Jeffry Hall Brock (1850 - 1915)

Ancestors

Biography

Jeffry Hall Brock grew up in Guelph, Ontario, the son of Thomas Brock and Eleanor Thompson . He was the youngest of eleven children.

In 1876 when he was living in Toronto he married Louisa Adelaide Clara Gillespie,^[1] with whom he had twelve children.

He was a business executive in Troy, New York, for RG Dunn & Company from 1869 to 1872 then moved to Toronto to help his brother William Rees at Ogilvy and Company until 1877 when he and his brother started a dry goods business called W. R. Brock and Brother in Winnipeg. He didn't move to Winnipeg until George Frederick Carruthers offered him a partnership position in a major insurance company.^[2]

In 1890/1891 he founded Great-West Life, in response to rising discontent in Western Canada with the insurance industry (all based in Eastern Canada; since Canadian companies represented only 29% of the industry, premiums were very high). He also started the insurance company because farmers and retailers in Western Canada needed capital funding and he wanted to help them. The company expanded to Eastern Canada in 1895 when it acquired Saint John based Dominion Safety Fund Life Association and the United States in 1906 when it began operating in North Dakota (American business became separate from Canadian operations in 1979 and became The Great-West Life & Annuity Insurance Company). Great-West Life was incorporated on August 28, 1891; Brock led the company alongside Winnipeg mayor Alexander Macdonald, who was its first president.

He helped found the liberal party of Manitoba. He also served as acting warden of Holy Trinity Anglican Church, joined Manitoba Health by appointment in 1893 and was director of the Northern Trusts Company. In 1905 he became a founding member of the St. Charles Country Club.

He died in California in 1915.^[3]

Sources

1. ↑ "Ontario Marriages, 1869-1927," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:FMNN-64C : 11 March 2018), Jeffry Hall Brock and Louisa Adelaide Clara Gillespie, 06 Sep 1876; citing registration , Toronto, York, Ontario, Canada, Archives of Ontario, Toronto; FHL microfilm 1,863,648.
2. ↑ "Canada Census, 1881," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:MVD1-WMK : 20 May 2019), Jeffry H. Brock, Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada; from "1881 Canadian Census." Database with images. Ancestry. (www.ancestry.com : 2008); citing Jeffry H. Brock, citing Library and Archives Canada, Ottawa, Ontario.
3. ↑ "California, County Birth and Death Records, 1800-1994", database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:QGRN-6KQX : 26 September 2019), Jaffry H Brock, 1915.

• Wikipedia contributors, "Jeffry Hall Brock," Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Jeffry_Hall_Brock&oldid=918791801 (accessed February 2, 2020).

• Richard E. Bennett, “BROCK, JEFFRY HALL,” in Dictionary of Canadian Biography, vol. 14, University of Toronto/Université Laval, 2003–, accessed February 2, 2020, http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/brock_jeffry_hall_14E.html.