Robert McLaughlin (November 16, 1836 – November 23, 1921) was a Canadian industrialist and businessman. He founded McLaughlin Carriage then

McLaughlin Motor Car Company McLaughlin Motor Car Company Limited was a Canadian manufacturer of automobiles headquartered in Oshawa, Ontario. Founded by Robert McLaughlin, it once was the largest carriage manufacturing factory in the British Empire. Around 1905, Rober ...

which later became part of General Motors Canada.

Life and career

McLaughlin was born in Cavan Township,

Upper Canada The Province of Upper Canada (french: link=no, province du Haut-Canada) was a Province, part of The Canadas, British Canada established in 1791 by the Kingdom of Great Britain, to govern the central third of the lands in British North Americ ...

in 1836, the son of an Irish immigrant, John McLaughlin. He moved to Darlington Township with his family in 1837. He married Mary Smith in 1864,"The McLaughlins - Sleighs, Buggys, Cars and Ginger Ale". ''The Clarington Promoter'', September 2016, pages 1 and 4. by Myno Van Dyke and bought a plot of land near the village of Tyrone from his father. He built a house and a workshop, and began building cutters and wagons. By 1869 his workshop was too small, and he set up a

carriage A carriage is a private four-wheeled vehicle for people and is most commonly horse-drawn. Second-hand private carriages were common public transport, the equivalent of modern cars used as taxis. Carriage suspensions are by leather strapping ...

works at

Enniskillen, Ontario Enniskillen is a township in the Canadian province of Ontario, within Lambton County. It is located at the intersection of Highway 21 (Oil Heritage Road) and Rokeby Line. The economy of the township is based on agriculture. It was named after Si ...

. McLaughlin also taught Sunday school in the

Presbyterian Presbyterianism is a part of the Reformed tradition within Protestantism that broke from the Roman Catholic Church in Scotland by John Knox, who was a priest at St. Giles Cathedral (Church of Scotland). Presbyterian churches derive their n ...

church there. In 1877, he moved his growing business to

Oshawa Oshawa ( , also ; 2021 population 175,383; CMA 415,311) is a city in Ontario, Canada, on the Lake Ontario shoreline. It lies in Southern Ontario, approximately east of Downtown Toronto. It is commonly viewed as the eastern anchor of the ...

to take advantage of available labour and railway access in the larger urban centre. He established the Oshawa Carriage Works, later known as McLaughlin Carriage. In 1878, he married Sarah Jane Parr; his first wife had died of consumption. His sons George William and Sam also became involved in the business (George later served as of GM Canada), but eldest son John James left to become a chemist, started a soft drink company in Toronto, and invented

Canada Dry Canada Dry is a brand of soft drinks founded in 1904 and owned since 2008 by the American company Dr Pepper Snapple (now Keurig Dr Pepper). For over 100 years, Canada Dry has been known mainly for its ginger ale, though the company also manuf ...

ginger ale.Arculus, Paul. ''Durant's Right Hand Man'', Freisen Press, 2011. page 45. During the 1880s, McLaughlin designed a new type of steering gear for carriages; through a distributor, the company sold about 20,000 of these gears to other carriage companies.Petrie, Ray. ''Sam McLaughlin'', Fitzhenry & Whiteside, 1975. pages 11-12. McLaughlin served on the board of health and board of water commissioners at Oshawa and also served as mayor. He was the first president of the local

YMCA YMCA, sometimes regionally called the Y, is a worldwide youth organization based in Geneva, Switzerland, with more than 64 million beneficiaries in 120 countries. It was founded on 6 June 1844 by George Williams in London, originally ...

. After his carriage works was destroyed in a fire in 1899, he relocated to

Gananoque Gananoque ( ) is a town in the Leeds and Grenville area of Ontario, Canada. The town had a population of 5,383 year-round residents in the 2021 Canadian Census, as well as summer residents sometimes referred to as "Islanders" because of the Tho ...

but returned to Oshawa the following year, rebuilding the business with a loan from the city. In 1901, he married Eleanor McCulloch after the death of his second wife. In 1907, on the advice of his sons Sam and George, he set up the

to manufacture automobiles. McLaughlin supported tariffs restricting trade with the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...

and opposed Sir

Wilfrid Laurier Sir Henri Charles Wilfrid Laurier, ( ; ; November 20, 1841 – February 17, 1919) was a Canadian lawyer, statesman, and politician who served as the seventh prime minister of Canada from 1896 to 1911. The first French Canadian prime mini ...

free trade Free trade is a trade policy that does not restrict imports or exports. It can also be understood as the free market idea applied to international trade. In government, free trade is predominantly advocated by political parties that hold econ ...

proposals in 1910–11. In 1915, he sold off his carriage manufacturing business. In 1918, his companies were taken over by General Motors. McLaughlin died at Oshawa in 1921 of

colon cancer Colorectal cancer (CRC), also known as bowel cancer, colon cancer, or rectal cancer, is the development of cancer from the colon or rectum (parts of the large intestine). Signs and symptoms may include blood in the stool, a change in bowe ...

. His brother James was a doctor and member of the Ontario assembly.

References

External links

Biography at the ''Dictionary of Canadian Biography Online''Oshawa MuseumMcLaughlin family fonds
Archives of Ontario {{DEFAULTSORT:McLaughlin, Robert 1836 births 1921 deaths Canadian automotive pioneers Canadian people of Irish descent Mayors of Oshawa Canadian founders of automobile manufacturers Deaths from colorectal cancer Deaths from cancer in Ontario