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James Laidlaw (politician)

Canadian politician (1822-1905)

Correspondence, annotated notebooks and portrait silhouettes prepared for research
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Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionMar 29, 2026
Entity authorityQ6137710 ↗
Source-derived summary

James Laidlaw (July 7, 1822 – March 3, 1905) was a Canadian farmer and politician. He represented Wellington South in the Legislative Assembly of Ontario as a Liberal member from 1879 to 1886.

He was born in Roxburghshire, Scotland in 1822 and came to Guelph, Upper Canada with his family in 1831. In 1848, he married Mary Beattie. He served on the council for Guelph Township, also serving as reeve and warden for Wellington County. Laidlaw served as manager for the Government farm and Agriculture College at Guelph in 1875.

External links

Ontario Legislative Assembly parliamentary history

Gemmill, J.A., ed. (1885). The Canadian Parliamentary Companion. Ottawa: J. Durie & Son.

Editorial summary

“James Laidlaw (politician)” enters the record as canadian politician (1822-1905). Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what James, Laidlaw and politician can confirm, complicate or overturn.

Editorial reviewStrongest as a route into the people, institutions and dated events that shaped the subject’s public record. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1822, 1905, 1879, 1886—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1822-07-07. Its strongest next move is a source search built around James, Laidlaw and politician.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

“James Laidlaw (politician)” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, James, Laidlaw and politician provides the most credible route into that argument.

Evidence profile

The entry’s evidential value lies in the named roles, institutions and publications that can be tested against primary documentation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Mar 29, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q6137710. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1822, 1905, 1879 and 1886.

Critical limits

Public reputation and documentary evidence do not always develop together; absence from a summary is not evidence of historical absence. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Read biographical claims against dates, named institutions and the cited references. Distinguish a subject’s later reputation from evidence produced during their lifetime.

Best used for
  • Establishing names and roles
  • Building a first chronology
  • Locating cited institutions
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Personal papers, civil or court records, institutional files and the scholarship cited by the source.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “James Laidlaw (politician)”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow James Laidlaw (politician) primary sources, James Laidlaw (politician) archive and James research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

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  3. How has the subject’s reputation changed across later accounts?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “James Laidlaw (politician)” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.