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George Frederick Matthew was born on August 12, 1837, in Saint John, New Brunswick.

He was a civil servant, geologist, paleontologist, curator, and author. He attended the Saint John Grammar School and entered public service in 1853 as a clerk in the provincial Treasury Department. He was appointed chief clerk of the Saint John customs service in 1879 and surveyor of customs in 1893, a position he held until his retirement in 1915. In 1857, he helped found the Steinhammer Club, the direct precursor of the Natural History Society of New Brunswick. Matthew became the first curator of the Natural History Society of New Brunswick. He also worked for the Geological Survey of Canada. He was a charter member of the Royal Society of Canada and published more than 200 scientific papers. He received honorary doctorates from Laval University and the University of New Brunswick and was awarded the Geological Society of London's Murchison Medal in 1917.

In 1868, he married Katherine Mary Diller (1842-1923). He died on April 14, 1923, in Hastings-on-Hudson, New York, and is buried in Gondola Point, New Brunswick.

Commander John Mathias, RD, RNR, a native of Youghal, Ireland, was known in Montreal as captain of the Laurentic, a ship which regularly ran the Montreal-to-Liverpool route. First launched in 1909, Laurentic was a ship of the White Star Line, which had taken over the Dominion Line Canadian Service for which Mathias had earlier commanded a vessel named Vancouver. In 1914, H.M.S. Laurentic was commissioned by the Canadian Expeditionary Force for troop transport; she was painted grey and joined a convoy of 32 ships that brought 35,000 Canadian soldiers to Europe that October. With Acting Commander Mathias in charge, she was then converted to an Armed Merchant Cruiser (AMC) with eight 6-inch and two 6-pounder naval guns. For the first 27 months of the war, she was on patrol duty in the East. In late November 1916 she left Halifax for Liverpool carrying officers and volunteer reserves of the Royal Canadian Navy. Two days before reaching port, a coal fire broke out in the hold not far from the munitions, trapping some of the men. Commander Mathias rushed to try to save them but a fire-warped iron beam fell on him, fracturing his skull and injuring some of his fellow rescuers. He died Dec. 4 but because of military regulations, the message was not relayed to Liverpool; Mrs. Mathias and her children met the ship expecting a happy reunion after her husband’s two-year absence, only to be told of his death. Mathias received the Royal Naval Reserve Officer’s Decoration.