CHAPTER THREE

TECHNOLOGICAL DEVELOPMENT OF CANADA

3.1 Technology in Canada

Technology is the manipulation of the physical world to achieve human goals. The

knowledge of technology is often embodied in physical objects such as tools.

Technologies affect and are affected by the society that uses them. In

Canada, for example, Indigenous people developed different types of canoes

depending on the type of water being travelled. Later, technology facilitated the

colonization of the country through the development of agricultural tools,

railroads and new forms of shelter. Today, Canada remains at the forefront of

technological development in areas including transportation, communications

and energy.

3.2 Indigenous Technologies

The technologies Indigenous peoples used to adapt to the regions of Canada, from the

Great Lakes to the Arctic, depended greatly on geographical conditions and local

resources. Notable achievements include: transportation technologies such as

birchback and cedar canoes, and the snowshoe; shelters such as the, and igloo; and a

variety of hunting and fishing technologies. These technologies did not remain static

over time. Instead, they grew in range and sophistication allowing more and more

successful

exploitation of a variety of environments in the acquisition of food resources,

the making of shelter and clothing, as well as engaging in trade and conflict.

3.3 Technological History of Canada

The technological history of Canada encompasses the country's development in the

areas of transportation, communication, energy, materials, public works, public

services (health care), domestic/consumer and defence technologies. Most

technologies diffused in Canada came from other places; only a small number actually

originated

in Canada.

3.3.1 Colonization and settlement (1500 - 1867)

While the Vikings, sailing on sophisticated ships called knarrs, travelled to North

America in the Middle Ages, Europeans from France, the British Isles and elsewhere

began to explore and settle on the continent at the very end of the 15th century. They

brought with them an inventory of tools and the know-how to use them. However, the

new environment of northern North America required modifications to all of these

technologies as fishing and trading outposts, agricultural settlements, roads and towns

were established. In addition, Europeans had to adjust to using these tools in a new

cultural setting.

Mainland settlements were principally agricultural in nature, using and adapting

European implements to a variety of challenging North American environments.

Agricultural technology, more than any other, is profoundly affected by local

conditions of weather, soil, water and pests, as well as land tenure systems. Acadian

farmers built dikes to protect their fields from flooding in the marshes.

A major technical problem facing all settlers was shelter. Western European timber-

frame construction, familiar to most colonists, was first used and adapted by the

Habitants and Acadians. Loyalists, settling in the Maritimes and in Upper Canada,

built houses of logs fastened together at the corners, making use of the abundant

timber resource.
Not all work was done by hand. The first water-powered grist mill in North America

was built by Jean de Biencourt de Poutrincourt, lieutenant governor of Acadia,at Port-

Royal in 1606. Eventually grist mills, flour mills and sawmills were found throughout

the colonies; many were the nuclei of small villages.

Transportation, over huge distances and difficult terrain, posed enormous challenges.

The birchbark canoe long used by Indigenous peoples, and adopted by French fur

traders, linked the North American interior to the wider world. The Hudson’s Bay

Company developed the York boat for the journey inland from Hudson Bay.

Shipbuilding began in 17th-century New France with carpenters learning the skills of

shipwrights. From the mid-18th century onward, government policy encouraged

shipbuilding in the Maritime colonies. Construction of roads over the long distances

between settlements was expensive, difficult and slow. By the end of the pioneer

period some arterial roads were completed. Cedar logs were used to cover swampy

stretches of road and gravel surfaces were laid where traffic was heaviest. In the

1840s,

Canadians experimented with plank roads, using cheap forest products, but the

winter ice and spring thaw left them in shambles. Only urban roads were paved,

usually with crude cobblestones. Of greater importance was the coming of the

railway, beginning with the Champlain and St Lawrence Railroad, also financed

by John Molson. By 1860, most major communities in the Canadas were

connected by the Grand Trunk Railway, while the St Lawrence and Atlantic

Railroad joined Montréal with Portland, Maine. Railway technology also had an

effect on bridge building. The tubular construction of the Victoria Bridge at

Montréal, completed in December 1859, was an engineering marvel of the day.

3.3.2 National Development (1867 - 1913)

During this period, political as well as economic forces promoted the growth of

railways, industrialization and settlement of the Prairies.

Farming, fishing and forestry were transformed by new technologies of production

and processing. The introduction of rolling mills, which processed hard western wheat

more quickly, radically changed flour milling. By the 1860s, Atlantic fishing

technology had been changed by the introduction of the longline or "bultow."

Refrigeration and railways increased the fresh-fish market. On the Pacific coast,

gillnetting harvested enormous numbers of salmon, which mechanized butchering and

canning facilities processed into a readily exportable product. Government and

university-based research

investigated and offered solutions to many of the technical problems associated with

harvesting and processing fish and other seafood.

Lumbering continued in eastern Canada, joined by British Columbia, with

provincial governments increasingly encouraging the milling of logs into lumber

domestically rather than exporting them to the United States. While the Fraser,

Cariboo and Yukon gold rushes were dramatic, the discovery of base metal deposits

had more lasting technical implications. Metallurgical techniques were often the final

key to unlocking the wealth of these mines.

Canals were recognized as efficient carriers of bulk cargo, and as shipping increased

on the Great lakes improvements were needed. In Nova Scotia, the long-awaited

Shubenacadie Canal, connecting the Bay of Fundy and Dartmouth, was opened in

1861. Completion of the in 1876 fulfilled a condition of Confederation by joining

central Canada to Nova Scotia and New Brunswick. Construction of first of the

Canadian Pacific Railway and then two other transcontinental lines through the
difficult rock and muskeg of the Canadian Shield, across the prairies and through the

Rockies, became one of Canada's greatest engineering feats.

Communication technology advanced rapidly with the electric, ushered in as a

companion to the railways starting in the 1850s. Alexander Graham Bell’s telephone

appeared in the 1870s and, by the 1880s and 1890s, exchanges were common in most

large cities. The first exchange in Canada was installed in 1878 in Hamilton and it had

40 telephones by the end of the year.

Also, Steam engines not only transformed transportation, but when applied to

industry and agriculture, gave a much more flexible power source. Electrical

power, electric lighting and electric motors for machinery gave even more

flexibility in industrial production. In Canada, the Second Industrial Revolution

arrived hard on the heels of the first as new industries based on chemistry and

electricity grew in importance. The rapid expansion of electrochemistry in the

20th century permitted the economical production of many chemicals. A

Canadian, Thomas Wilson, developed the first successful commercial process

for manufacturing calcium carbide.

3.3.3 First and Second World War (1914 – 1950)

In spite of the First and Second World Wars and the Great Depression, the first half of

the century brought unparalleled agricultural and industrial development and

prosperity. With the advent of the internal combustion engine, Canadians became

second only to Americans in their use of the automobile, while bush flying helped

open the Canadian North. Radio was a new medium not just of communication, but

also entertainment. The Canadian Standards Association, which originated during the

First World War, played a major role not just in aiding uniformity of technical
practices in industry across Canada, but in ensuring technological compatibility

between Canadian and US goods.

Farming increasingly became a blend of tradition with new mechanical skills.

Canada’s rail system continued to expand with the Temiskaming and Northern

Ontario Railway (Ontario Northland) constructed from 1903 to 1931 and extending

from to James Bay, Ontario.

The pioneering 19th-century development of hydroelectricity at

Niagara Falls was followed by ambitious projects there and elsewhere. Ontario

Hydro’s Queenston–Chippawa power generation project (under construction from

1917 to 1921) was the largest engineering project since the completion of the

Panama Canal.

3.3.4 Contemporary Canada (1950 – Present)

Canada emerged from the as a middle power and continues to rank among the

strongest of the world’s economies. Canada has remained at the forefront of

technology as a user of technologies developed elsewhere, but also as a developer and

manufacturer of advanced high-tech items.

Two Post-war transportation megaprojects had profound influence on

Canada.

The first was the St Lawrence Seaway, a joint Canada-US

transportation and

power development scheme completed in 1959. It allows bulk goods

to travel

by water from the interior of the continent to the Atlantic Ocean.

Second, the
opening of the Trans-Canada Highway in 1962 signalled the victory

of personal

cars over passenger rail as Canadians' preferred mode of travel. In

addition, Toronto’s first subway line opened in 1954, followed by in

1966. Buses and Light Rail Transit supplemented transit systems in

these and other Canadian cities.

Canadian contributions of computer technology include the WATFOR

compilers

developed at the University of Waterloo and widely used in

computer education in the 1970s and 1980s. In addition, Canadian

James Gosling invented the JAVA programming language. Waterloo,

Ontario-based Research in Motion developed the Blackberry

smartphone and, along with IBM Canada, is also among the top 10

biggest corporate spenders on research and development in

Canada.

3.4 Future Growth Potential for Canada’s Technology Industry

Despite not fostering innovation as well as some countries around the world, 84% of

Canada’s technology companies are profitable. Since many technology companies in

Canada are relatively new start-ups, there is potential for significant revenue growth

within Canada’s technology industry.

Accenture Consulting, a global professional services and consulting firm, reports that

Canada’s tech sector is outperforming the rest of Canada’s economic sectors. Growing

faster than any other sector on the Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX) since the start of

2013, the tech sector is currently valued at $250-billion.

3.5 Staple Thesis

Stable Thesis, a theory asserting that the export of natural resources, or stables, from

Canada to more advanced economies has a pervasive impact on the economy as well

as on the social and political systems. The thesis was formulated in the 1920s by

economic historians Harold A. Innis and W.A. Mackintosh. Agreeing that Canada had

been born with staple economy, they differed insofar as Mackintosh saw a continuing

evolution toward a mature industrialized economy based on staple production,

whereas Innis saw a tendency for Canada to become permanently locked into

dependency as a resource hinterland. Contemporary proponents of this thesis argue

that Innis’s version more accurately describes the Canadian situation to the present.

The thesis may be the most important single contribution to scholarship by Canadian

social scientists and historians; it has also had some influence internationally, notably

in the analysis of a comparable country such as Australia.

References
Mel Watkins (2006). Retrieved from Staple Thesis | The Canadian Encyclopedia:
<https://thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/staple-thesis>

Matthew Rodgers (2011). Technology Industry is Canada’s Fastest Growing

Economic Sector Mentorworks Ltd.
<https://www.mentorworks.ca/blog/markett-trends/canadian-technology-
industry/>
W.G. Richardson, James H (2006). Retrieved from Technology in Canada | The
Canadian Encyclopedia:
<https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/technology>