Rev. William Caven (1830-1904)

William Caven was born in Kirkcolm, Scotland and immigrated to Canada in 1847. Caven studied at United Presbyterian Seminary at London, Canada West, and entered the ministry in 1852 and was given the charge of the parish of St. Mary's and Downie. When Downie and St Marys separated into 2 congregations he continued as minister of the Presbyterian Church in St Marys, Ontario until 1866.

In 1865 he was called to the Chair of Exegetical Theology in Knox College, Toronto, became principal in 1873, and led the college into full affiliation with University of Toronto. He remained as principal until his death in 1904. The present Knox College building, shown, was completed in 1914.

In 1875, as moderator of the General Assembly of the Canada Presbyterian Church, he was involved in the negotiations which united the Free Church and Kirk in the Presbyterian Church in Canada. Caven was a strong opponent of the Jesuits' Estates Act of 1888 and of denominational schools in Manitoba in the 1890s. At the same time, he was also a strong advocate of interdenomination Protestant union.

Rev. George Leslie Mackay (1844-1901)

George Leslie Mackay was born near Embro, Zorra Township, Canada West on March 22, 1844, the son of Scots immigrants.   Mackay decided to become a missionary when a graduate student in Edinburgh after hearing Alexander Duff call for foreign evangelism.

In 1871, Mackay was sent to Mainland China by the Canadian Presbyterian Church but the following year he founded the first Canadian overseas mission in Tamsui, Taiwan.

Mackay practiced lay dentistry and trained local clergy.   He worked in north Taiwan, married a Taiwanese, and had three children.   Although natives destroyed several of his churches, he established 60 mission stations in 20 years.

In 1881, he raised funds in Oxford County to help build Oxford College, Tamsui, which later became a university.   He was an inspiration to the evangelical missions movement in Ontario.   He was an outspoken opponent of the Canadian head tax on Chinese immigrants.

George Leslie Mackay died in Formosa (Taiwan) June 2, 1901 at age 57.

Queen's University, Kingston, Ontario

Queen's College was established in Kingston, Ontario by the Presbyterian Church of Canada in association with the Church of Scotland in 1841. The following year classes began in a rented building with 2 professors and 10 students. It was primarily intended to train men for the ministry. Its ties to the Presbyterian Church slowly diminished and in 1912 the separation of church and state was complete with its charter amended becoming Queen's University at Kingston.

Queen's currently has approximately 13,500 full-time undergraduate students, 2,900 graduate students and a staff of 4,200.

St Andrew's Presbyterian, Fergus, Ontario

Fergus, Ontario is on the Grand River north of Guelph, 100km west of Toronto.

Members of St. Andrew's began meeting in 1834 and were the first Presbyterian congregation established between Guelph and Georgian Bay. The cornerstone of their first church was laid in 1835, replaced by the present stone structure completed in 1862. This attractive Gothic Revival building was designed by David Murray of Guelph and built of locally quarried stone. St. Andrew's was the religious focus of this Scottish community during the second half of the 19th century. The "auld kirk yard" behind the church, the village's first burial ground, holds the remains of most of the early settlers.

Since its completion, St. Andrew's has undergone several interior and exterior alterations, notably the erection in 1968 of a large addition incorporating Sunday school and meeting rooms and Fellowship Hall. The church, nevertheless, retains much of its original character.

St Andrew's Presbyterian, Fergus will be open on Saturday, June 28 from 10am to 4pm as part of the Doors Open Ontario program.

Sir Robert Alexander Falconer (1867-1943)

Robert Alexander Falconer was a Canadian clergyman and educator.   Son of a Presbyterian minister, he won a scholarship to the University of Edinburgh graduating in 1889. He pursued postgraduate work at Leipzig, Berlin and Marburg, Germany.

In 1892 he was ordained a minister in the Presbyterian Church in Canada and took up a lectureship in New Testament Greek at Pine Hill Divinity Hall, Halifax.   Becoming a professor there in 1895, he was appointed principal in 1904.   In 1907 he became president of the University of Toronto and stayed in that position for 25 years.

Falconer was active in the Presbyterian Church in Canada. He was one of those who sought to bring his denomination into union with Canada's Methodists and Congregationalists resulting in the formation of the United Church of Canada in 1925.

Falconer was was much in demand as a public speaker and wrote several books on current affairs, including 'The German Tragedy and its Meaning for Canada' (1915), 'Idealism in National Character' (1920) and 'The United States as a Neighbour' (1926).   After his retirement from the University of Toronto in 1932, he continued his scholarly work, producing 'Pastoral Epistles', his most notable work of religious scholarship in 1937.

He died in Toronto on 4 November 1843 at age 76.