James Garden

For the British surgeon and academic, see O. James Garden.

James Ford Garden (February 19, 1847 – December 9, 1914)[1] was a Canadian engineer and the seventh Mayor of Vancouver, British Columbia, serving from 1898 to 1900. Under his tenure the city developed a street car system, sidewalks, road grades and water connections.

Born in Woodstock, New Brunswick, the son of H. M. G. and E. Jane (Gale) Garden, Garden was elected a member of the Canadian Society of Civil Engineers in 1894. He was a lieutenant in the Intelligence Corps in the North-West Rebellion in 1885 and was wounded in the Battle of Batoche. From 1898 to 1900, he was mayor of Vancouver.[2] He ran unsuccessfully as the Conservative candidate for the House of Commons of Canada for the electoral district of Burrard in the 1900 federal election.[3]

After an unsuccessful attempt in the 1898 provincial election, he was elected to the British Columbia Legislative Assembly as a British Columbia Conservative Party MLA for Vancouver City in 1900 and re-elected in a 1901 byelection and in the general elections of 1903 and 1907. He did not stand for a fifth term in the 1909 provincial election.

He died of a stroke at his home at 679 Granville Street, Vancouver.[4]

  1. ^ "Welcome to nginx". search.bcarchives.gov.bc.ca. Archived from the original on 27 November 2012. Retrieved 2 February 2022.
  2. ^ British Columbia from the earliest times to the present. 1914. p. 13.
  3. ^ "History of Federal Ridings since 1867".
  4. ^ "Mr. James F. Garden Passes Away". Vancouver Daily World. 9 Dec 1914. p. 1 – via Newspapers.com.