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Engineering astride the border Legget, R. F.

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Engineering Journal, 43, 5, pp. 79-81, 1960-07-01

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ENCINEERINCASTRIDE THE BORDER

by

R. F. LEGGET Al,JALYTf;D

B1JILDTNGRESEARCII - LIBRARY. ^uGs 1960

IIATIONAL RESEARCII{OUilCTL

REPRINTED FROM THE ENGTNEERING JOURNAL, VOL, 43, NO. 5, MAY 1960, P.79-8I

Technical Paper No. 102 of the Division of Building Research

Price l0 Cents Ottarva, july 1960 NRC 5733

.4 if

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T1|EBORDER R. F. LeggetT M.E.I.c., Director,Ditsision of Building Research, n*ational Research C ouncil, Ottawa.

From a talk given by the author at the Cleveland Convention of the American Society of Civil Engineers, May, 1959.

IS doubtful if any of the popular A few months ago, standing on the top of the great earth dyke which flanks TT power I speakers about the Seaway has the Canadian part of the immense new house at Barnhart Island on the St. Lawrence, the writer had by his side a close friend, a distinguished scientist and reminded his audiencd, when talking engineer from a distant land. The Director of the St. Lawrence Proiect for the about the frontier, that one of the Hydro-Electric Power Commission of Ontario, standing there in the warm sunlight great early American border forts was of that lovely summer day, told how this vast construction project had been carried found to have been built in Canadian out by two countries, working independently but side by side, without the slightest difficulty or real argument from the very start of the actual work. The foreign guest territory when surveys were checked. was amazed. "How can such things be?" he asked. "How can two great countries To be reminded of such an early such as yours co-operate so closely? And if you can do it, why cannot other countries piece of construction reallg asftide do the same? What is the secret?" These questions are worth considering, but into the border may, however, pr.ovids a without launching the usual eulogy about the more than five thousand miles of undefended frontier. good starting point for a realistic look at the inter-relations of American and Canadian civil engineering, with many consequences, not the least of Lake St. Francis, and as a joint special reference to works that are which was that the Province of Que- project with the United States in the near the long border. bec, without the power that could be international section from there to developed by a dam at the Lachine Lake Ontario, all costs being shared. The St. Lawrence Seaway will Rapids, one of the seaway works, In this joint project the lift from assuredly stimulate greatly the com- had to go elsewhere for much needed the tail-water level at Barnhart is merce on the vast international water- power. Work was therefore started made by two locks on the U.S. side. ways provided by the Great Lakes. instead on the Bersimis project in At Iroquois, the lock to pass the Built with all the accustomed speed northeastern which will even- Resulator Dam is in Canada. Later of modern construction, the Seaway Quebec, tually develop 2 million hp. thele may be locks at both places in and associated power works constitute For many reasons, therefole, Cana- both countries when the traffic so a monumental project of civil en- dian patience was sorely tried, with requires. gineering. When they were officially the result that in 1951 the Prime In 1952, however, it was said in dedicated, there may have been some Minister suggested to the President some American engineering circles, who remembered that it was almost of the United States that if the Inter- statements even appearing in print, exactly 27 years since (on 18, July national Commission would that Canada could not possibly carry 1932) a solemn treaty was signed Joint agree to the generation of power out the Seaway project on her own,, covering the prosecution of this great jointly by New York and Ontario in that her suggestion of doing so was undertaking. Unfortunately, the treaty the international section of the St. just a political move, that she was failed to win the nec€ssary two-thirds Lawrence, Canada would herself just bluffiirg. That assertion, coming majority of the votes of the U.S. carry out all the associatd seaway from fellow engineers, was not easy Senate and so it proved to be abor- work. The Commission did so agree, to take. Those who made this asser- tive. Canada had-to wait. Even the on 29 October 1952, and Ontario tion had, apparently, never been to imperative ,of war failed to win a and New York went ahead with the the eastern end of Lake Erie to see simple majority of senatorial votes power works at Barnhart, now com- how ships both large and small man- for the executive agreement prepared pleted and in operation. Before Can- age to get to Lake Ontario, 326 feet to authorize the start of construction could get started on the Seaway below. This is done by way of the in 1941. ada construction, however,,other factors , one of the great These things are not said in any had emerged which eventually led canals of the world, which conveys way critically. They are statements of to the international agreement under the largest of upper lake freighters historical fact that show that the which the job has been successfully up and down the Niagara esca{p- answers to the simple questions cited carried through to completion-as a ment in just seven locks. It is en- at the outset are not clear-cut. The Canadian project on the Canadian tirely a Canadian aclrievement, iust clelay in the start of construction had part of the river from to as wel'e the five plccedlng, smaller Welland Canals-in conception, de- know that just the other sid,e of the the actual constructi'on of civil en- sign, construction and cost. Officially hills at which she was looking was gineering projects lies the much more opened on 6 August 1932, more than the world's largest aluminum plant, difficult task of co-operation in the a quarter of a century ago, the "new" at Arvida, then being expanded at planning of these international ven- Welland Canal cost $13f ,900,000. breakneck speed, and that to serve it tures. For boundary water problems, Replacement today is estimated to with vital power there was even then this is done by the International cost $350,000,000. being oompleted possibly the greatest Joint Commission, with equal mern- The sceptics could just as readily of all Canadian construction achieve- bership from both countries, and have gone to the western end of ments, the building of tJle Shipshaw urrder joint chairmanship. Another Lake Erie and into the St. Clair power plant. Developing 1,200,000 distinguished Canadian engineer, River, to have a look at the "chemical hp. this entire project involving five General A. G. L. McNaughton, has city" that has developed around Sar- dams, large tunnels and a great long served as the Canadian chairman nia, and in particular at the installa- power house, was "on the line" Iess of the International Joint Commission. tions of the largest and most success- than eighteen months from the start This great venture in international ful of Canadian chemical plants. It of active construction, eighteen engineering understanding has now a makes synthetic rubber and was built months that included one of the most history of over half a century of at the height of war emergency, in severe winterg ever experienced in the splendid achievement. Great and dif- 7942-43. Many will recall how criti- Lake St. Johp country. ficult problems have been solved by cal material proved a rubtrcr to be in This recital of what Canadians ean this unique , arrangement, with very years the early war and how it was do wifl suggest the atmosphere of few questions ever having had to be decided that six synthetic rubber Texas-or should one now say Alaska, referred to higher authority or to the plants had to be built with the highest if the largest state is to produce the courts. Great problems are even now pliorities. of all war Originally, it tallest tales? These are not tall tales, under consideration by the I.l.C. All was planned that all six should be however, but matters which come to civil engineers will hope that the glounds built in the U.S.A., on the mind as one considers those pointed Commission's work will continue to such job that even one was beyond questions as to how two countries show what can be done by two na- the capacity of Canadian engineers manage to work together so harmoni- tions, acting in concert, with a reci- and constructors. ously in the carrying out of civil procal sharing of responsibility, a Fortunately, the Minister in the engineering works. This is surely reciprocal recogEition of capabilities, Canadian Government responsible for done, despite the impediments that a reciprocal interchange of skilled war supplies knew well what the others may put in the way, because servrce. Canadian construction industry could of mutual respect for what each Samuel Fortier do, for he was an engineer himself, ,and can do when American Canadian To speak of this co-operation the Rt. Hon C. D. Howe He was as a engineers work together and because reciprocal process may able to have the original decision sound strange of common high purpose. Canadian to some, especially to those changed and so, after some delay, who concrete experts may never persuade never think of Canada as Canada was given the sixth and last very much Americans that placing mass con- more than the great white plant to build. All equipment and blank that crete in high lifts is good practice aDpears north of the process designs were shared between U.S. border on (thinking now of that same St. Law- all too many American the several plants, a superb piece of maps. It renoe power house). Canadian5 may would be invidious American engineering, but plans for' to cite modern never convince some Americans that examples of the other the Canadian plant site, its service side of the winter concreting is an economical penny but if one tulns structures and utilities u'ere prepared back the pages procedure, but both have learned of engineering histor.y by Canadian consultants, and the en- for a few much from the other; so may it moments, it is tire project built by Canadian contrac- easy to illustrate what always be. is meant Samuel Fortier, tors, using as many as 8,000 men on for example, And when Canadians and Ameri- is a nane now the square mile occupied by the plant. little known but a cans do work together, with adminis- name still familiar Last of the six to be started, it was to those few who trative and political hurdles removed, know said at the time that the Canadian the histoly of irrigation in the then the impossible becomes merely western plant was the first to be finished. Be States as that of one of the a challenge, the incredible merely a great pioneer irrigation that as it may, the fact remains that engineers of tale to be told. Think for exampl" America. Fortier the first carload of styrene was was. however. a of the DEW Line, that great line'of true pioneer shipped from this plant, to an unspeci- in the field of soil me- outposts for continental defence- chanics. Fifty years fied destination in the United States, before the name much of it built in Canada, but with soil mechani,cs eleven months to the dav after thr,. had been coined, American money; designed by Amer.i- first sod was turned. Fortier was experimenting with soil can engineers, but with some assir^t- stabilization, soil compaction and Arvida ance regarding Iocal conditions fronr other so-called modern tLchniques of Nloving a little away from the Canadians; built in Canada bv Cana- soil engineering. And he was a Cana- border, but still on St. Lawrence dian prime contractors but with in- dian, a native of Leeds, Quebec, waters, many know the lovelv sail un valuable assistance in the deliver.v tlained at McGill University. the Saguenay River, past Tadoussac, of men and supplies from the Ameri He graduated in 1885, but heard past Capes Trinity and Eternity, and can Navy and Air F,orce. There were the call to the West soon after, for finally into Ha-Ha Bay to the small some difficulties, naturally, but not he was in Denver by 1890. His great port 'of Bagotville. joint Approaching the at the working level. To stand work was done with the United States wharf there, late one fine evenine on the Arctic Coasf of Canada at a Department of Agriculture, rvhere he in 1942, July a tourist was over- DEW Line installation and to be became Associate Chief of the Divi- heard explaining that on the other unable to distinguish Canadian work- sion of Agricultural Engineering. He side of the treelined hills behind the ers from American is to see further also served the Agricultural Colleges little town was "nothine there but vivid evidence of what can be done of Utah and Montana and was on the trees and rivers and lakes all the wav together. staff of the Universitv of California to the Arctic Ocean." Little did she Behind all such co-operation in for two peliods. Fortier was not the helped in Canadian presidential St. Lawrence be ambushed from the only Canadian who with the term the : start of irrigation in the West. The chair coincided with his tenure of American side. town of Ontario, in California, was another office, for he was also the Fortunately, the Rideau Canal had so named by two young Canadians, eighteenth President of the Ameiican never to be used for this warlike the Chaffey brothers, who went out Society, the only Canadian ever to purpose. Today, it is used as never west from a small plaie near Ottawa hold this office. Small wonder, then, before for invasion purposes - the in the l830rs. (Later, they also started that he had a garden party at his invasion of the lovely Rideau Lakes irrigation in the Murray Valley of home when the Society met in his by hundreds of American holiday Australia where one may now see a own city; small wonder that those makers. But for over 2O years it memorial to them.) who were there regarded the event served as the first St. Lawrence Sea- as so memorable an occasion. For way, a large fleet of small steamboats Turning to a different branch of Thomas Keefer was born in 1821, plying a busy trade 'on the "Tri- civil engineering, the longest rail- trained as an engineer on the early angular Route" from Montreal up the way tunnel in North Arnerica, east Erie and Welland Canals, steadily Ottawa River, then up to the Rideau of the Mississippi, is still the Hoosac gaining such a high reputati,on that Lakes and down again to Kingston, Tunnel of the Boston and Maine his practice at least touched almost usually returning to Montreal down Railroad. It is located in the heart ever'y major Canadian civil engineer- the rapids of the St. Lawrence. In of the mountains at the northwest ing project of the nineteenth century. 1855, the first St. Lawrence Canals corner of Massachusetts, near North were finished after the expenditure Adams. Nearly five miles long, it is Naturally, therefore, Keefer had of over $20 million, a really vast sum still in excellent condition and in regu- much to do with the steady develoP- fol those days which almost bank. lar service even though it was opened ment of the St. Lawrence Canals, his rupted . and which for use n 1877. How many know work in this field continuing through had appreciable influence upon that it was finally built, after several most of. his professional career and Canadian history. The great activity false starts, by two Canadians? These culminating in his membershiP of on the Rideau was over. For wer:e the Shanly brothers, Walter and the International DeeP WaterwaYs the next 103 years, shipping was to Francis, two memberq of a quite re- Commission which conducted one of sail up and down between the sea markable group of young engineers the first studies of the practicability and the Great Lakes, using the St. who, try great good fortune, served of a deep ship canal between the Lawrence Canals which Canada built Canada in the early days of her Great Lakes and the sea. In this and and rebuilt on her own. The Seaway railway building and at the hey-day maqy other ways, not least bY his of 1959 is no new thing, it should of canal construction. The Shanlys presidencv of the A.S'C.E., he served be recalled, but a greatly en. had gained such an enviable reputa- ih" t*o countries well. At that gar- iust larged version of what Canada her- tion as engineers and builders in den party, the old gentleman could self has provided for international use Canada that the Commonwealth of have shown a tangible link with the for over a century, and without Massachusetts invited them, in 1868, very first St. Lawrence Seaway which charge for these many years. to submit a tender for the construc- dates back to 1832, for Mrs. Keefer's Thomas Keefel might well have tion of the Hoosac Tunnel, after other father, Thomas McKay, was one of told about all this, with a smile, had contractors had failed. Their offer the builders of the Rideau Canal' So one been privileged to chat with him was acoepted. They started work in well did McKay execute his masonrY in his garden on that day in 1869 and the tunnel was completed, work that, just before the Canal was June 1913. He would certainly have told on schedule, in 1874. The brothers opened, the Superintending Engineer, of one of his earliest boyhood mem- introduced several new features into Lt.-Col. John By, presented to him ories-horv, on a day in November tunnel work, the most notable being a beautiful silver loving cup as token 1829, he had seen the first two ves- the first use in North America of of his appreciati'on of work well done. sels to use the first Welland Canal. as nitro-glycerine as an explosive; they The cup was bequeathed to Mrs. they passed his home at Thorold, paved the way for the great advance Keefer and is now in the Possession sailing side by side, one American in tunnelling that followed in the of Thomas Keefer's grandson, another and one Canadian, on their way up next few decades, bearer of his distinguished name. from Lake Ontario to the Welland River and so into Lake Erie. One r. c.Keefer ,n"*"rtiJi"3i?"*#iH."";"*; hundred and thirty years later, two The only rneeting that the Ameri- be surprising to those who have fleets of boats, gunboats but sailing can Society of Civil Engineers has never heard of the Rideau Waterway. on peaceful occasions, side by side in ever held in Ottawa *ui i.r 1913. It is the Canal that ioins the cities of true naval comradeship, come up One of the highlights of the meeting Ottawa and Kingston, formed by the rrgain from the sea, this time officially was a garden party, held in the canalization of two rivers and tl.re to participate in the opening of the, garden of one of Ottawa's lovely linking of their headwater lakes. It gleatest seaway link of all. As a part homes. In the centre of the garden is 127 miles long, includes 47 mas- of the ceremonies on that day a stone was the host, then in his ninely-sec- onry locks and over 50 dams, large u'as unveiled, granite set into the solid ond year, still keen and active ment- and small. And it was constructed by concrete of the great power house. ally but slowed down physically by the Royal Engineers of Great Britain Or.re need go no further than this the burden of his years. His n"*e -ot between 1826 and 1832, through stone to find the answer to those Thomas Coltrin Keefer; he had been what was then the virgin forest of early questions, for there engraved a friend of Walter and Francis Upper Canada' It was built as a to see,for all time,are these Shanly. Far more than that, he lvas military waterway, as a direct after- 1"::,i11 the acknowledged dean of Canadian math of the war of 1812, to provide "This stone bears witness to the engineers, the only man to serve an alternative route between Mont- conlmon purpose of two nations twice as President of the Canadian real and Kingston (bV using the uhose frontiers are the frontiers Society of Civil Engineers (which Ottawa and then the Canal), in case of friendship. whose uaAs are became, in 1918, th; Engineering hostilities should break out again and the uays of freedom, and whose Institute of Canada). His second the supply line up the rapids of the works are the works ol peace."