(15 Aug. 1846-23 July 1936), contractor. (A. D. McDougall, Alex D. McDougall; was familiarly known as “A. D.”) Born in western GC or in eastern Stormont County, on the South Branch, near Cornwall. The location almost certainly was Lot A, Concession 3, Cornwall Township. Parents: Duncan McDougall and his wife Grace Cameron.

     Alexander Duncan is described in his obituary as having “had charge of construction of enough railroad to span two thirds of the continent” and as having “won a distinguished name as a builder of bridges, tunnels and docks.” The future contractor’s upbringing, probably modest enough, was on his father’s farm. From age fifteen, he worked for some two years in his uncle’s quarry (probably near his father’s farm), before leaving Canada for the United States. At the age of 17 or 18, he was working as a construction foreman in Wisconsin. He began taking contracts of his own on railway construction when he was in his mid-20s, but also for some years combined independent contracting with working as a foreman for others. Not only a highly successful railway builder, he also constructed buildings including paper mills. He was married at the age of 28 to Annie Scott of Hamilton, Ont. He lived for the last 25 years of his life in Portland, Ore. (two children surviving him) He organized the firm McDougall and Duffy in 1895. In 1902 it became the firm A. D. McDougall and Son, which in the following nine years “completed a great amount of railroad construction in Oregon, Washington and Montana.” Later, McDougall was associated with the firms Guthrie-McDougall and A. Guthrie & Co., which carried on a wide range of general construction work.

     He died at his home in Portland. Roman Catholic. He was buried in the “family mausoleum” at Mount Calvary Cemetery, Portland. At the time of his death he was described as being, through his long time in the work, “the dean of construction men in this country,” having among his great number of friends “most of the prominent railroad executives and construction men of the Middle West and Pacific Coast.” Shortly before his death, the Oregon Journal printed two remarkable articles based on an interview with McDougall. Priding himself on still being at work at the age of 86, he told the story of his life with reminiscences of his early days as one of the fighting foreman who ruled the tough construction crews of his youth. So far as has been recorded, his work as a construction man seems to have been wholly in the United States. He was described as an “intimate friend” of the Canadian railway magnate, James J. Hill, and he is quoted by a journalist as calling Archbishop Christie (1850-1925) “my old pal” and one of his “lifelong friends” (this was Alexander Christie, archbishop of Oregon); another lifelong friend he much valued was John F. Stevens (1853-1943), who was chief engineer of the Panama Canal and chairman of the Isthmian Canal Commission.

     He was the brother of Aeneas, George, and J. A. McDougall, all of them in the present dictionary. When his mother died on the South Branch on 6 April 1887, leaving four sons who were thriving contractors in the United States, Alex D. came home from Mankato, Minn., to attend the funeral, while his brothers George and Allan came home for the same purpose from Republic, Mich.

     A. D. McDougall’s son Natt, who was born in Hamilton, Ont., in 1879 and graduated from Marquette University, and was described in the interview of 1936 as having been a partner of his father for 37 years, continued his father’s career in construction work. Natt McDougall was married to Christena or Christina, the daughter of John J. Kennedy. In 1924 it was reported that Natt and his father were “the leading spirits in the Guthrie Construction Company,” which was involved in the Great Northern’s double track project in Montana. (Cornwall Standard 13 March 1924) The following year, Natt and his father were involved in building an immense tunnel in the Cascade Mountains, Washington state. (Cornwall Standard 17 Dec. 1925) His construction company, The Natt McDougall Co., which carried out many large projects, was formed in 1932 with Natt McDougall as president. He died in Portland, 3 Sept. 1954. (three children) The descendants of A. D. McDougall were still in the construction business in the 1990s.

Oregon Journal, 23 & 24 July 1936 (valuable biog. detail, with portrait) (QF), Wisconsin State Journal 24 July 1936, Oregonian 24 & 25 July 1936, Standard Freeholder 19 Aug. 1936 (from Daily Journal of Commerce, of Portland) * Fred Lockley, “Impressions and Observations of the Journal Man,” Oregon Journal, 13 & 15 June 1936 * Duncan MacDonald, ed., St. Andrews West (RC) Parish Register, Part II (1984) 229 (birth) * for more on parents, see also entry for Aeneas McDougall * mother’s death: DTL Standard Freeholder 7 April 1945, based on Cornwall Freeholder 8 April 1887 * friends: Cornwall Standard 17 Dec. 1925 (James J. Hill), Lockely interview (Archbishop Christie and John F. Stevens) * personal information * Portland city directories 1912, 1915, 1920, 1925, 1930, 1935, for A. D. and Natt McDougall, and A. Guthrie * Natt McDougall: obituaries Oregon Journal 3 Sept. 1954 (portrait) and Oregonian 4 Sept. 1954 (portrait)