Cornelius Gallagher

Who was Cornelius Gallagher?

Cornelius Gallagher was a meat merchant and politician in Alberta, Canada. He served as a municipal councillor and briefly as the third mayor of Edmonton.

Gallagher was born in New Brunswick in 1854, the son of an Irish immigrant father. After attending the schools of his birthplace, he moved west to Winnipeg with his family, and became involved in the family meat packing business, established by his father. He would soon move west again to what would later become the province of Saskatchewan, where he would continue his business, providing his product to the local police establishments and soldiers during the North-West Rebellion. After his contracts expired there, Gallagher would move again further west, to Edmonton, where he would permanently settle.

In Edmonton he established the developing town's largest meat packing business, upon land atop the banks of the North Saskatchewan River, overlooking the river valley. He would also get involved with the city's local politics, sitting on the Edmonton Town Council in the 1890s and early 1900s.