Arthur James Nesbitt (August 19, 1880 – October 24, 1954) was a

Canadian Canadians (french: Canadiens) are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of ...

businessman and

philanthropist Philanthropy is a form of altruism that consists of "private initiatives, for the Public good (economics), public good, focusing on quality of life". Philanthropy contrasts with business initiatives, which are private initiatives for private goo ...

. He was a cofounder of

Nesbitt, Thomson and Company Nesbitt, Thomson and Company was a Canadian stock brokerage firm that was founded in 1912 by Arthur J. Nesbitt and Peter A. T. Thomson. The firm was headquartered on St. James Street in Montreal, Quebec.Nesbitt, A. R. Deane. ''Dry Goods & Pic ...

stockbroker A stockbroker is a regulated broker, broker-dealer, or registered investment adviser (in the United States) who may provide financial advisory and investment management services and execute transactions such as the purchase or sale of stocks an ...

age and the Power Corporation of Canada.

Biography

Salesman and Royal Securities

Born in

Saint John, New Brunswick Saint John is a seaport city of the Atlantic Ocean located on the Bay of Fundy in the province of New Brunswick, Canada. Saint John is the oldest incorporated city in Canada, established by royal charter on May 18, 1785, during the reign of Ki ...

, Arthur Nesbitt first worked as a dry goods salesman, peddling products to area merchants. During the course of his travels he met Peter A. T. Thomson, a pickle salesman for the Canadian arm of the H. J. Heinz Company. The two struck up a friendship and would promote each other to their customers. Nesbitt was hired by British newspaper magnate Max Aitken, better known as Lord Beaverbrook, to work for his

Royal Securities Corporation Royal Securities Corporation Limited was a stock brokerage firm founded in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada in early 1903 by John F. Stairs, its first president. The company was the first brokerage firm to be opened east of Montreal, Quebec, the then ...

stock brokerage. In 1906, after undergoing training in

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

, Aitken sent Nesbitt to open a Royal Securities office in Montreal, Quebec, the then financial center of Canada. Nesbitt prospered while working for Royal Securities.

Nesbitt, Thomson and Company

Nesbitt had remained in touch with his friend Peter Thomson, and in 1912 the two decided to open up their own stock brokerage, Nesbitt, Thomson and Company, with offices on St. James Street in Montreal and in

Hamilton, Ontario Hamilton is a port city in the Canadian province of Ontario. Hamilton has a population of 569,353, and its census metropolitan area, which includes Burlington and Grimsby, has a population of 785,184. The city is approximately southwest of T ...

. The business provided financing for the burgeoning

mining Mining is the extraction of valuable minerals or other geological materials from the Earth, usually from an ore body, lode, vein, seam, reef, or placer deposit. The exploitation of these deposits for raw material is based on the economic via ...

and

natural resource Natural resources are resources that are drawn from nature and used with few modifications. This includes the sources of valued characteristics such as commercial and industrial use, aesthetic value, scientific interest and cultural value. O ...

industries and underwrote stock and bond issues for the many new

electric power Electric power is the rate at which electrical energy is transferred by an electric circuit. The SI unit of power is the watt, one joule per second. Standard prefixes apply to watts as with other SI units: thousands, millions and billions o ...

generating companies that were springing up across the country. Nesbitt, Thomson and Company grew to become one of the largest brokerage houses in Canada.

Power Corporation and other holdings

By 1925, Nesbitt, Thomson and Company held major equity positions in a number of major electric utilities. The two partners established Power Corporation of Canada as a holding company for their substantial interests, with Nesbitt serving as its first president. In 1927, Nesbitt purchased the Ogilvy

department store A department store is a retail establishment offering a wide range of consumer goods in different areas of the store, each area ("department") specializing in a product category. In modern major cities, the department store made a dramatic app ...

in Montreal that his son James Aird would successfully run for more than 50 years. Nesbitt's second son,

Arthur Deane Arthur Deane FRSE MRIA (1875 – 1954) was a Scottish botanist and photographer. He was the first director of botany at the Ulster Museum. He specialised in trees and in photo-micrographs of cell samples. Life He was born in Glasgow on 6 June ...

, would follow in his father's footsteps at the helm of the family's brokerage/investment business.

Philanthropy

Arthur Nesbitt supported various benevolent causes, including a gift to the hospital in his

New Brunswick New Brunswick (french: Nouveau-Brunswick, , locally ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is one of the three Maritime provinces and one of the four Atlantic provinces. It is the only province with both English and ...

hometown to build a

tuberculosis Tuberculosis (TB) is an infectious disease usually caused by '' Mycobacterium tuberculosis'' (MTB) bacteria. Tuberculosis generally affects the lungs, but it can also affect other parts of the body. Most infections show no symptoms, in ...

sanitarium for children, in memory of his parents.

Personal life

Funeral monument of Arthur James Nesbitt

By 1910, he was married with two sons and had purchased a home in the Westmount area of Montreal. On his death in 1954, Nesbitt was interred in the

Mount Royal Cemetery Opened in 1852, Mount Royal Cemetery is a terraced cemetery on the north slope of Mount Royal in the borough of Outremont in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Temple Emanu-El Cemetery, a Reform Judaism burial ground, is within the Mount Royal grounds. Th ...

in Montreal. In 1989 his grandson A.R. Deane Nesbitt published his life story, ''Dry Goods & Pickles: The Story of Nesbitt, Thomson''.A.R. Deane Nesbitt. ''Dry Goods & Pickles: The Story of Nesbitt, Thomson''. (1989 - Nesbitt – Toronto)