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McDougall spent his youth playing in the ravines that are now Alexander Muir Gardens. He was 15 when he witnessed the burning of nearby Montgomery’s Tavern during the Rebellion of 1837
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public speaking and expository writing, and awareness of the modern progress of science, would give shape to McDougall’s career in to what it turned out to be
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Along with Charles Lindsey, he established the Canada Farmer, a weekly devoted to agricultural improvement, science, and literature
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McDougall was admitted to practise as an attorney and solicitor in 1847; he entered into partnership in Toronto with Ambrose Gorham, a fellow student. His legal career, however, served mainly to finance his ambition to disseminate his ideas through journalism.
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He merged it with William Graham Edmundson’s British American Cultivator to form the Agriculturist Canadian Journal.
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George Buckland joined William McDougall in 1849 to transform that paper into the Canadian Agriculturist, which was intended more pointedly to promote agriculture and colonization. In this pursuit, science was used to transcend party politics and provide a bridge to a higher goal, “the mastery of the Globe.” The word “Canadian” in the journal’s title expressed the owners’ desire “that the work should assume a distinct and national character.”
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In 1849 McDougall’s Toronto office became a meeting-place for dissatisfied reformers, who formed the Clear Grit wing.
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He began in agricultural journalism, then branched out to political journalism in 1850 with the creation of the North American. This bi-weekly was the promotional vehicle of the Clear Grit reform movement, of which William McDougall and his close associates were supporters. He did this premoting healthy living with healthy home-grown food dispite a health problem.
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In 1850 McDougall and Buckland worked through the Agricultural Association of Upper Canada to establish the Board of Agriculture of Upper Canada. The legislation, written by McDougall, defined it as a popular and responsible council mandated to assess and improve, through education and organization, the agricultural resources of the country.
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The North American published the Clear Grit platform, which included elective institutions, extension of the franchise, vote by ballot, representation by population, retrenchment, and parliamentary responsibility for public expenditures as well as trade and commerce.
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In July 1851 he lent the voice of the North American to the Hincks-Morin ministry in exchange for Clear Grit representation in the cabinet (John Rolph and Malcolm Cameron).
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In 1863, Sir William McDougall and his wife were asked by U.S President and long time friend, Abraham Lincolin, to attend the gettysburg address in his train car.
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In 1867 he changed parties again, becoming Sir John A. Macdonald’s first Conservative minister of public works
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In 1868, he travelled to London with George-Étienne Cartier. A group of Métis, under orders from Louis Riel, prevented McDougall from entering the Territory.
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On September 28, 1869, Prime Minister Macdonald named William McDougall first lieutenant-governor of the Northwest Territories.
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He was promised a seat in the Senate but illness prevented him from fulfilling his duties.
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