Uncle John's Bathroom Reader Plunges into Canada Read online

  After much discussion and debate, though, the argument that finally won the day was that England should hold onto any territories it got its hands on…no matter how much (or little) those territories seemed to be worth.

  Who Let the Dogs Out?

  Canadians love their dogs. They spend nearly $2 billion each year on them. And judging by the fact there are many breeds native to the Great White North, it’s clear that this bond between human and canine has been around for a long time.

  Newfoundland

  Newfoundland

  This dog probably developed in the 1500s from mastiffs that were brought by Europeans and bred with native canines. People in Newfoundland lived primarily in small villages, so dogs with traits that could aid the people living there were the ones that prevailed: large size, strength (for hauling carts and equipment), and webbed toes for strong swimming were the ticket to favored status. Today, the Newfoundland is more of a pet than a worker. However, the dog has long been known for its heroism in rescuing people from drowning, so Newfoundland dog clubs often teach water rescue courses.

  Fast Fact: Nana, the dog in J. M. Barrie’s Peter Pan, was likely based on Barrie’s beloved Newfoundland, Luath.

  Canadian Eskimo dog

  Canadian Eskimo Dog

  This is one of the oldest dog breeds still in existence in Canada. The Inuit used them for about 1,800 years for hunting and sledding, and they have been part of the native culture for as far back as their oral history goes. They were also used early on by European explorers and worked as hauling dogs in both the Arctic and Antarctica. Because the dogs howl like the American wolf (and have some similar markings), many early European explorers and scientists thought the Canadian Eskimo dog was a wolf mix. Recent genetic testing has disproved that theory.

  In 1950, estimates put this breed population at more than 20,000. Today, that number has fallen into the hundreds. The introduction of snowmobiles eliminated the need for sled dogs, and by 1970, the breed had nearly died out. But tourism to the Canadian Arctic may actually save the breed from extinction. With more visitors wanting a “real-life” dogsled experience, the demand for Canadian Eskimo dogs has increased in recent years. In 2000 Nunavut made this dog its official territorial animal in an effort to bring more attention to the plight of Canada’s oldest native dog.

  Fast Fact: Despite “Canadian Eskimo dog” being the breed’s common name, “Eskimo” is considered derogatory by many of Canada’s First People. The Inuit prefer to use the name Qimmiq, which means “dog,” or “Canadian Inuit dog” instead.

  Duck-tolling retriever

  Nova Scotia Duck-Tolling Retriever

  This breed first came on the scene in Yarmouth County, Nova Scotia, in the early 1800s. Its origins aren’t clear, but the dog looks to be a blend of Irish setter and cocker spaniel. Tolling is a hunting technique that lures bird prey. In the case of this retriever, a hunter hides near a body of water and tosses objects out in the open for the dog to play with. The dog’s swishing tail, flopping ears, and contrasting white chest draw the attention of nearby ducks. As the ducks come closer to check out the dog’s frolicking, the hunter appears, startling the flock and sending them skyward. The hunter shoots, and the dog retrieves the fallen birds.

  Nova Scotia duck-tolling retrievers today are mostly kept as pets, but hunters still use the dog’s innate ability to lure and retrieve. In 1995 this retriever was declared the provincial dog of Nova Scotia.

  Fast fact: People may have gotten the idea to use dogs to hunt ducks after watching the red fox do it. One fox hides while the other romps and dances, mesmerizing nearby waterbirds. When the birds come closer, the playful fox disappears, and they curiously follow up onto land…where the hidden fox is waiting to attack.

  An artist’s rendering shows the extinct Tahltan bear dog.

  Tahltan Bear Dog

  Canada’s only native West Coast dog comes from the Tahltan people of northern British Columbia. Bred for hunting, particularly bears, the dogs were small to medium in size, with medium-length hair, pointy ears, and a bushy tail. On the hunt, they were carried in sacks until the hunters found prints in the dirt or snow. The dogs were then released to chase the bear, confusing and cornering it with their incessant yapping. Hunters followed and slew the confused bear.

  Today, this breed is officially considered extinct. Although some groups are trying to bring back a dog that’s physically similar, there’s no way to re-create the bear dog breed without some of the original purebred animals, the last of which is believed to have died in the 1970s.

  Fast Fact: The Tahltan people loved dogs in general but held their bear dogs in especially high esteem. Some hunters lovingly carried the smaller bear dogs in packs on their chests during hunting expeditions, and many people allowed the animals to sleep indoors with the family. That said, they also had a spiritual ritual of shallowly stabbing their dogs’ haunches with animal bone at the onset of a hunt.

  Labrador retriever

  Labrador Retriever

  This is another breed that originally hails from Newfoundland. It’s difficult to pin down the exact lineage, but Labrador retrievers probably came from the St. John’s dog—the smaller offspring from mating Newfoundlands and European water dogs. The breed probably showed up in the late 1700s on the boats and shores of Newfoundland, working and keeping constant companion with the fishermen. By the late 1800s, Labs went to England, where they were used primarily for hunting. (Because the breed was further developed in England, many don’t consider the Labrador retriever to be truly Canadian.)

  More Canadians keep Labrador retrievers as pets than any other breed of dog, and the breed’s exceptional intelligence has made them the number one choice to train as service dogs for people with disabilities. They also have a keen sense of smell and are used often as trackers in investigative work. The Labrador retriever has been known to perform heroically in emergency situations, too, protecting injured owners or even putting itself in harm’s way to save the life of its master.

  Fast fact: Endal, a yellow Lab from England, won nearly a dozen major awards for rescue, service, and charity work before his death in March 2009. For his achievements, he was dubbed “the most decorated dog in the world.”

  Dog Gone…But Not Forgotten

  There have been many more native purebred dogs in Canada’s history, but centuries of development has made several breeds obsolete. Here are three early ones, documented by western explorers and settlers, that are no longer with us:

  •Coast Salish wool dog: Similar in size and coat to a Pomeranian, this small, furry dog was bred for its soft fur, which was used by the Salish peoples of the West Coast to make clothing.

  •MicMac Indian dog: MicMac hunters trained this breed to prance around, luring ducks close enough for a kill.

  •Hare Indian dog: This dog resembled a large fox and was used to chase prey around the Mackenzie River. This breed rarely barked, but when it did, it sounded like a wolf howling.

  First Ladies

  Let us now praise the Canadian women who—sometimes in the face of great resistance—accomplished firsts in their fields.

  Frances Moore Brooke, by Catherine Read

  Frances Moore Brooke

  Novelist (1724–89)

  After a year or so in the wilds of Quebec, Francis Moore Brooke became bored with the life of a British military chaplain’s wife. So over the next four years, she wrote a novel called The History of Emily Montague, about a Quebec woman adapting to the transition from French rule to British. It was the first novel written in Canada—and possibly the first written in North America, because the Puritans thought novels were a waste of time (and that fiction, being by definition untrue, was also a lie…and a sin.)

  After Brooke returned to England, she published several more of her “books of lies,” gaining critical acclaim and popularity with readers. She died in England in 1789. Almost 200 years later, in 1985, she also got a crater on Venus named after her.

 
Emily Jennings Stowe had to go to the United States to get her medical degree.

  Emily Jennings Stowe

  Doctor (1831–1903)

  When Emily Jennings applied to Victoria College in 1852, she was turned away because she was a woman. But she kept looking until she was granted admission to Toronto’s newly launched Normal School for Upper Canada in 1853. She graduated a year later with honors and a degree in education that left her well positioned for her first mention in history…as the first female principal of a public school in Upper Canada (in Brantford, to be specific).

  Emily Jennings married John Stowe in 1856, and the couple had three children before John developed tuberculosis. The disease changed the direction of all of their lives. Emily’s desire to care for her husband led her to study homeopathic medicine and herbal remedies, which in turn led her to want to become a medical doctor. She applied to medical schools, but quickly learned that there was no medical school in Canada that was open to female students (“or ever will be,” one school administrator told her emphatically).

  Finally, Emily Stowe headed south and, in 1867, earned a medical degree at the New York Medical College for Women. However, there was a problem—in the interim, the Canadian medical association had started requiring that graduates from American colleges take some specific Canadian courses to apply for a license. This created a dilemma: Stowe couldn’t legally practice without the courses, but no Canadian schools would accept her. So she opened an office in Toronto, illegally, becoming the first woman to practice medicine in Canada; her patients were mostly women and children.

  She kept trying to get into Canadian schools too. Finally, in 1871, the University of Toronto relented, accepting Stowe and another female aspirant, Jennie Kidd Trout, as special cases. The faculty and the other male students were unwelcoming and harassed the women. Trout stayed and finished the program, but Stowe—fed up with the ill treatment—left school without taking the licensing exam and went back to her clinic as an unlicensed doctor…but as a newly minted feminist.

  Augusta Stowe-Gullen

  In 1879 she was charged with giving a pregnant girl herbs to help her induce an abortion. At the time, one of the medical profession’s arguments against allowing female doctors was the “concern” that they’d be more likely than male physicians to help pregnant girls get abortions, a procedure that had been outlawed in Canada in 1869. In Stowe’s case, the pregnant girl was found dead shortly after visiting her clinic, so Stowe was charged with culpability in the death and with providing a “poison with the intent to procure a miscarriage.” The case went to trial and Stowe was found not guilty. But she always believed she’d been the victim of discrimination. Stowe said, “My career has been one of struggle, attended by that sort of persecution which falls to the lot of everyone who pioneers a new movement or steps out of line with established custom.”

  Finally, in 1880, others in Canada started to recognize her contribution to the field of medicine. The College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario issued Stowe a license based on her education and experience, making her the second licensed female physician in Canada (the first was her classmate at the University of Toronto, Jennie Trout). The door was cracked open for women to enter the profession. Three years later, Stowe was in the audience when the first woman graduated from a Canadian medical school. There was good reason for that (besides wanting to support a new female doctor): that first graduate was Emily Stowe’s daughter, Augusta Stowe-Gullen.

  Sharon Wood (above) first climbed the Yukon’s Mount Logan when she was 20.

  Sharon Wood

  Mountaineer (1957)

  Most of us spend a lifetime trying to decide what to do with our lives; Sharon Wood figured it out when her father took her to the top of her first mountain when she was 12. Then, at 20, she joined an all-women expedition to the top of Mount Logan, the tallest mountain in Canada, and a few years later, climbed Alaska’s Mount McKinley, North America’s tallest. Then, in 1986, climbing with fellow Canadian Dwayne Congdon, Wood became the first North American woman to summit Everest and only the sixth woman ever to reach the top. She and her team also had climbed a new route up the mountain—the west ridge to the north face—and she was the first woman to blaze that new trail unassisted by a Sherpa.

  Autos to Ottawa

  Real Canadian car companies never quite got off the ground. Instead, the ones that made it were American subsidiaries… and their Canadian partners.

  Gordon McGregor teamed with American Henry Ford to manufacture cars in Canada.

  Canadian Fords?

  Gordon McGregor had a strong baritone voice that made him a popular singer at parties and a convincing speaker when he talked business. One day in 1904, he was talking to two of his partners—who were also his younger brothers—in the offices of the Walkerville Wagon Works in Walkerville, Ontario, now part of Windsor. “There are men in Detroit, like Henry Ford, who say every farmer will soon be using an automobile,” McGregor intoned, with all the self-assuredness of an older brother. “I don’t see why we can’t build autos right here.”

  His brothers were ready to listen, partly because it sounded like a good idea, but also because they knew their company was in dire straits. Their father had died the year before, and the wagon works he had founded and passed on to them was spiraling down the drain of insolvency. It seemed doubtful that their business of making horse-drawn wagons was ever going to be as profitable as it used to be, what with the new horseless carriages exciting the public imagination. Bold action was called for. If they failed, the worst that could happen was that they’d go out of business, and they were already on the verge of that.

  The brothers looked at each other, shrugged, and decided that yes, Gordon should get in touch with his acquaintance across the Detroit River. Maybe that Henry Ford fellow would want some sort of partnership that could benefit both companies. After all, what were automobiles but wagons with motors added on? Soon after, Gordon made an appointment with Henry Ford. But just to hedge his bets, he also scheduled a meeting with auto magnate Henry Leland about the possibility of making Canadian Cadillacs.

  An early model T-Ford

  Not Yet a Big Wheel

  It wasn’t that Ford was doing much better than the McGregor brothers. In fact, none of the American carmakers were doing terribly well. There were too many of them, and they were chasing too few customers. There weren’t many people who could afford to buy a luxury item like an automobile. Thus far, the Ford Motor Company had manufactured two models of cars, and neither had been successful. But McGregor believed in Ford’s vision to build a moderately priced, reliable car for the common man. If Ford could pull it off, it would be a refreshing contrast to the high-priced autos of the day.

  At the meeting with Gordon McGregor, Ford made it clear that he had long wanted to tap into the mostly untapped Canadian car market. He immediately saw the benefits in having a factory in Canada.

  For one, he could circumvent Canada’s stiff import tariffs, which were 35 percent on manufactured goods. But, best of all, being in Canada as a “Canadian” business would give Ford access to a much juicier plum: the entire British Commonwealth. And it didn’t hurt that hooking up with a willing Canadian partner meant the development costs could come out of someone else’s pockets. Ford could reap much of the profit, while letting McGregor worry about raising the capital to make it happen.

  Ford Model T Runabout, 1911

  The two struck a deal: the American Ford Motor Company would own 51 percent of McGregor’s newly created Ford Motor Company of Canada. In return, McGregor would have the right to manufacture cars using Ford’s designs, patents, and parts. Ford Canada would get the exclusive right to sell Fords in almost all of the British Empire—Canada, India, Australia, etc. But there was one big exception: Henry Ford would keep the United Kingdom for himself.

  McGregor was excited (and desperate) enough to agree to those terms. He needed $125,000 for start-up costs and immediately began looking for investors.
He rounded up enough brave—or foolish—men to get the business going. Although they eventually got many times the return on their investment, for the next few years it looked as if breaking even was a doubtful possibility.

  Henry Ford saw great opportunity in selling his cars in Canada.

  0 to 16 MPH in Ten Seconds

  In October 1904, McGregor drove the first Ford Canada car out of the factory and down Windsor’s Sandwich Street. Automobiles were still something of a novelty then; their clouds of smoke, horse-spooking noise, and dangerously inexperienced drivers made them largely unpopular, especially in a region that hadn’t yet been acclimated to them. Perhaps that was the reason that Ford Canada had trouble at first. By the summer of 1905, the 17 wagon-works employees had hand-assembled and the company sold just 107 Ford Model Cs and seven Model Bs…not the 400 that McGregor hoped for. The next year was worse: 101 cars. McGregor was nervous…and his investors, even more so.

  They became more heartened in 1908 when things started turning around. Demand tripled, overseas sales finally started getting a foothold, and at the end of the year, the company showed a profit of $19,000. The investors, with their modest dividends in hand, quieted. McGregor offered to buy out any that had cold feet about the venture; none took him up on the offer. Smart move, because pretty soon they were going to be rewarded many times over. In 1909 Henry Ford unveiled the Model T. This was it—the car that would change everything and would get the middle class and farmers into automobiles.