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Provincial Archives of New Brunswick

Dictionary of Miramichi Biography

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MCBAIN, JAMES AFLECK FRASER (1841-1911)

MCBAIN, JAMES AFLECK FRASER, Presbyterian minister, St John's Church, Chatham, 1877-82; b. Ontario, 11 Nov 1841, s/o William McBain and Janet McLachlan (McLaughlan, McLaughlin); m. 1875, Mary Morrison Quin; d. Philadelphia, Pa., 1 Jun 1911.

James A. F. McBain was educated at Knox College in Toronto, graduating in 1868. After serving as a licentiate for a year, he was ordained a Presbyterian minister and inducted into the Drummondville-Chippewa charge in the Hamilton Presbytery. He served there until 1877, when he was called to the pulpit of St John's Church, Chatham. During his incumbency he participated in all church-related activities and was a popular public speaker. "Heroes and How to Become a Hero" was the title of an address he delivered in 1880 in a lecture series sponsored by the Methodist church.

McBain was granted a three-month leave of absence in 1881 for health reasons. He and his family were enumerated in the 1881 census in his wife's hometown of Port Dover, Norfolk County, Ontario. A few months after his return to Chatham, he resigned to accept a call to Georgetown, Quebec. He preached his farewell sermon in Chatham on 30 April 1882. In 1886, he took a church in Providence, R.I., of which he remained pastor until 1896. A PhB degree was conferred on him in 1888 by the Wesleyan University of Illinois and a DD in 1893 by a college in Wisconsin. He and his family were back in Ontario in 1901, but he was assigned to a church in Buffalo, N.Y., in 1904, and he was living in Philadelphia in 1910. His death occurred there in June 1911.

McBain and his wife, Mary M. Quin, were the parents of the chemist James W. McBain, who was born in Chatham in March 1882. He was a member of faculty of Bristol University in England and later of Stanford in California. Upon his retirement in 1947 he was invited by Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru to build and direct the National Chemical Laboratory at Poona, India. He finished this assignment a few months before his death in 1953. He was much honored, and accounts of his life and work appeared in Who's Who in America and other prestigious publications.

Sources

[b] census [m/d] Ontario and Pennsylvania vital records / Advance 12 Feb 1880, 3 Mar 1881, Advocate 23 Feb 1881, 5 Apr 1882, 3 May 1882; Commercial World 19 Mar 1953; Leader 10 Nov 1939; McBain biog. data; Robinson's; Times 14 Aug 1877; Walkington; World 22 Mar 1882, 15 Apr 1882


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