Canada reads…in vintage photos

We are a nation of readers: in 2015, we bought 52 million books, amounting to more than $983 million sales. We’ve embraced electronic but still prefer paper (source: booknet).

We have an annual battle of the books called “Canada Reads”, which is hosted by CBC radio every year. We even worry that we are not reading enough.

Where, why, how do we read? Look no further than Library and Archives Canada. I’ve been exploring their digital image collection for years–and what I’ve found is a wealth of historical images of people reading.

Here’s what I found: First peoples’ and fur trappers, settlers and soldiers, country and city dwellers. If we’re at war, if we’re in a remote region, if we’re building a city, if we’re out in the woods or going to bed–we bring along something to read.

Mostly, we read to educate or entertain, sometimes for propaganda (to attract settlers and immigrants, for example) and, tragically, for assimilation (Indigenous people in Canada are working to reclaim their languages).

I’ve selected some of my favourites, and in the process, it has resulted in a visual tour of Canadian history over the last century. We may not agree on everything, but we are a country united–by geography, by history, by “hope and hard work”, and by books!

Canada reads.

We read at home.

Inuit reading “book of wisdom”, Rymer Point, N.W.T, 1950 (photo credit, S.J. Bailey)

We read in log cabins.

Promotional photo of frontiersmen in log cabin “reading room” (no date)

We read in monasteries.

Monks reading in a cloister, trappist monastery near Oka, Quebec, 1890

We read in bed.

Trapper “George Lush reads Time magazine in bed,” N.W.T, 1949-50 (photo credit: Richard Harrington/Library and Archives Canada)

Western Canada, 1954-1963 (Credit: Mary Gilliat Eaton)

We read in tents.

Rosemary Gilliat, 1954

Fraser, B.C., 1954 (photo credit: Rosemary Gilliat Eaton)

Canadian soldier, 1916

We read by lamplight.

Gatineau Park, photo by Rosemary Gilliat Eaton

Capt J de Dominico reading a book on deployment in Laos, 1955 (credit: Herb Taylor)

We read in the snow.

Gatineau Park, Quebec, (credit: Rosemary Gilliat Eaton)

We read on moose antlers.

(photo credit: Rosemary Gilliat Eaton, 1956)

We read at war.

Leading Wren Ruth Church, Women’s Royal Canadian Naval Service, delivers books to Able Seaman Bill Swetman of HMCS Petrolia, Londonderry, Northern Ireland, Nov. 1944 (photo credit: Lt. F.R. Kemp)

We read at the library.

(photo credit: Toronto Public Library)

(photo credit: National Film Board)

Toronto Public Library (1930-1960) (photo credit: Citizenship and Immigration)

We read at mobile libraries.

We read at school.

We read in the country.

We read in small towns.

Poet Wilson P. MacDonald gives reading, Cheapside, Ontario, 1960 (credit: Ken E. Muma)

We read in the city.

James Hope and Sons bookstore, Ottawa, @ 1900 (source)

Toronto, 1957 (photo credit: Michel Lambeth)

“People walking down a Toronto sidewalk, a sign for an evangelical bookshop and a tavern side-by side,” January 1946 (photo credit: Ronny Jaques)

Happy Canada Day!

And thank you for reading.

MERCI (français)
THANK YOU (english)
Wli Wni (abénaquis)
Meegwetch (algonquin)
Mikwetc (atikamekw)
Meegwetch (cris)
Tshinashkumitin (innu)
Qujannamiik/Nakurmiik / Ai(inuit)
Welaliog (micmac)
Niá : wen (mohawk)
Chiniskomiitin (naskapis)
Tiawenhk! (wendat)

 

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Unless otherwise noted, source for all photographs: Library and Archives Canada