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Patrick Burns (July 6, 1856 – February 24, 1937) was a Canadian rancher, meat packer, businessperson, senator, and philanthropist. A self-made man of wealth, he built one of the world's largest integrated meat-packing empires, P. Burns & Co., becoming one of the wealthiest Canadians of his time. He is honoured as one of the Big Four western cattle kings who started the Calgary Stampede in Alberta in 1912. While making his fortune in the meat industry, ranching was his true passion. Burns' of cattle ranches covered so vast an area of Southern Alberta that he could travel from Cochrane to the US border without ever leaving his land.〔 In 1931, he was appointed to the Canadian Senate as a representative for Alberta. On October 16, 2008, the ''Calgary Herald'' named Burns as Alberta's Greatest Citizen.〔 ==Early years== Born in Oshawa, Ontario in 1856, Patrick was the fourth of eleven children of Michael and Bridget O'Byrne. Shortly after, the family moved to Kirkfield, Ontario where Pat would spend the majority of his childhood.〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=Senator Patrick Burns )〕 His parents had emigrated from Ireland and, as part of the naturalization process, the family name was shortened to Byrne and then later to Burns.〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=Pioneers: The Burns Era )〕 Pat had very little formal schooling but learned a great deal about hard work and thriftiness from his parents.〔 Pat spent his last summer in Kirkfield chopping wood for a neighbour. It had been his intent to save enough money to travel out west, however when it came time for him to collect his pay he discovered that his employer did not have enough cash to cover the $100 he was owed for his labour, and he was instead given two oxen as payment. These two oxen had a resale value of $70 but Pat saw an alternative. Instead he made $140 by slaughtering the animals and reselling their meat and by-products. The experience was one he would remember during his later days as an entrepreneur. He headed out west with his brothers John and Dominic in 1878, at the age of 22. They started out by steamer but when they reached Rat Portage he feared that if he paid for transportation the rest of the way, he might lack funds on his arrival. Undaunted, he bought some bread and cheese and, with his gun for protection, walked the rest of the way to Winnipeg. Pat and John were impressed by reports of good lands to the west and decided to take advantage of the Dominion Homestead Act of 1872. The brothers set out on foot to locate their homesteads and walked until finding land to their liking just east of Minnedosa, Manitoba. Pat continued to homestead in Manitoba until after the Louis Riel uprising but gradually became involved in buying cattle and selling meat. He began his meat packing career with a cow bought on credit and sold for four dollars. He began freighting goods from Winnipeg and driving his neighbours' cattle to the Winnipeg market. By 1885 Burns was buying and selling his own cattle.〔 It was as a contractor from railway construction that Burns transitioned from being a small-time broker to a successful entrepreneur. In 1887, William Mackenzie and his partners Donald Mann, James Ross, and Herbert Holt secured a railway construction contract to drive a line from Quebec through Maine to the Eastern seaboard. Mackenzie had grown up in Kirkfield and remembered Pat from their briefly shared school days and time spent working in their fields. He was also aware of Burns' experience in the livestock business, so Mackenzie gave him the opportunity to provision the labourers who were to construct the line. Burns learned to establish a mobile slaughtering facility which could move easily as the railhead was extended. The success of the contract in Maine led to whole succession of other contracts with Mackenzie and Mann. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Patrick Burns (businessman)」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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