Harry A. Corey

Who was Harry A. Corey?

Harry Allen Corey was a Canadian entrepreneur and politician. In 1924, he married Nelda Stairs, daughter of Ernest W. Stairs, a prominent Southampton, New Brunswick, farmer and a member of the Legislative Assembly of New Brunswick.

Corey entered the lumber business in his early twenties, first working in forestry in his home area in northern York County, New Brunswick before settling in Millinocket, Maine, where Great Northern Paper Company owned vast timberlands and operated the second largest newsprint mill in the state. Unusual for the time, his wife Nelda played an active role in the creation and development of the family's lumber business which led the couple to the small community of Harvey, New Brunswick, where they made their permanent home in the 1930s. Highly successful, Corey's lumber operations grew to employ more than five hundred people.

Introduced to politics by his father-in-law, in the 1944 New Brunswick general election, Corey was elected to the 40th New Brunswick Legislative Assembly as the Liberal Party's candidate for York County. He was returned to office in the 1948 election. Following his party's defeat in the 1952 election, he was voted President of the New Brunswick Liberal Association, a position he held from 1953-1959.