Arthur Sturgis Hardy

Arthur Sturgis Hardy, QC (December 14, 1837 – June 13, 1901) was a lawyer and Liberal politician who served as the fourth Premier of Ontario, Canada, from 1896 to 1899. On January 19, 1870 he married Mary Morrison, daughter of Judge Joseph Curran Morrison.

Hardy attended school at the Rockwood Academy in Rockwood, Ontario. He was first elected to the Legislative Assembly of Ontario in 1873 and was promoted to the Cabinet of Sir Oliver Mowat in 1877 as Provincial Secretary. In 1889 as Commissioner of Crown Lands, Hardy established Algonquin Park. Entering his sixties and having been in government for over twenty years, Hardy lacked the energy and strength to take the government forward or excite the populace when he succeeded Mowat as both Premier and Attorney-General in 1896. In the 1898 election Hardy's government was returned with a narrow six seat majority due to the collapse of the agrarian Patrons of Industry party which had served as the Liberal's allies in the legislature. Exhausted and needing money, Hardy retired from politics in 1899 and died two years later from appendicitis. An Ontario Historical Plaque was erected in Brantford, Ontario by the province to commemorate the Honourable Arthur Sturgis Hardy's role in Ontario's heritage. On Thursday June 25, 2009 a new plaque was unveiled to commemorate Hardy under the initiative of Premiers' Gravesites Program. Local politicians, guests and family members paid tribute to the former politician. The family included the great-great-great-granddaughter and the children of Hagood Hardy.

He became town solicitor for Brantford in 1867, a bencher of the Law Society of Upper Canada in 1875, and a QC in 1876.

Hardy's body was originally interred at Greenwood Cemetery, however 34 years after his death, his son Senator Arthur Charles Hardy had the remains of Hardy, his wife, and their daughter Gladys Mary Starr moved to Farringdon Burial Ground.

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