James Edwin Ganong was a Canadian

Canada

Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

 businessman. Known as Edwin, he was born in Boston, Massachusetts where his Canadian parents had relatives. The son of James H. Ganong

James H. Ganong

James Harvey Ganong was a Canadian businessman in St. Stephen, New Brunswick who co-founded Ganong Bros. chocolate making company in 1873 and the St. Croix Soap Manufacturing Co. in 1878....

 and Susan E. Brittain, he is the brother of Susie

Susan B. Ganong

Susan Brittain Ganong B.Sc., LLD was a widely respected Canadian educator and proprietor of the Netherwood School for girls in the Province of New Brunswick....

, Kit (Whidden), Arthur, and William

William Francis Ganong

William Francis Ganong, M.A., Ph.D., LL.D., F.R.S.C., was a Canadian botanist, historian and cartographer. His botany career was spent mainly as a professor at Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts...

.

His family returned to their native New Brunswick

New Brunswick

New Brunswick is one of Canada's three Maritime provinces and is the only province in the federation that is constitutionally bilingual . The provincial capital is Fredericton and Saint John is the most populous city. Greater Moncton is the largest Census Metropolitan Area...

 when Edwin was still a young boy. Living in the border town

Border town

A border town is a town or city close to the boundary between two countries, states or regions. Usually the term implies that it is one of the things the town is most famous for. Border towns can have highly cosmopolitan communities, a feature they share with port cities...

 of St. Stephen

St. Stephen, New Brunswick

St. Stephen is a Canadian town in Charlotte County, New Brunswick, situated on the east bank of the St. Croix River at .-Climate:...

, in 1873 his father and uncle Gilbert Ganong

Gilbert Ganong

Gilbert White Ganong was a Canadian politician, the 14th Lieutenant Governor of New Brunswick and co-founder of Ganong Bros. Limited, candy makers in the town of St...

 founded Ganong Bros.

Ganong Bros.

Ganong Bros., Limited is Canada's oldest candy company; it was founded by James and Gilbert Ganong in 1873 in St. Stephen, New Brunswick where it is based to this day. The primary product is boxed chocolates...

, a grocery and bakery business that became a very successful manufacturer of chocolate

Chocolate

Chocolate is a raw or processed food produced from the seed of the tropical Theobroma cacao tree. Cacao has been cultivated for at least three millennia in Mexico, Central and South America. Its earliest documented use is around 1100 BC...

 confectionery. In 1878 the brothers established the St. Croix Soap Manufacturing Company

St. Croix Soap Manufacturing Company

The St. Croix Soap Manufacturing Company was a Canadian business founded in 1878 in St. Stephen, New Brunswick by brothers James and Gilbert Ganong and Freeman H. Todd. The bothers had earlier founded the Ganong confectionary company and in 1884 dissolved their partnerships with the result that...

 but in 1884 they elected to dissolve their partnership and Edwin's father became the sole owner of the soap

Soap

In chemistry, soap is a salt of a fatty acid.IUPAC. "" Compendium of Chemical Terminology, 2nd ed. . Compiled by A. D. McNaught and A. Wilkinson. Blackwell Scientific Publications, Oxford . XML on-line corrected version: created by M. Nic, J. Jirat, B. Kosata; updates compiled by A. Jenkins. ISBN...

 factory.

Edwin Ganong would join his father in his successful soap-making business. Following his father's untimely death in 1888, the twenty-two year-old Edwin found himself in charge and quickly proved himself an astute businessman and marketer. His company was best known for its Surprise Soap that became a national brand which was produced until 1946. Advertising helped sell the company's products but Edwin seized other opportunities such as the 1894 publishing of The Surprise Cook Book, a recipe collection formally registered as The Premium Cook Book by the then widely popular American writer Marion Harland

Mary Virginia Terhune

Mary Virginia Terhune , also known by her penname Marion Harland, was an American author. She began her career writing articles at the age of 14, using various pennames until 1853, when she settled on Marion Harland. Her first novel Alone was published in 1854 and would go on to sell over 100,000...

.

On January 24, 1903, Edwin Ganong married Boston, Massachusetts native Anna Louisa Webb. The couple had a son, Brigadier General

Brigadier General

Brigadier general is a senior rank in the armed forces. It is the lowest ranking general officer in some countries, usually sitting between the ranks of colonel and major general. When appointed to a field command, a brigadier general is typically in command of a brigade consisting of around 4,000...

 James Edwin Jr.

In 1913, Edwin Ganong sold the St. Croix Soap Manufacturing Company to Lever Brothers

Lever Brothers

Lever Brothers was a British manufacturer founded in 1885 by William Hesketh Lever and his brother, James Darcy Lever . The brothers had invested in and promoted a new soap making process invented by chemist William Hough Watson, it was a huge success...

 of Toronto, Ontario, a subsidiary of the British conglomerate. Ganong became president of Lever Brothers and moved to Toronto. Socially active, they maintained a summer home at fashionable St. Andrews, New Brunswick

St. Andrews, New Brunswick

St. Andrews is a Canadian town in Charlotte County, New Brunswick.It is sometimes referred to in tourism marketing by its unofficial nickname "St. Andrews-by-the-sea".-Geography:St...

. Edwin Ganong died in Toronto in 1944 and his wife died the following year.