Businessman, rower.
Born at Toronto, Ontario on 18 September 1849, he came to Manitoba in 1882 and lived at Emerson for five years, working as an appraiser for the Canada Permanent Savings and Loan Company (later the Canada Permanent Mortage Corporation). He moved to Winnipeg in 1887 as the company’s inspector for Manitoba and the North West Territories, rising to General Manager. He lived in Winnipeg for the rest of his life, except for a five-year period (1900-1905) in Toronto. He retired in 1920. On 24 August 1881, he married Fanny Cole Baker (1857-1938) at Hamilton, Ontario. They had five children: Marion Rachel Harris (1883-1966, wife of Ralph Hoskins), Guy Mewburn Harris (1885-1949), Marjorie Charles Harris (1890-1970, wife of William Thomson Chisholm), Thomas Dennie Harris (1892-1956), and Sydney Baker Harris (1896-1923). Active in rowing, he was one of the founders of the Winnipeg Canoe Club and served as its first Commodore (1893). He died at his Winnipeg home, 215 Harvard Avenue, on 27 June 1938 and was buried in the St. John’s Cathedral Cemetery.
Ontario marriage registration, Ancestry.
1901 Canada census, Automated Genealogy.
“G. F. R. Harris, here in ’82, has 86th birthday,” Winnipeg Tribune, 18 September 1935, page 4.
Birth, marriage, and death registrations, Manitoba Vital Statistics.
“Founder of Canoe Club dies,” Winnipeg Free Press, 28 June 1938, page 1.
Obituaries and burial transcriptions, Manitoba Genealogical Society.
We thank Colin Harris for providing additional information used here.
This page was prepared by Gordon Goldsborough.
Page revised: 1 December 2019
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