Andrew Trew Wood

Who was Andrew Trew Wood?

Andrew Trew Wood was a Canadian businessman and parliamentarian.

Born in Mountnorris, County Armagh, Ireland, the son of David Wood, a merchant, and Frances Bigham Trew, he emigrated to Canada sometime before 1846. He found employment at James Shepard Ryan's hardware store in Toronto in that year; in 1848, he was put in charge of the branch in Hamilton. In 1856, he opened his own business. Wood was a founding director of the Hamilton and Lake Erie Railway Company in 1869 and the Ontario Cotton Mills Company in 1881. In 1893, he became one of the owners of the Hamilton Blast Furnace Company; when it merged with the Ontario Rolling Mills Company to form the Hamilton Steel and Iron Company in 1899, Wood served as its first president.

A Liberal, he served three terms as a Member of Parliament in the Canadian House of Commons. First elected in the Canadian federal elections of 1874, the election was later declared void. He was re-elected in an 1875 by-election and again in 1896. He represented the electoral district of Hamilton in the province of Ontario.

Wood was married twice: to Elizabeth Freeman from 1851 until her death in 1860 and to Jane White in 1863.