Merchant Princes: Halifax's First Family of Finance, Ships and Steel

This book tells the story of an extraordinary family of merchants and entrepreneurs. It begins in 1810, when William Stairs opened a small general store on the Halifax waterfront. Over the next 150 years, successive generations of businessmen were engaged in a surprising range of mercantile and industrial activity. The Stairs family saga includes sugar refining, banking, steel making, a mammoth and highly successful rope manufacturing plant, and a company that for a time was the world's leading manufacturer of skates.

The Stairs family were also active in politics, starting with William who was a long-time, loyal and influential backer of Nova Scotia's pre-eminent reformer Joseph Howe. The Stairs have been involved in many of the major issues in Nova Scotia politics, and this book often offers surprising information on what was going on in back rooms over the past two centuries.

Through this family history, author James Frost sheds new light on many aspects of Nova Scotia's business and political history. The story of the Stairs family -- their readiness to accept risk, their commitment to industrial development, their interest in manufacturing -- challenges many of the stereotypes often used to explain Nova Scotia's economic decline after Confederation. Frost's many years of research and his unparalleled access to family records for this book have produced a major new book.