SIR JOHN A. MACDONALD
1815 - 1891

First Prime Minister of Canada

Born January 11, 1815 in Glasgow, Scotland and immigrated to Canada with his family in July 1820, settling in Kingston, Ontario. He studied law in Kingston and was admitted to the Bar on February 6, 1836.

Sir John won his first election in 1843 when he was elected to the Kingston Town Council. The following year he was elected to the Legislative Assembly for Kingston. On November 26, 1857 he became the Prime Minister of the Province of Canada (present day Ontario) and utilized this position to promote the Confederation of the British Territories in North America. He chaired the Charlottetown and Quebec Conferences of 1864 and the London Conference in 1866, which lead to the formation of Canada. For these efforts he was knighted on the day of Canada's birth July 1, 1867 as he assumed the position of Canada's first Prime Minister. Sir John A. MacDonald is acknowledged as The Father of Confederation, the single greatest influence in the construction of the transcontinental railway, and Canada's premier political figure.

He was an active member of the St. Andrews and Caledonia Society of Kingston, and in his own words, "a Piper of modest talent".