James Maclaren (March 19, 1818 – February 10, 1892) was an early settler and entrepreneur in western Quebec.
The family then settled in Torobolton Township and then moved to Wakefield in Lower Canada in the 1840s.
In 1853, Maclaren leased a sawmill in New Edinburgh from Thomas McKay with partners including Moss Kent Dickinson and Joseph Merrill Currier.
Maclaren also helped found the Hull Iron Company in 1880, the North Pacific Lumber Company of British Columbia in 1889, and the Bank of Ottawa, later merged with Scotiabank, in 1874.
MacLaren also had business interests in Vermont, Massachusetts, and Michigan.