Dictionary of Glengarry Biography

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====== Cass, John Edward ====== 
(1866-17 June 1949), ashery proprietor and photographer. (John E. Cass, J. E. Cass) Born at Gouverneur, N.Y. Parents: Elijah Cass and his wife Sarah. John E. Cass, who came to Canada as a child, lived there first at Cass Bridge, near Winchester, and afterwards (from c. 1888) at Maxville, where he operated an ashery. The potash produced in the ashery was used for making soap and ammunition. The used ashes were sold to a dealer at Lucknow, Ont., for fertilizer. Local people brought fat to the Maxville ashery to be made into a rough soap by the addition of the potash (lye). Russ Dewar has suggested that a batch of potash made at the ashery about 1939 may have been the last potash made at any ashery in Canada (//Maxville (1991) //36). Probably this event took place long after regular production at the ashery had ceased. The ashery was torn down after World War II. Cass also bought ashes throughout the GC area for shipment to the United States, being noted as having shipped 200 tons from various local railway stations during his 1912 season. (//Glengarry News// 27 Feb. 1903, 16 May 1912) Cass also toured the fall fairs as a photographer producing tintypes. Later he had a photographic studio in Maxville. After being a diary farmer near Maxville, with a herd of purebred Jersey cows, he retired to Maxville. He died at Maxville, and is buried at the Maple Ridge cemetery, Winchester. He was a Baptist. He was married in 1892 to Marjorie Mackintosh or MacIntosh. His sister Grace was married to Duncan McMillan the photographer.


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<fs small>//Standard Freeholder// 23 June 1949, //Glengarry News// 24 June 1949 * //Maxville (1991) //35-37, 501-503 * MacGillivray & Ross 113-114 * Marjorie MacPherson [dau. of John E. Cass], “The Cass Ashery: from Ashes to Riches,” //The Maxville Centennial// 1:2 (Aug. 1990)
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