McKAY, James, Canadian legislator, b. in Sas- katchewan, Canada, about 1815; d. there, 3 Dec, 1879. He was educated at the Red River settle- ment, was in the employ of the Hudson bay com- pany for a time, and afterward became a contractor and superintended the construction of part of the Dawson route. When the province of Manitoba was formed Mr. McKay became a member of its legislative council, and was speaker for several years. He was appointed a member of the first provincial administration in January, 1871, with the office of president of the executive council, which he held till December, 1874. Soon after- ward he became minister of agriculture, but re- signed in 1878, owing to illness. His intimate ac- quaintance with the Indians and half-breeds, and the great influence he possessed over them, enabled him to render the government valuable aid in con- nection with the various treaties by which Indian land-titles were extinguished.
MACKAY, John William, capitalist, b. in Dub-
lin, Ireland, 28 Nov., 1831. He is of Scotch-Irish
descent, and came with his parents in 1840 to New
York, where his father died soon after their arrival.
Young Mackay obtained a public-school education,
and was apprenticed to the trade of ship-building.
On the discovery of gold in California he went with
the crowd that was then thronging to the Pacific,
and lived a miner's life for several years, with vary-
ing fortunes, acquiring a perfect command of the
technical and practical knowledge of mining. ' Be-
fore he was thirty years old he had made and lost
a small fortune. In 1860 Mackay left California
for Nevada, where he has since made his home.
In Nevada his fortunes slowly and steadily im-
proved, and he became a leader of men among the
rough spirits that formed the mining community.
He was a man of rigidly temperate habits, which
saved him from the misfortunes that attended so
many in the early mining days. In 1872 he was
among the discoverers of the Bonanza mines, on a
ledge of rock in the Sierra Nevadas, under what is
now Virginia City. The discovery of their vast
deposits of silver and gold is the most noted and
perhaps the most romantic incident in mining
history. It changed the face of the silver markets
of the world, and to nations like India and China
became an important and embarrassing factor in
modern political economy. The mines that came
within the Bonanza designation were owned by John
W. Mackay, James C. Flood, James G. Fair, after-
ward senator from Nevada, and William O'Brien.
Of this interest Mr. Mackay owned two fifths —
double that of any of his partners. In 1873 the
great silver vein was opened, and from one mine
alone Mr. Mackay and Mr. Fair, the practical min-
ing members of the Bonanza firm, took out $150,-
000,000 in silver and gold. In 1875 the working
of the mines was interrupted by a fire, but the own-
ers continued to pay dividends in order that the
share-holders, many of whom were their working-
men, should not lose their income. During the
active yield of the mines Mr. Mackay devoted him-
self personally to their superintepdence, working
in the lower levels as an ordinary miner. In 1878,
with Mr. Flood and Mr. Fair, he founded the Bank
of Nevada, with its headquarters in San Francisco.
Mr. Mackay has spent some time in Europe for the
education of his children, and, although he has a
special interest in the study of art, he has main-
tained his active and personal intei'est in mining.
His firm are understood to control the principal
mines on the Comstock lode. In 1884 Mr. Mackay,
in partnership with James Gordon Bennett, laid two
cables across the Atlantic from the United States
to England and France. These cables are under a
system i^nown as the Commercial cable company,
although the private property of Mr. Mackay and
Mr. Bennett. In 1885 Mr. Mackay was offered the
nomination as U. S. senator from Nevada, under
circumstances that would have made his election
virtually unanimous, but he refused, as his private
business rendered, in his opinion, a usefid public
life impossible. He has been liberal in his dona-
tions to charities, and among other gifts to the
Roman Catholic church, of which he is a member,
has founded an orphan asylum in Nevada City.
MACKAY, Robert, Canadian jurist, b. in Mon-
treal in 1816 ; d. there, 23 Feb., 1888. His father
was an army officer in the East Indian depart-
ment. The son was called to the bar in 1837, and
became Queen's counsel in 1867. He was appoint-
ed a commissioner for consolidating the statutes in
1856, and worked upon the Lower Canada and
general statutes. He became puisne judge of the
supreme court in 1868, was a judge of the court of
Queen's bench from 1868 till 1883, and was presi-
dent of the Montreal bar association and of the
Art association of that citv.
MACKAY-SMITH, Alexander, clergyman, b.
in New Haven, Conn., 2 June, 1850. He is a grand-
son of Nathan Smith, U. S. senator from Connec-
ticut, and a younger brother of the Rev. Cornelius
B. Smith, D. D., of St. James's church, New York
city. He was graduated at Trinity in 1872, studied
divinity at the General theological seminary and
in England and Germany, and took orders in the
Protestant Episcopal church. He was rector of
Grace church. South Boston, Mass., in 1877-'80,
and in the latter year became assistant rector of
St. Thomas's church. New York city. In 1886 he
declined the post of assistant bishop of Kansas, and
in 1887 he became first archdeacon of New York.
He has taken an active part in the civil-service re-
form movement, and has published occasional
poems in periodicals.
McKEAN, Joseph, clergyman, b. in Ipswich,
Mass., 19 April, 1776; d. in Havana, Cuba, 17
March, 1818. He was graduated at Harvard in
1794, and taught in Ipswich and Berwick till 1797,
when he was ordained pastor of the Congregational
church in Milton, Mass. The failure of his health
compelled his resignation in 1804, and he resumed
teaching. He declined the chair of mathematics
at Harvard in 1806, but two years afterward ac-
cepted the Boylston professorship of rhetoric and
oratory, succeeding John Quincy Adams, continu-
ing in office until a few months before his death,
which was the result of pulmonary disease. Prince-
ton gave him the degree of LL. D. in 1818, and
Allegheny college that of D. D. a few months later.
He published occasional sermons, and a " Jlemoir
of the Rev. John Eliot," printed in the Massachu-
setts historical collections.
McKEAN, Samuel, senator, b. in Huntingdon
county, Pa., in 1790; d. in McKean county, Pa.,
23 June, 1840. He was elected to congress as a
Democrat in 1822, served in 1823-9, and from
March, 1833, till March, 1839, was United States
senator from Pennsylvania.
McKEAN, Thomas, signer of the Declaration of Independence, b. in New London, Chester co., Pa., 19 March, 1734; d. in Philadelphia, Pa.. 24 June, 1817. His parents were both natives of Ireland. The son was educated by the Rev. Francis Allison, who was at that time a celebrated teacher of New Castle, Del., and after studying law a few
months became register of probate of New Castle county, Del. He was admitted to the bar before he was twenty-one, appointed deputy attorney-
