...
on the West Coast. He styled himself C.C. (for "Crofter Commissioner") to distinguish himself from another
Alexander Begg also working as a journalist in Victoria at the time.
Publications
*Letters on the situation in the north west, by Julius, as they appeared in the Montreal "Gazette" (
ontreal 1881);
*
History of British Columbia from its earliest discovery to the present time' (Toronto, 1894; repr. 1972);
*
Report relative to the Alaskan boundary question' (Victoria, 1900)
*''A sketch of the successful missionary work of William Duncan amongst the Indian tribes in northern British Columbia, from 1858 to 1901'' (Victoria, 1901)
*
Statement of facts regarding the Alaska boundary question', compiled for the government of British Columbia (R. Wolfenden, Victoria, 1902).
References
* Jill Wade,
Alexander Begg in Dictionary of Canadian Biography online, 2000.
1825 births
1905 deaths
Canadian newspaper journalists
Canadian male journalists
Canadian people of Scottish descent
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