Carload Ritchie

“Carload” Ritchie, one of Canada’s richest men, loved “fast cars, fast boats, and fast airplanes” — but not because of vanity. The man once known as the “world’s greatest salesman” felt the need for speedy vehicles “because they got him to his next appointment quickly,” author Don Gillmor writes in an engaging new biography of Harold F. Ritchie.

Born in Bobcaygeon, Ontario, in 1881, Ritchie was raised far from the centres of power in Toronto and Montreal. But he grew to eclipse most of his entrepreneurial peers due to his insatiable drive for ever-increasing sales. It was said that he sold by the carload, hence the nickname.

At the height of Ritchie’s success, he travelled up to 200,000 kilometres per year overseeing his global sales empire. And what did he sell? Well, pretty much whatever people needed — or would pay for — in the early twentieth century: from staples such as tea, coffee, rice, and flour to dubious miracle cures and assorted balms and ointments.

At 117 pages, minus endnotes and acknowledgements, Gillmor’s book is physically slim — but it’s brimming with colourful commentary on the “squeaky-voiced Canadian” whose death during surgery in 1933 warranted a full obituary in Time magazine. It also includes a small selection of photographs.

Despite his riches, Ritchie obsessively avoided the limelight. But, thanks to Gillmor, the story of Carload Ritchie will undoubtedly find new and appreciative audiences.