=Robertson, John Ross=, journalist. The direct descendant of Duncan R., chief of the clan of Robertson of Strowan, 1347; eldest son of the late John Robertson, wholesale dry goods merchant, Toronto, and Margaret R., daughter of Hector Sinclair, Stornoway, Island of Lewis, Scotland. He was born in Toronto, Dec. 28, 1841, and educated at Upper Canada College; married, 1st, in 1871, Maria Louisa (d. Aug., 1886), daughter of Edward Earle Matthew Gillbee, Northamptonshire, Eng., grandson of the late Rev. Dr. Edward Gillbee, Vicar of Barby, near Rugby, descendant of the noted Anthony Gilby, one of the translators of the first edition of the Geneva or “Breeches” Bible, 1560; 2ndly, 1888, Jessie Elizabeth, daughter of George B. Holland, a prominent insurance man of Toronto. While still at college he occupied his spare hours in acquiring a knowledge of the printer’s craft, and was a fairly rapid compositor; commenced a small office which he established in his father’s residence, John St., Toronto, and with a few fonts of type he issued to the boys at Upper Canada College a paper under the name of the “College Times,” which later took the name of the “Boys’ Times,” a monthly publication that existed 1857-60. He also published in succession to the “Boys’ Times,” during a year at the Model Grammar School, a newsy paper for boys called “Young Canada.” Picking up a general knowledge of setting type and small job work in city offices, his face was a familiar one in the old “Christian Guardian” office, where occasionally he used to work off odd jobs, the composition of which he did in his own office; in the “Globe” Office, where in 1859, when opportunity offered, he sometimes used to feed one of the Hoe single cylinder presses when printing the inner pages of the four-page “Globe,” for the inside was always printed the afternoon before the morning issue; in the “Leader,” where he at times worked off on a small job cylinder Hoe press, the “Grumbler,” the weekly that he issued in 1860; the following year he equipped a newspaper and job office, and issued “Sporting Life,” the first paper in Canada to be devoted to athletic sports, and subsequently continued the publication of the “Grumbler,” a weekly satirical paper, at one time edited by W. J. Rattray, W. A. Foster, and the late Chief Justice Thomas Moss. He worked on the reportorial and advertising staff of the “Leader,” when Charles Lindsey and Charles Belford were editors and Ephraim Roden, City Editor, continuing at the same time the management of his printing office. He also issued for a year, Robertson’s Canadian Railway Guide, the first of its kind in Canada, and early in 1865 joined the Toronto “Globe” staff as city Editor, in May, 1866, becoming one of the founders of the “Daily Telegraph,” a journal that had a high reputation among the newspapers of Canada. Owing to political complications it ceased publication in 1872. Prior to this, in December, 1869, Mr. Robertson, then of the “Daily Telegraph,” made a trip to the North-West, accompanied by Mr. Robert Cunningham of the “Globe.” They travelled by rail from Toronto to the end of steel at St. Cloud, Minn., and there with a French half-breed guide and a two-horse farmer’s sleigh, fully equipped, began a journey of about 400 miles over the prairie. Snow storms raged and the thermometer ran from zero to 20 below. The travellers camped every night in the woods along the Red River, and arrived in Fort Garry after a perilous journey of ten days, to be locked up by the so-called “President” Riel, in Fort Garry for a week, and only allowed out to see their friends in the town, under a guard. They both secured interesting information, but were ordered out of the territory, as Riel thought they were “dangerous characters,” so they left Fort Garry for Pembina, U.S., the boundary post, one day when the thermometer was about 40 below zero. They declared they would not do the trip again for the whole North-West. Mr. Robertson, after the “Daily Telegraph” ceased publication, proceeded to London, Eng., where for three years he acted as resident correspondent and business representative of the Toronto “Daily Globe.” On his return to Canada, 1875, he assumed the business management of the “Nation,” edited by the late Prof. Goldwin Smith. It is said that during his managership of the “Nation,” his friend, Mr. Goldwin Smith asked his opinion as to the opportunities offered for an independent daily evening paper in Toronto, and that this conversation led up to the establishment of the “Evening Telegram,” which first saw light in April, 1876. It is said to be the only daily paper in Canada that has paid its way from the start. Mr. Robertson continued to conduct it until his death, May 31, 1918.