(died 2 Dec. 1987, aged 88), contractor, bridge builder. Born presumably in or near Alexandria, GC. Parents: Ranald D. Chisholm (1854-1941) and his wife Catherine Ann McGillis (1863-1928). Ranald D. Chisholm was a contractor and builder and was the son of John R. Chisholm who built St. Finnan’s Cathedral. As a young man, John Chisholm worked at construction in Washington state, Alaska, Florida and northern New York state. He formed John Chisholm Limited, of Alexandria, a construction company which concentrated on bridge-building. Over the years this small but well-known company built bridges in the SDG area, in northern Ontario, in Ottawa, and in northern New York state. The Glengarry News often reported on contracts obtained by the Chisholm company, e.g. GN 21 April 1950 (new steel bridge over Nation River at Chesterville), GN 13 Feb. 1958 (bridge over the Spanish River at Espanola, Ontario, completed, GN 29 Sept. 1960), GN 5 July 1962 (five bridge structures for the Queensway, Ottawa). John Chisholm is described in his obituary as a “builder of bridges throughout his lifetime.” He was one of the relatively few men who in the twentieth-century continued the great tradition of the nineteenth-century Glengarry-born contractors. He died at Glengarry Memorial Hospital, Alexandria. (five children) He was married on 31 Oct. 1936 to Marguerite McDonell (d. 13 May 2002, aged 91). Their son R.D. Chisholm, of Chesterville, Ontario, continued the Chisholm construction business in the fourth generation.

     John Chisholm’s brother Dugald Donald Chisholm, of Round Lake, N.Y., also headed a construction company. As incorporated by early 1956, it was expected to specialize in bridge construction. (GN 2 Feb. 1956) He was married to Helen, daughter of Donald R. Mcdonald, the MLA and well known contractor. Dugald died 15 Nov. 1984 aged 78.

Ottawa Citizen 4 Dec. 1987, Glengarry News 9 Dec. 1987 * parents’ gravestone, St. Finnan’s cemetery * obituary of his wife, GN 5 June 2002 * McCormicks 138-139 * obituary of Dugald Donald Chisholm GN 21 Nov. 1984 * obituary of his sister Mrs Mary Jane McIntosh, GN 11 Nov. 1992 * obituaries of Chisholm co. employees: Donald John McTavish, WWII veteran, GN 29 May 1991; Arthur Joseph Gagnon, 34-year employee, GN 20 April 1994; Darwin MacLennan, foreman in 1950s, Vankleek Hill Review 6 Feb. 2002 * MacGillivray & Ross 548 * Butternuts and Maple Sugar 200 * Williamstown 200, 69, on a John Chisholm Ltd bridge * Bibliography of Glengarry 92-93: a personal memory of the Chisholm company