Richard Hardisty

Richard Charles Hardisty (3 March 1831 – 15 October 1889) was a Canadian politician. He was a Hudson's Bay Company official in Edmonton, and a member of the Senate of Canada for the North-West Territories.

Background Richard Hardisty’s father was a Hudson’s Bay Company chief trader, born in London, England. His mother, Margaret Sutherland, was of First Nations and Scottish heritage.

He married Eliza McDougall, daughter of George Millward McDougall, on 21 September 1866 while he was a Hudson's Bay Company employee. They had three children.

in the 1887 Canadian federal election he ran as an Independent Conservative in Alberta (Provisional District). He finished a close second to Donald Watson Davis.

He was appointed to the Senate of Canada on the advice of Prime Minister John A. Macdonald on 23 February 1888, the first Métis senator.

He died on 15 October 1889, two weeks after being thrown from a horse-drawn buggy on 2 October. (His replacement in the Senate was Sir James Lougheed, who was married to Richard Hardisty's niece Isabella (Belle) Hardisty. James Lougheed was the grandfather of Peter Lougheed, premier of Alberta from 1971 to 1985.)

The village of Hardisty, Alberta, is named in his honour, as is Mount Hardisty in Jasper National Park.