Lyon Cohen (born Yehuda Leib Cohen; May 11, 1868 – August 17, 1937) was a Polish-born Canadian businessman and a philanthropist. He was the grandfather of singer/poet Leonard Cohen.

Cohen was born in Congress Poland, part of the Russian Empire, to a Jewish family on May 11, 1868.^[3] He immigrated to Canada with his parents in 1871.^[3] He was educated at the McGill Model School and the Catholic Commercial Academy in Montreal.^[3] In 1888, he entered the firm of Lee & Cohen in Montreal; later became partner with his father in the firm of L. Cohen & Son; in 1895, he established W. R. Cuthbert & Co; in 1900, he organized the Canadian Improvement Co., a dredging contractor; in 1906, he founded The Freedman Co. in Montreal; and in May 1919, he organized and became President of Canadian Export Clothiers, Ltd.^[3] The Freedman Company went on to become one of Montreal’s largest clothing companies.^[4]

In 1897, Cohen and Samuel William Jacobs founded the Canadian Jewish Times, the first English-language Jewish newspaper in Canada.^[5] The newspaper promoted the Canadianization of recent East European Jewish immigrants and encouraged their acceptance of Canadian customs^[4] as Cohen felt that the old world customs of immigrant Jews were one of the main causes of anti-Semitism.^[4] In 1914, the paper was purchased by Hirsch Wolofsky, owner of the Yiddish-language Keneder Adler, who transformed it into the Canadian Jewish Chronicle.^[4]

He died on August 17, 1937, at the age of 69.^[2]

Cohen was elected the first president of the Canadian Jewish Congress in 1919 and organized the Jewish Immigrant Aid Services of Canada.^[5] Cohen was also a leader of the Young Men’s Hebrew Benevolent Society (later the Baron de Hirsch Institute) and the United Talmud Torahs, a Jewish day school in Montreal.^[6] He also served as president of Congregation Shaar Hashomayim^[4] and president of the Jewish Colonization Association in Canada.^[5]

Cohen married Rachel Friedman of Montreal on February 17, 1891. She was the founder and President of Jewish Endeavour Sewing School. They had three sons and one daughter:

• Nathan Bernard Cohen, who served as a lieutenant in the World War; he married Lithuanian Jewish immigrant Masha Klonitsky and they had one daughter and one son:
  • Esther Cohen and
  • singer/poet Leonard Cohen.^[6][7][8][9]
• Horace Rives Cohen, who was a captain and quartermaster of his battalion in World War I;^[3]
• Lawrence Zebulun Cohen, student at McGill University, and^[3][10]
• Sylvia Lillian Cohen.^[3]