Joseph Rielle

In the long years of an active professional career Joseph Rielle has made continuous advancement until he stands today not only as a veteran civil engineer and surveyor, but also as one of the most capable representatives of his chosen calling in Montreal. Each year has found him in advance of the position which he occupied the previous year, because of his developing powers and growing ability. He was born at Laprairie on the 6th of October, 1833, and received his initial business training with the firm of Ostell & Perrault, architects and land surveyors, whose service he entered in 1850 when a youth of seventeen years. He continued with that firm for four years and then became assistant to Mr. John Page, chief engineer of public works. He next accepted the position of assistant engineer to the harbor commission and eventually entered upon the general practice of land surveying in Montreal and the surrounding district. He has been connected with extensive surveys for the Grand Trunk and the Canadian Pacific Railways and the harbor commissioners of Montreal and in addition to his general practice has made a number of important hydraulic surveys. In 1904 he was presented with a testimonial by members of the society of land surveyors to mark the fiftieth anniversary of his entry into civil engineering and land surveying.

While this has been his chief life activity, Mr. Rielle has done important work in other connections. He was formerly vice president of the Pontiac Pacific Junction Railway, and he has done much work of a public and semi-public character, whereby the general interests of the country at large have been greatly promoted. He was secretary and manager of the Montreal Turnpike Trust for about fifteen years. He was a member of the council of Verdun, Montreal, from 1875 until 1900 and was intrusted with many important public works. He is a life governor of the House of Industry and Refuge, also of the Montreal General Hospital, and is president of the Fraser Institute and Free Public Library of Montreal. His activities have been of a nature that have contributed largely to the general development and good, but he has never taken an active part in politics.

Mr. Rielle married Miss Jeannie T. Goldie of Laprairie, P. Q., who was vice president of the Montreal Industrial Rooms and who died in June, 1904. Mr. Rielle has his home at No. 90 Union Avenue and is a member of the St. James Club. He has now reached the advanced age of more than eighty years, but is still active in his profession and in spirit and interest seems yet a man in the prime of life.