Memorable Manitobans: Robert “Bob” Jacob (1879-1944)

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Robert Jacob
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Lawyer, sportsman, MLA (1918-1920), MLA (1923-1927).

Born at Baltensborough, Somersetshire, England, son of John Jacob and Ellen Kate Lutley, brother of Albert Ernest Jacob, he came to Gladstone in 1892. He was educated there and at St. John’s College (class of 1901). He was proud that he had worked his way through school, as a farmhand and as an apprentic printer at the Gladstone Age. He then articled to a Gladstone lawyer, Thomas Morton, was called to the Manitoba Bar in 1906 and practised law at Winnipeg in partnership with A. E. Moore, later Jacob and Morton.

He was a member of the Winnipeg School Board (1913-1923). Elected as a Liberal in a January 1918 provincial by-election, he was a candidate in the 1920 provincial general election but was defeated. Elected an Independent MLA from North Winnipeg in 1922, he served for a time as provincial Attorney General and chairman of the unemployment advisory board.

On 20 August 1907, he married Margaret Morton (1881-1928), daughter of Thomas Lewis Morton, and subsequently had four children: Helen Mary Margaret Jacob (1908-?), John Robert Morton “Jack” Jacob (1911-1981), Honora Elisabeth Jacob (1913-?, wife of William George Reid), and Thomas Jacob (1921-?). He was a footballer, golfer (member of the Assiniboine Golf Club and Elmhurst Golf and Country Club, President of the Canadian Golf Association), and lawn bowler (member, St. John’s Lawn Bowling Club and founder of the Manitoba Lawn Bowling Association). He was also a curler, serving as President of the St. John’s Curling Club (1913-1914) and two terms as President of the Manitoba Curling Association (1926-1927, 1937-1938). He was a member of the AF & AM (King Edward Lodge).

He died at his Winnipeg home, 61 Cathedral Avenue, on 13 March 1944 and was buried in the St. John’s Cathedral Cemetery.

See also:

Historic Sites of Manitoba: Hawthorne Lodge (729 River Road, RM of St. Andrews)

Sources:

Birth registrations, Manitoba Vital Statistics.

1921 Canada census, Ancestry.

Pioneers and Prominent People of Manitoba, Winnipeg: Canadian Publicity Company, 1925.

“Robert Jacob, barrister, dies,” Winnipeg Free Press, 14 March 1944. [Manitoba Legislative Library, Biographical Scrapbook B9, page 149]

Obituary [John Robert Morton Jacob], Winnipeg Free Press, 3 December 1981, page 67.

Dictionary of Manitoba Biography by John M. “Jack” Bumsted, Winnipeg: University of Manitoba Press, 1999.

Obituaries and burial transcriptions, Manitoba Genealogical Society.

We thank Oliver Bernuetz (Legislative Library of Manitoba), Rick Mutton, and Darryl Toews for providing additional information used here.

This page was prepared by Gordon Goldsborough.

Page revised: 3 March 2024

Memorable Manitobans

Memorable Manitobans

This is a collection of noteworthy Manitobans from the past, compiled by the Manitoba Historical Society. We acknowledge that the collection contains both reputable and disreputable people. All are worth remembering as a lesson to future generations.

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