Charles Thornton Bate (February 10, 1825 – April 10, 1889) was

mayor In many countries, a mayor is the highest-ranking official in a municipal government such as that of a city or a town. Worldwide, there is a wide variance in local laws and customs regarding the powers and responsibilities of a mayor as well a ...

Ottawa Ottawa (, ; Canadian French: ) is the capital city of Canada. It is located at the confluence of the Ottawa River and the Rideau River in the southern portion of the province of Ontario. Ottawa borders Gatineau, Quebec, and forms the core ...

in 1884.Dave Mullington "Chain of Office: Biographic Sketches of Ottawa's Mayors (1847-1948)" (Renfrew, Ontario: General Store Publishing House, 2005) He was born in

Cornwall Cornwall (; kw, Kernow ) is a historic county and ceremonial county in South West England. It is recognised as one of the Celtic nations, and is the homeland of the Cornish people. Cornwall is bordered to the north and west by the Atlantic ...

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 ...

in 1825, the son of Henry Newell Bate and Lisette Meyer. The family emigrated to

St. Catharines St. Catharines is the largest city in Canada's Niagara Region and the sixth largest urban area in the province of Ontario. As of 2016, it has an area of , 136,803 residents, and a metropolitan population of 406,074. It lies in Southern Ontario ...

Ontario Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central Ca ...

in 1833. In the 1850s he founded a large wholesale grocery business, "C. T. Bate & Co.", in Ottawa, Ontario with his brother, Henry Newell Bate, who became the first head of the Ottawa Improvement Commission, later the

National Capital Commission The National Capital Commission (NCC; french: Commission de la capitale nationale, CCN) is the Crown corporation responsible for development, urban planning, and conservation in Canada's Capital Region (Ottawa, Ontario and Gatineau, Quebec), i ...

and who was knighted in 1910. Mr. Bate was mayor when Ottawa became the first city in

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

to be completely lit by

electricity Electricity is the set of physical phenomena associated with the presence and motion of matter that has a property of electric charge. Electricity is related to magnetism, both being part of the phenomenon of electromagnetism, as described ...

, after nearly two years of debate (the move having been rejected as unnecessary by Ottawa's previous mayor Charles Mackintosh). President of the Ottawa Electric Light Company and the Ottawa Gas Company, Bate served on the first board of the Bank of Ottawa, which later merged with

Scotiabank The Bank of Nova Scotia (french: link=no, Banque de Nouvelle-Écosse), operating as Scotiabank (french: link=no, Banque Scotia), is a Canadian multinational banking and financial services company headquartered in Toronto, Ontario. One of Canada ...

. In ''Ottawa, An Illustrated History'', John H. Taylor wrote, "In the late nineteenth century, only the Ottawa merchandiser C.T. Bate, appears to have had any standing in the Canadian financial community".

References

Legislative Assembly of Ontario
* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Bate, Charles Thornton 1823 births 1889 deaths Mayors of Ottawa English emigrants to pre-Confederation Ontario British emigrants to Canada Canadian people of Cornish descent Immigrants to Upper Canada