Early Life and Education
He was born in Carleton (now West Saint John), New Brunswick, in 1864, the eldest of seven children. He is the brother of Susie, Arthur, Edwin, and Kit Ganong Whidden. At the age of seven, the family moved to St. Stephen where his father, James Harvey Ganong and uncle Gilbert Ganong established the now-famous Ganong Brothers candy factory. It was expected that young William would enter the family business when he came of age, but early on, he showed an interest in the natural world. These interests extended to botany, reading, maps, and exploring the countryside. He also showed a talent for languages. Through his life he would come to have at least a working knowledge of French, German, Maliseet and Mi'kmaq. He was an early naturalist and by the age of seventeen, he had first-hand knowledge of numerous rivers and coastal areas of New Brunswick as well as the flora and fauna of the province. His explorations would continue throughout his life, both on his own and with one or more companions including Arthur H. Pierce, Mauran I. Furbish and George Upham Hay. He frequently prepared his own maps of these explorations.
He attended the University of New Brunswick where he received a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1884 and his Masters degree in 1886. The next year, he went to Boston where in 1887, he received an A.B. from Harvard University. He obtained a doctorate in biology from the University of Munich in 1894 and published two papers in the German language. It was probably at Harvard that he met Jean Murray Carmen, sister of his friend and fellow Harvard student, New Brunswick poet Bliss Carman. They married in 1888. The marriage lasted thirty-two years until her death in 1920. They had no children.
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