William Galt

William Galt, the present manager of the Toronto Ferry Company, is a gentleman whose natural ability and conscientious performance of duty made his services in constant demand. He was born at Kilmarnock, county of Ayr, Scotland, in 1861, a son of Capt. Alexander Galt, who served as chief of police at Kilmarnock, and passed away in 1868.

The early education of William Galt, was acquired in his native town, where he displayed the close application of the "reasoning Scott," and laid the foundation for the thorough training he afterward secured in the schools at Glasgow. His naturally keen perceptive faculties were strengthened by his out-door sports, and he soon rose to the front rank in the athletic world. He took an active part in the Association football, being for several years a member of the Champion county team, and has played against all the principal teams in England and Ireland, where he won the highest praise from the devotees of the great game for his strength, alertness, and his rigid conformity to the established rules. He is a proud possessor of several gold medals won in open competition, and in all the contests in which he took part he never had the misfortune to win less than the first prize.

His brother, John Galt, who has won fame as an engineer and waterworks expert, in the Dominion, urged his younger brother to cross the Atlantic and lend his youth and strength to the New World. Accordingly in 1884, William Galt bade farewell to the familiar hills and waving heather, and turned his face westward. After his arrival in Canada he was for two and a half years local manager at Montreal for the Boiler Inspection & Insurance Co., of Canada. In 1887 he resigned that position to go to Toronto, where until April, 1898, he was a member of the reportorial and editorial staff of the Toronto Mail and Empire. On April 15, 1898, he was appointed manager of the Toronto Ferry Company and entered at once upon the actual discharge of the duties pertaining to that position.

That Manager William Galt has by his methodical way of doing business, done good work for the Toronto Ferry Company, there can be no doubt. He has convinced the public that they could depend on a regular service to Toronto Island, regardless of the weather, and the result is an increase in the popularity of Hanlan's Point as a summer resort. The point has undergone remarkable changes for the better, one of the greatest improvements being the construction of the magnificent bicycle race track and baseball and lacrosse oval; that quarter-mile track is noted all over the continent, and has been the scene of some of the fastest racing ever done. The enlarging and refitting in modern style of the "Hotel Hanlan," as well as the exquisite landscape gardening, have lent an additional charm. Messrs. M. A. and Fred Thomas, managers of the hotel, father and son, are two well-known hotel men in Canada, and enjoy the patronage of many Americans, who spend their summers at the Hotel Hanlan, one of the garden spot of the world.

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Volume I

This version of Volume II is based, with permission, on the work of the great volunteers at the Marine Captains Biographies site. To them goes the credit for reorganizing the content into some coherent order. The biographies in the original volume are in essentially random order.

Some of the transcription work was also done by Brendon Baillod, who maintains an excellent guide to Great Lakes Shipwreck Research.