CLARK, R. CORRY (1866-1945)

CLARK, R. CORRY, businessman; b. Paisley, Scotland, 11 Dec 1866, s/o Robert Clark and Ellen Corry; unmarried; d. Newcastle, 6 Jun 1945.

R. Corry Clark came from a family whose surname was closely identified in the 19th century with the great cotton thread mills of Paisley, Scotland. Having well-to-do parents, he was sent away to be educated at the college school of the University of London and in Germany and Switzerland. He was later in business with his father, who was a partner in Clark, Skillings & Co., spool manufacturers, of Glasgow and Boston. Clark, Skillings had a corporate link with the American Bobbin, Spool, and Shuttle Co., which owned a large number of spool factories in the United States.

In 1891 the American Bobbin firm set up a mill at Ox Brook in the Sugary (near Maple Glen) to saw birch spoolwood. The mill was managed by Charles D. Manny, the father of Louise Manny, who had previously been in charge of the American Bobbin Works at Gilead, Me. In 1893 Clark, Skillings erected a large spoolwood manufacturing plant in Newcastle on the site of the former spool factory of M. Russell & Son, and this also came under Manny's management. When the Newcastle mill opened, the one at Ox Brook was dismantled, but smaller Clark, Skillings mills were later conducted near Beaverbrook Station and elsewhere on the Miramichi. The company contracted for birch logs in New Brunswick, Quebec, Newfoundland, and elsewhere, which it processed for shipment overseas.

In 1899 R. Corry Clark came to Newcastle from Scotland as representative and purchasing agent for Clark, Skillings, & Co. in Canada. With his participation, the firm enjoyed a lengthy period of prosperity, and he acquired a considerable personal fortune. The spoolwood industry continued to flourish for a time after his death, but it came to a rather abrupt end in the 1960s when plastic took the place of wood as the material of choice for spools.

Clark sat on the Miramichi Hospital Board from the date of hospital's founding in 1916 and was, at different times, treasurer, secretary, president, and honorary president of the board. He was president of the Highland Society in 1918 and again in 1932/33. In 1925, with G. Percival Burchill and others, he was a founding director of the Miramichi Golf and Country Club. He was also a member of the Beaverbrook Scholarship Committee and took an active part in charitable work.