The Navvies

The Navvies were traveling labourers who built the Great Lakes Canals, the railroads and the mines in Canada and England. They were exploited by the upper classes in body and spirit even after death. This is an excerpt from an online biography of the Navvies. Those in Canada were Irish labourers, Catholics whose bosses were Orangemen. In England they came from the North, Scotland and Ireland. They were the epitome of the English proletarianized peasantry.
In Canada they are celebrated in song by Gordon Lightfoot with his Great Canadian Railway Triology.




Navvies built canals, railways, dams and then pipe tracks, the big nineteenth century sea-port docks, and the Manchester Ship Canal.

Navvying began suddenly in 1763 in the Bridgewater Canal: it ended around 1943, after a twenty-year fade-out. Along with the rest of Britain there was a kind of kink in the navvy's history in the 1870s when things began changing, generally for the better.

At first they were just skilled earth shifters digging canals at prodigious speed. Later they were skilled in tunnelling, mining, timbering — skilled enough to set up as one-man contractors employing local unskilled labourers to shift their muck. You could set a gang of prime navvies down in an untouched valley, they said of themselves, and they'd build you a dam without aid of an engineer. At times they slotted into the pay scales at twice a common labourer's wages, though they never equalled apprenticed craftsmen like masons.

It is easy for the urbanised and pensionable to romanticise them. They seem free, fearless above the humdrum conventions of shopkeepers, clerks, factory workers, vicars, and the legally wed. Perhaps we glamorise cowboys, blue-water sailors and the hell-bent navvy for the same reasons. In reality, isolation was the biggest thing in a navvy's life. They were perpetual outsiders: a people apart. Sub-working class. Sub-the-bottommost-heap of English working society. Sub-all, almost.

Left: Railway Navvies. Right: Navvies, 1890s

Click on thumbnails for larger images.

The navvy never called a spade a spade, always a bloody shovel. Everything he shovelled he called muck. Earth, blasted rock, clay, all were generically and indiscriminately muck. With the muck he created new landscapes and changed old societies. It was mass transformation by muscle and shovel.

To do so navvies worked in geographical and social isolation; crude, muck-caked men on a helix spiralling down from prejudice [4/5] to more isolation, isolation to more prejudice. Eighty per cent were English, most of their work was in England, yet they lived like aliens in their own country, often outside its laws, usually outside its national sense of community. They were their own country's non-belongers. They belonged to themselves only tenuously. Mostly they lived apart in navvy settlements. New habits of life, thought, dress, speech, and a tightening of the ring against outsiders came out of their isolation. Their own countrymen were terrified of them, and despised them. Heavy drinking was normal, death by alcohol common. Drink was a common cause of riot, along with an unhesitating hatred for their own Irish minority. Their accident and death rates were higher than any other group in Britain, including colliers, including soldiers fighting nineteenth-century wars. Often they were nameless, known to each other only at second-hand by nickname. They were a homeless, wandering itinerant people belonging nowhere except to the island as a whole.

They survived the Great War as a separate community, but not for long. Nawying was killed by a lack of large scale public works (worsened by the Slump), by bureaucracy and by the petrol engine. Probably in that order. By the mid-1950s they were quietly ending as a recognisable separate community. Individuals did live and work on. Their descendants still do (at their height, just before the Great War, there may have been as many as a hundred and seventy thousand of them).

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Brain Work and Manual Work 

PETER KROPOTKIN

First Published: The Nineteenth Century, March 1890, pp. 456-475
Source: Archive.org

Note: Kropotkin was a frequent contributor to The Nineteenth Century. He was their regular correspondent for science news, and used the journal to issue his book Mutual Aid in serial form, as well as many articles on other topics. Brain Work and Manual Work was later published in lightly edited form as Chapter 8 of Fields, Factories, and Workshops

Transcription/Markup/Notes: by Graham Seaman for MIA, Jan 2021.

In olden times, men of science, and especially those who have done most to forward the growth of natural philosophy, did not despise manual work and handicraft. Galileo made his telescopes with his own hands. Newton learned in his boyhood the art of managing tools; he exercised his young mind in contriving most ingenious machines, and when he began his researches in optics he was able himself to grind the lenses for his instruments and himself to make the well-known telescope which, for its time, was a fine piece of workmanship. Leibnitz was fond of inventing machines: windmills and carriages to he moved without horses preoccupied his mind as much as mathematical and philosophical speculations. Linnæus became a botanist while helping his father — a practical gardener — in his daily work. In short, with our great geniuses handicraft was no obstacle to abstract researches — it rather favoured them. On the other hand, if the workers of old found but few opportunities for mastering science, many of them had, at least, their intelligences stimulated by the very variety of work which was performed in the then unspecialised workshops; and some of them had the benefit of familiar intercourse with men of science. Watt and Rennie were friends with Professor Robinson; Brindley, the road-maker, despite his fourteen-pence-a-day wages, enjoyed intercourse with educated society, and thus developed his remarkable engineering faculties; the son of a well-to-do family could ‘idle’ at a wheelwright’s shop, so as to become later on a Smeaton or a Stephenson.

We have changed all that. Under the pretext of division of labour, we have sharply separated the brain worker from the manual worker. The masses of the workmen do not receive more scientific education than their grandfathers did; but they have been deprived of the education of even the small workshop, while their boys and girls are driven into a mine, or a factory, from the age of thirteen, and there they soon forget the little they may have learned at school. As to the scientists, they despise manual labour. How few of them would be able to make a telescope, or even a plainer instrument? Most of them are not capable of even designing a scientific instrument, and when they have given a vague suggestion to the instrument-maker they leave it with him to invent the apparatus they need. Nay, they have raised the contempt of manual labour to the height of a theory. ‘The scientist,’ they say, ‘must discover the laws of Nature, the civil engineer must apply them, and the worker must execute in steel or wood, in iron or stone, the patterns devised by the engineer. He must work with machines invented for him not by him. No matter if he does not understand them and cannot improve them: the scientist and the scientific engineer will take care of the progress of science and industry.’

It may be objected that nevertheless there is a class of men who belong to none of the above three divisions. When young, they have been manual workers, and some of them continue to be; but, owing to some happy circumstances, they have succeeded in acquiring some scientific knowledge, and thus they have combined science with handicraft. Surely there are. such men; happily enough there is a nucleus of men who have escaped the so-much-advocated specialisation of labour, and it is precisely to them that industry owes its chief recent inventions. But they are the exceptions; they are the irregulars – the Cossacks who have broken the ranks and pierced the screens so carefully erected between the classes. And they are so few, in comparison with the ever-growing requirements of industry — and of science as well, as I am about to prove — that all over the world we hear complaints about the scarcity of precisely such men.

What is the meaning, in fact, of the outcry for technical education which has been raised at one and the same time in this country, in France, in Germany, in the States, and in Russia, if it does not express a general dissatisfaction with the present division into scientists, scientific engineers, and workers? Listen to those who know industry, and you will see that the substance of their complaints is this: ‘The worker whose task has been specialised by the permanent division of labour has lost the intellectual interest in his labour, and it is especially so in the great industries: he has lost his inventive powers. Formerly, he invented very much. Manual workers — not scientists nor trained engineers — have invented, or brought to perfection, the prime motors and all that mass of machinery which has revolutionised industry for the last hundred years. But since the great factory has prevailed, the worker, depressed by the monotony of his work, invents no more. What can a weaver invent who merely supervises four looms, without knowing anything either about their complicated movements or how the machines grew to be what they are? What can a man invent who is condemned for life to bind together the ends of two threads with the greatest celerity, and knows nothing beyond making a knot? At the outset of modem industry, three generations of workers have invented; now they cease to do so. As to the inventions of the engineers, specially trained for devising machines, they are either devoid of genius or not practical enough. Those ‘nearly to nothings’ of which Sir Frederick Bramwell spoke recently at Bath[a] are missing in their inventions — those nothings which can be learned in the workshop only, and which permitted a Murdoch and the Soho workers to make a practical engine of Watt’s schemes. None but he who knows the machine — not in its drawings and models only, hut in its breathing and throbbings — who unconsciously thinks of it while standing by it, can really improve it. Smeaton and Newcomen surely were excellent engineers; but in their engines a boy had to open the steam valve at each stroke of the piston; and it was one of those boys who once managed to connect the valve with the remainder of the machine, so as to make it open automatically, while he ran away to play with other boys. Hut in the modem machinery there is no room left for naïve improvements of that kind. Scientific education on a wide scale has become necessary for further inventions, and that education is refused to the workers. So that there is no issue out of the difficulty unless scientific education and handicraft are combined together — unless integration of knowledge takes the place of the present divisions. Such is the real substance of the present movement in favour of technical education. But, instead of bringing to public consciousness the, perhaps, unconscious motives of the present discontent, instead of widening the views of the discontented and discussing the problem to its full extent, the mouthpieces of the movement do not mostly rise above the shopkeeper’s view of the question. Some of them indulge in jingo talk about crushing all foreign industries out of competition, while the others see in technical education nothing but a means of somewhat improving the flesh-machine of the factory and of transferring a few workers into the upper class of trained engineers.

Such an ideal may satisfy them, but it cannot satisfy those who keep in view the combined interests of science and industry, and consider both as a means for raising humanity to a higher level. We maintain that in the interests of both science and industry, as well as of society as a whole, every human being, without distinction of birth, ought to receive such an education as would enable him, or her, to combine a thorough knowledge of science with a thorough knowledge of handicraft. We fully recognise the necessity of specialisation of knowledge, but we maintain that specialisation must follow general education, and that general education must be given in science and handicraft alike. To the division of society into brain-workers and manual workers we oppose the combination of both kinds of activities; and instead of ‘technical education,’ which means the maintenance of the present division between brain work and manual work, we advocate the éducation intégrale or complete education, which means the disappearance of that pernicious distinction. Plainly stated, the aims of the school under this system ought to be the following: To give such an education that, on leaving school at the age of eighteen or twenty, each boy and each girl should be endowed with a thorough knowledge of science — such a knowledge as might enable them to be useful workers in science — and, at the same time, to give them a general knowledge of what constitutes the bases of technical training, and such a skill in some special trade as would enable each of them to take his or her place in the grand world of the manual production of wealth. I know that many will find that aim too largo, or even impossible to attain, but I hope that if they have the patience to read the following pages, they will see that we require nothing beyond what can be easily attained. In fact, it has been attained; and what has been done on a small scale could be done on a wider scale, were it not for the economical and social causes w4iich prevent any serious reform from being accomplished in our miserably organised society.

The experiment has been made at the Moscow Technical School for twenty consecutive years, with many hundreds of boys; and the testimonies of the most competent judges at the exhibitions of Brussels, Philadelphia, Vienna, and Paris are to the effect that the experiment has been a success.[b] The Moscow school admits boys not older than fifteen, and it requires from boys of that age nothing but a substantial knowledge of geometry and algebra, together with the usual knowledge of their mother tongue; younger pupils are received in the preparatory classes. The school is divided into two sections — the mechanical and the chemical; but as I personally know the former only (it is also the more important in our case), so I shall limit my remarks to the education given in the mechanical section. Well, after a five or six years’ stay at the school, the students leave it with a thorough knowledge of higher mathematics, physics, mechanics, and connected sciences so thorough, indeed, that it is not second to that acquired in the best mathematical faculties of the best European universities. When myself a student of the mathematical faculty of the St. Peterburg University, I had the opportunity of comparing their knowledge with our own. I saw the courses of higher geometry compiled by some students of the technical school for the use of their comrades; I admired the facility with which they applied the integral calculus to dynamical problems; and I came to the conclusion that while we, university students, had more knowledge of a general character (for instance, in mathematical astronomy), they, the students of the school, were much more advanced in higher geometry, and especially in the applications of higher mathematics to the most intricate problems of dynamics, the theories of heat and elasticity. But while we, the students of the# university, hardly knew the use of our hands, the students of the school fabricated with their own hands, and without the help of professional workmen, fine steam-engines, from the heavy boiler to the last finely turned screw, agricultural machinery, and scientific apparatus — all for the trade — and they received the highest awards for the work of their hands at the international exhibitions. They were scientifically educated skilled workers — workers with university education — highly appreciated even by the Russian manufacturers who so much distrust science.

Now, the methods by which these wonderful results were achieved were these: In science, learning from memory was not in honour, while independent research was favoured by all means. Science was taught hand in hand with its applications, and what was learned in the schoolroom was applied in the workshop. Great attention was paid to the highest abstractions of geometry as a means for developing imagination and research. As to the teaching of handicraft, the methods were quite different from those which proved a failure at the Cornell University, and differed, in fact, from those used in most technical schools. The student was not sent to a workshop to learn some special handicraft and to earn his existence as soon as possible, but the teaching of technical skill was prosecuted — according to a scheme elaborated by the founder of the school, M. Dellavos, and now applied also at Chicago – in the same systematical way as laboratory work is taught in the modern universities. It is evident that drawing was considered as the first step in technical education. Then the student was brought, first, to the carpenter’s workshop, or rather laboratory, and there he was thoroughly taught to execute all kinds of carpentry and joinery. No efforts were spared in order to bring the pupil to a certain perfection in that branch — the real basis of all trades. Later on, he was transferred to the turner’s workshop, where he was taught to make in wood the patterns of those things which he would have to make in metal in the following workshops. The foundry followed, and there he was taught to cast those parts of machines which he had prepared in wood; and it was only after he had gone through the first three stages that he was admitted to the smith’s and engineering workshops. Such was the system which English readers will find described in full in a recent work by Mr. Ham,(1) and which has been introduced, in its technical part, in the Chicago Manual Training School. As for the perfection of the mechanical work of the students, I cannot do better than to refer to the reports of the juries at the above-named exhibitions.

The Moscow Technical School surely is not an ideal school. It totally neglects the humanitarian education of the young men. But we must recognise that the Moscow experiment — not to speak of hundreds of other partial experiments — has perfectly well proved the possibility of combining a scientific education of a very high standard with the education which is necessary for becoming an excellent skilled labourer. It has proved, moreover, that the best means for producing really good skilled labourers is to seize the bull by the horns — to grasp the educational problem in its great features, instead of trying to give some special skill in some handicraft, together with some scraps of knowledge in some branch of some science. And it has shown also what can be obtained, without over-pressure, if a rational economy of the scholar’s time is always kept in view, and theory goes hand in hand with practice. Viewed in this light, the Moscow results do not seem extraordinary at all, and still better results may be expected if the same principles are applied from the earliest years of education. Waste of time is the leading feature of our present education. Not only are we taught a mass of rubbish, but what is not rubbish is taught so as to make us waste as much time as possible. Our present methods of teaching originate from a time when the accomplishments required from an educated person were extremely limited; and they have been maintained, notwithstanding the immense increase of knowledge which must be conveyed to the scholar’s mind since science has so much widened its former limits. Hence the over-pressure in schools, and hence, also, the urgent necessity of totally revising both the subjects and the methods of teaching, according to the new wants and to the examples already given here and there, by separate schools and separate teachers.

It is evident that the years of childhood ought not to be spent so uselessly as they are now. German teachers have shown how the very plays of children can be made instrumental in conveying to the childish mind some concrete knowledge in both geometry and mathematics. The children who have made the squares of the theorem of Pythagoras out of pieces of coloured cardboard, will not look at the theorem, when it comes in geometry, as on a mere instrument of torture devised by the teachers; and the less so if they apply it as the carpenters do. Complicated problems of arithmetic, which so much harassed us in our boyhood, are easily solved by children seven and eight years old, if they arc put in the shape of interesting puzzles. And if the Kindergarten — German teachers often make of it a kind of barrack in which each movement of the child is regulated beforehand — has often become a small prison for the little ones, the idea which presided at its foundation is nevertheless true. In fact, it is almost impossible to imagine, without having tried it, how many sound notions of nature, habits of classification, and taste for natural sciences can be conveyed to the children’s minds; and, if a series of concentric courses adapted to the various phases of development of the human being were generally accepted in education, the first series in all sciences, save sociology, could be taught before the age of ten or twelve, so as to give a general idea of the universe, the earth and its inhabitants, the chief physical, chemical, zoological, and botanical phenomena, leaving the discovery of the laws of those phenomena to the next series of deeper and more specialised studies. On the other side, we all know how children like to make toys themselves, how they gladly imitate the work of full-grown people if they see them at work in the workshop or the building-yard. But the parents either stupidly paralyse that passion, or do not know how to utilise it. Most of them despise manual work and prefer sending their children to the study of Roman history, or of Franklin’s teachings about saving money, to seeing them at a work which is good for the ‘lower classes only.’ They thus do their best to render subsequent learning the more difficult.

And then come the school years, and time is wasted again to an incredible extent. Take, for instance, mathematics, which everyone ought to know, because it is the basis of all subsequent education, and which so few really learn in our schools. In geometry time is foolishly wasted by using a method which merely consists in committing geometry to memory. In most cases, the boy reads again and again the proof of a theorem till his memory has retained the succession of reasonings. Therefore, nine boys out of ten, if asked to prove an elementary theorem two years after having left the school, will be unable to do it, unless mathematics is their specialty. They will forget which auxiliary lines to draw, and they never have been taught to discover the proofs by themselves. No wonder that later on they find such difficulties in applying geometry to physics, that their progress is despairingly sluggish, and that so few master higher mathematics. There is, however, the other method which permits progress, as a whole, at a much speedier rate, and under which he who once has learned geometry will know it all his life long. Under this system, each theorem is put as a problem; its solution is never given beforehand, and the pupil is induced to find it by himself. Thus, if some preliminary exercises with the rule and the compass have been made, there is not one boy or girl, oat of twenty or more, who will not be able to find the means of drawing an angle which is equal to a given angle, and to prove their equality, after a few suggestions from the teacher; and if the subsequent problems are given in a systematic succession (there are excellent text-books for the purpose), and the teacher does not press his pupils to go faster than they can go at the beginning, they advance from one problem to the next with an astonishing facility, the only difficulty being to bring the pupil to solve the first problem and thus to acquire confidence in his own reasoning. Moreover, each abstract geometrical truth must be impressed on the mind in its concrete form as well. As soon as the pupils have solved a few problems on paper, they must solve them on the playing-ground with a few sticks and a string, and they must apply their knowledge in the workshop. Only then will the geometrical lines acquire a concrete meaning in the childrens minds; only then will they see that the teacher is playing no tricks when he asks them to solve problems with the rule and the compass, without resorting to the protractor; only then will they know geometry. ‘Through the eyes and the hand to the brain’ — that is the true principle of economy of time in teaching. I remember as if it were yesterday, how geometry suddenly acquired for me a new meaning, and how this new meaning facilitated all ulterior studies. It was as we were mastering a Montgolfier balloon, and I remarked that the angles at the summits of each of the twenty strips of paper out of which the balloon was going to be made must cover less than the fifth part of a right angle each. I remember, next, bow the sines and the tangents ceased to be mere cabalistic signs when they permitted us to calculate the length of a stick in a working profile of a fortification; and how geometry in space became plain when we began to make on a small scale a bastion with embrasures and barbettes – an occupation which obviously was soon prohibited on account of the state into which we brought our clothes. ‘You look like navvies,’ was the reproach addressed to us by our intelligent educators, while we were proud precisely of being navvies — and of discovering the use of geometry.

By compelling our children to study real things from mere graphical representations, instead of making those things themselves, we compel them to waste the most precious time; we uselessly worry their minds; we accustom them to the worst methods of learning; we kill independent thought in the bud; and very seldom we succeed in conveying a real knowledge of what we are teaching. Superficiality, parrot-like repetition, slavishness and inertia of mind are the results of our education. We do not teach our children how to learn. The very beginnings of science are taught on the same pernicious system. In most schools, even arithmetic is taught in the abstract way, and mere rules are stuffed into the poor little heads. The idea of a unit, which is arbitrary and can be changed at will in our measurement (the match, the box of matches, the dozen of boxes, or the gross; the metre, the centimetre, the kilometre, and so on), is not impressed on the mind, and therefore, when the children come to the decimal fractions they are at a loss to understand them;, whereas in France, where the decimal system of measures and money is a matter of daily life, even those workers who have received the plainest elementary education are quite familiar with decimals. To represent twenty-five centimes, or twenty-five centimetres, they write ‘ zero twenty-five,’ while most of my readers surely remember how this same zero at the head of a row of figures puzzled them in their boyhood. We do also what we can to render algebra unintelligible, and our children spend one year before they have learned what is not algebra at all, but a mere system of abbreviations, which can be learned by the way, if it is taught together with arithmetic.

The waste of time in physics is merely revolting. While young people very easily understand the principles of chemistry and its formulae, as soon as they themselves make the first experiments with a few glasses and tubes, they mostly find the greatest difficulties in grasping the mechanical introduction into physics, partly because they do not know geometry, and especially because they are merely shown costly machines instead of being induced to make themselves plain apparatus for illustrating the phenomena they study. Instead of learning the laws of force with plain instruments which a boy of ten can easily make, they learn them from mere drawings, in a purely abstract fashion. Instead of making themselves an Atwood’s machine with a broomstick and the wheel of an old clock, or verifying the laws of falling bodies with a key gliding on an inclined string, they are shown a complicated apparatus, and in most cases the teacher himself does not know how to explain to them the principle of the apparatus, and indulges in irrelevant details. And so it goes on from the beginning to the end, with but a few honourable exceptions(2).

If waste of time is characteristic of our methods of teaching science, it is characteristic as well of the methods used for teaching handicraft. We know how years are wasted when a boy serves his apprenticeship in a workshop; but the same reproach can be addressed, to a great extent, to those technical schools which endeavour at once to teach some special handicraft, instead of resorting to the broader and surer methods of systematical teaching. Just as there are in science some notions and methods which are preparatory to the study of all sciences, so there are also some fundamental notions and methods preparatory to the special study of any handicraft. Reuleaux has shown in that delightful book, the Theoretische Kinematik, that there is, so to say, a philosophy of all possible machinery. Each machine, however complicated, can be reduced to a few elements — plates, cylinders, discs, cones, and so on — as well as to a few tools — chisels, saws, rollers, hammers, &c.; and,however complicated its movements, they can be decomposed into a few modifications of motion, such as the transformation of circular motion into a rectilinear, and the like, with a number of intermediate links. So also each handicraft can be decomposed into a number 6f elements. In each trade one must know how to make a plate with parallel surfaces, a cylinder, a disc, a square and a round hole; how to manage a limited number of tools, all tools being mere modifications of less than a dozen types; and how to transform one kind of motion into another. This is the foundation of all mechanical handicrafts; so that the knowledge of how to make in wood those primary elements, how to manage the chief tools in wood-work, and how to transform various kinds of motion, ought to be considered as the very basis for the subsequent teaching of all possible kinds of mechanical handicraft. The pupil who has acquired that skill already knows one good half of all possible trades. Besides, none can be a good worker in science unless he is in possession of good methods of scientific research; unless he has learned to observe, to describe with exactitude, to discover mutual relations between facts seemingly disconnected, to make hypotheses and to verify them, to reason upon cause and effect, and so on. And none can be a good manual worker unless he has been accustomed to the good methods of handicraft altogether. He must grow accustomed to conceive the subject of his thoughts in a concrete form, to draw it, or to model, to hate badly kept tools and bad methods of work, to give to everything a fine touch of finish, to derive artistic enjoyment from the contemplation of gracious forms and combinations of colours, and dissatisfaction from what is ugly. Be it handicraft, science, or art, the chief aim of the school is not to make a specialist from a beginner, but to teach him the elements of knowledge and the good methods of work, and, above all, to give him that general inspiration which will induce him, later on, to put in whatever he does a sincere longing for truth, to like what is beautiful both as to form and contents; to feel the necessity of being a useful unit amidst other human units, and thus to feel his heart at unison with the rest of humanity.

As for avoiding the monotony of work which would result from the pupil always making mere cylinders and discs, and never making machines or other useful things, there are thousands of means for avoiding that want of interest, and one of them, in use at Moscow, is worthy of notice. It is not to give work for mere exercise, but to utilise everything which the pupil makes, from his very first steps. Bo you remember how you were delighted, in your childhood, if your work was utilised, be it only as a part of something useful? So they do at Moscow. Each plank planed by the pupils is utilised as a part of some machine in some of the other workshops. When a pupil comes to the engineering workshop, and he is set to make a quadrangular block of iron with parallel and perpendicular surfaces, the block has an interest in his eyes, because, when he has finished it, verified its angles and surfaces, and corrected its defects, the block is not thrown under the bank — it is given to a more advanced pupil, who makes a handle to it, paints the whole, and sends it to the shop of the school as a presse papier. The systematical teaching thus receives the necessary attractiveness(3).

It is evident that celerity of work is a most important factor in production. So it might be asked if, under the above system, the necessary speed of work could be obtained. But there are two kinds of celerity. There is the celerity which we see in a lace-manufactory; full-grown men, with shivering hands and heads, are feverishly binding together the ends of two threads from the remnants of cotton-yarn in the bobbins; you hardly can follow their movements. But the very fact of requiring such kind of rapid work is the condemnation of the factory system. What has remained of the human being in those shivering bodies? What will be their outcome? Why this waste of human force, when it could produce ten times the value of the odd rests of yarn? This kind of celerity is required exclusively because of the cheapness of the factory slaves; so let us hope that no school will ever aim at this kind of quickness in work. But there is also the time-saving celerity of the well-trained worker, and this is surely achieved best by the kind of education which we advocate. However plain his work, the educated worker makes it better and quicker than the uneducated. Observe, for instance, how a good worker proceeds in cutting anything — say a piece of cardboard — and compare his movements with those of an improperly trained worker. The latter seizes the cardboard, takes the tool as it is, traces a line in a haphazard way, and begins to cut; half-way he is tired, and when he has finished his work is worth nothing; whereas, the former will examine his tool and improve it if necessary; he will trace the line with exactitude, secure both cardboard and rule, keep the tool in the right way, cut quite easily, and give you a piece of good work. That is the true time-saving celerity, the most appropriate for economising human labour; and the best means for attaining it is an education of the most superior kind. The great masters painted with an astonishing rapidity; but their rapid work was the result of a great development of intelligence and imagination, of a keen sense of beauty, of a fine perception of colours. And that is the kind of rapid work which humanity is in need of.

Much more ought to be said as regards the duties of the school but I hasten to say a few words more as to the desirability of the kind of education briefly sketched in the preceding pages. Certainly, I do not cherish the illusion that a thorough reform in education, or in any of the issues indicated in my preceding papers, will be made as long as the civilised nations remain under the present narrowly egotistic system of production and consumption. All we can expect, as long as the present conditions last, is to have some microscopical attempts at reforming here and there on a small scale — attempts which necessarily will prove to be far below the expected results, because of the impossibility of reforming on a small scale when so intimate a connection exists between the manifold functions of a civilised nation. But the energy of the reconstructive genius of society depends precisely upon the depths of its conception as to what ought to be done, and how; and the necessity of recasting education is one of those necessities which are most comprehensible to all, and are most appropriate for inspiring society with those ideals, without which stagnation or even decay are unavoidable. So let us suppose that a community — a city, or a territory which has, at least, a few millions of inhabitants — gives the above-sketched education to all its children, without distinction of birth (and we are rich enough to permit us the luxury of such an education), without asking anything in return from the children but what they will give when they have become producers of wealth. Suppose such an education is given, and analyse its probable consequences. I will not insist upon the increase of wealth which would result from having a young army of educated and well-trained producers; nor shall I insist upon the social benefits which would be derived from erasing the present distinction between the brain workers anti the manual workers, and from thus reaching the concordance of interest and harmony so much wanted in our times of social struggles. I shall not dwell upon the fulness of life which would result for each separate individual, if he were enabled to enjoy the use of both his mental and bodily powers; nor upon the advantages of raising manual labour to the place of honour it ought to occupy in society, instead of being a stamp of inferiority, as it is now. Nor shall I insist upon the disappearance of the present misery and degradation, with all their consequences — vice, crime, prisons, price of blood, denunciation, and the like — which necessarily would follow. In short, I will not touch now the great social question, upon which so much has been written and so much remains to be written yet. I merely intend to point out in these pages the benefits which science itself would derive from the change.

Some will say, of course, that to reduce the scientists to the rôle of manual workers would mean the decay of science and genius. But those who will take into account the following considerations probably will agree that the result ought to be the reverse — namely, such a revival of science and art, and such a progress in industry, as we only can faintly foresee from what we know about the times of the Renaissance. It has become a commonplace to speak with emphasis about the progress of science during the nineteenth century; and it is evident that our century, if compared with centuries past, has much to be proud of. But, if we take into account that most of the problems which our century has solved already had been indicated, and their solutions foreseen, a hundred years ago, we must admit that the progress was not so rapid as might have been expected, and that something hampered it. The mechanical theory of heat was very well foreseen in the last century by Rumford and Humphry Davy, and even in Russia it was advocated by Lomonosoff.(4) However, much more than half a century elapsed before the theory reappeared in science. Lamarck, and even Linnæus, Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire, Erasmus Darwin, and several others were fully aware of the variability of species; they were opening the way for the construction of biology on the principles of variation; but here, again, half a century was wasted before the variability of species was brought again to the front; and we all remember how Darwin’s ideas were carried on and forced on the attention of university people, chiefly by persons who were not professional scientists themselves; and yet in Darwin’s hands the theory of evolution surely was narrowed, owing to the overwhelming importance given to only one factor of evolution. For many years past, astronomy has been needing a careful revision of the Kant and Laplace’s hypothesis; but no theory is yet forthcoming which would compel general acceptance. Geology surely has made wonderful progress in the reconstitution of the palaeontological record, but dynamical geology progresses at a despairingly slow rate; the theory of the igneous origin of granite and other unstratified crystalline rocks is still taught in the universities, although the field geologists cannot reconcile it with the contradictory facts, and they are abandoning it in Germany and Russia; while all future progress in the great question as to the laws of distribution of living organisms on the surface of the earth is hampered by the want of knowledge as to the extension of glaciation during the Quaternary epoch.(5) In short, in each branch of science a revision of the current theories as well as new wide generalisations are wanted. And if the revision requires some of that inspiration of genius which moved Galileo and Newton, and which depends in its appearance upon general causes of human development, it requires also an increase in the number of scientific workers. When facts contradictory to current theories become numerous, the theories must be revised (we saw it in Darwin’s case), and simple intelligent workers in science are required to accumulate them.

Immense regions of the earth still remain unexplored; the study of the geographical distribution of animals and plants meets with stumbling-blocks at every step. Travellers cross continents, and do not know even how to determine the latitude nor how to manage a barometer. Physiology, both of plants and animals, psycho-physiology, and the psychological faculties of man and animals are so many branches of knowledge requiring more data of the simplest description. History remains a fable convenue chiefly because it wants fresh ideas, but also because it wants scientifically thinking workers to reconstitute the life of past centuries in the same way as Thorold Rogers or Augustin Thierry have done it for separate epochs. In short, there is not one single science which does not suffer in its development from a want of men and women endowed with a philosophical conception of the universe, ready to apply their forces of investigation in a given field, however limited, and having leisure for devoting themselves to scientific pursuits. In a community such as we suppose, thousands of workers would be ready to answer any appeal for exploration. Darwin spent almost thirty years in gathering and analysing facts for the elaboration of the theory of the origin of species. Had he lived in such a society as we suppose, he simply would have made an appeal to volunteers for facts and partial exploration, and thousands of explorers would have answered his appeal. Scores of societies would have come to life to debate and to solve each of the partial problems involved in the theory, and in ten years the theory would have been verified; all those factors of evolution which only now begin to receive due attention would have appeared in their full light. The rate of scientific progress would have been tenfold; and if the individual would not have the same claim on posterity’s gratitude as he has now, the unknown mass would have done the work with more speed and with more prospect for ulterior advance than the individual could do in his lifetime. Mr. Murray’s dictionary is an illustration of that kind of work — the work of the future.[c]

However, there is another feature of modern >science which speaks more strongly yet in favour of the change we advocate. While industry, especially by the end of the last century and during the first part of the present, has been investing on such a scale as to revolutionise the very face of the earth, science has been losing its inventive powers. Scientists invent no more, or very little. Is it not striking, indeed, that the steam-engine, even in its leading principles, the railway-engine, the steamboat, the telephone, the phonograph, the weaving-machine, the lace-machine, the lighthouse, the macadamised road, photography in black and in colours, and thousands of less important things, have not been invented by professional scientists, although none of them would have refused to associate his name with any of the named inventions? Men who hardly had received any education at school, who had merely stolen the crumbs of knowledge from the tables of the rich; men who made their experiments with the most primitive means — the attorney-clerk Smeaton, the instrument-maker Watt, the engine-brakesman Stephenson, the jeweller’s apprentice Fulton, the millwright Rennie, the mason Telford, and hundreds of others whose very names remain unknown, were, as Mr. Smiles justly says, ‘the real makers of modern civilisation’; while the professional scientists, provided with all means for acquiring knowledge and experimenting, have invented little in the formidable array of implements, machines, and prime-motors which has shown to humanity how to utilise and to manage the forces of nature.(6) The fact is striking, but its explanation is very simple: those men — the Watts and the Stephenson — knew something which the savants do not know — they knew the use of their hands; their surroundings stimulated their inventive powers; they knew machines, their leading principles, and their work; they had breathed the atmosphere of the workshop and the building-yard.

We know how the scientists will meet the reproach. They will say:– ‘We discover the laws of Nature, let others apply them; it is a simple division of labour.’ But such a rejoinder would be utterly untrue. The march of progress is quite the reverse, because in a hundred cases against one the mechanical invention comes before the discovery of the scientific law. It was not the dynamical theory of heat which came before the steam-engine — it followed it. When thousands of engines already were transforming heat into motion under the eyes of thousands of scientists, and when they had done so for half a century, or more; when thousands of trains, stopped by powerful brakes, were disengaging heat and spreading thousands of sparks on the rails at their approach to the stations; when all over the civilisational world heavy hammers and perforators were rendering burning hot the masses of iron they were hammering and perforating — then, and then only, a doctor, Mayer, ventured to bring out the mechanical theory of heat with all its consequences; and yet the scientists almost drove him to madness by obstinately clinging to their mysterious caloric fluid. When every engine was illustrating the impossibility of utilising all the heat disengaged by a given amount of burnt fuel, then came the law of Clausius. When all over the world industry already was transforming motion into heat, sound, light, and electricity, and each one into each other, then only came Grove’s theory of the ‘correlation of physical forces.’ It was not the theory of electricity which gave us the telegraph. When the telegraph was invented, all we knew about electricity was but a few facts more or less badly arranged in our books; the theory of electricity is not ready yet; if still waits for its Newton, notwithstanding the brilliant attempts of late years. Even the empirical knowledge of the laws of electrical currents was in its infancy when a few hold men laid a cable at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean, despite the warnings of the authorised men of science.

The name of ‘applied science’ is quite misleading, because, in the great majority of cases, invention, far from being an application of science, on the contrary creates a new branch of science. The American bridges were no application of the theory of elasticity; they came before the theory, and all we can say in favour of science is, that in this special branch, theory and practice developed in a parallel way, helping one another. It was not the theory of the explosives which led to the discovery of gunpowder; gunpowder was in use for centuries before the action of the gases in a gun was submitted to scientific analysis. And so on. The great processes of metallurgy; the alloys and the properties they acquire from the addition of very small amounts of some metals or metalloids; the recent revival of electric lighting; nay, even the weather forecasts which truly deserved the reproach of being ‘unscientific’ when they were started by an old Jack tar, Fitzroy — all these could be mentioned as instances in point. Of course, we, have a number of cases in which the discovery, or the invention, was a mere application of a scientific law (cases like the discovery of the planet Neptune), but in the immense majority of cases the discovery, or the invention, is unscientific to begin with. It belongs much more to the domain of art — art taking the precedence over science, as Helmholtz has so well shown in one of his popular lectures — and only after the invention has been made, science comes to interpret it. It is obvious that each invention avails itself of the previously accumulated knowledge and modes of thought; but in most cases it makes a start in advance upon what is known; it makes a leap in the unknown, and thus opens a quite new series of facts for investigation. This character of invention, which is to make a start in advance of former knowledge, instead of merely applying a law, makes it identical, as to the processes of mind, with discovery; and, therefore, people who are slow in invention are also slow in discovery.

In most cases, the inventor, however inspired by the general state of science at a given moment, starts with a very few settled facts at his disposal. The scientific facts taken into account for inventing the steam-engine, or the telegraph, or the phonograph were strikingly elementary. So that we can affirm that what we presently know is already sufficient for resolving any of the great problems which stand in the order of the day — prime-motors without the use of steam, the storage of energy, the transmission of force, or the flying-machine. If these problems are not yet solved, it is merely because of the want of inventive genius, the scarcity of educated men endowed with it, and the present divorce between science and industry. On the one side, we have men who are endowed with capacities for invention, but have neither the necessary scientific knowledge nor the means for experimenting during long years; and, on the other side, we have men endowed with knowledge and facilities for experimenting, but devoid of inventive genius, owing to their education and to the surroundings they live in — not to speak of the patent system, which divides and scatters the efforts of the inventors instead of combining them.

The flight of genius which has characterised the workers at the outset of modern industry has been missing in our professional scientists. And they will not recover it as long as they remain strangers to the world, amidst their dusty bookshelves; as long as they are not workers themselves, amidst other workers, at the blaze of the iron furnace, at the machine in the factory, at the turning-lathe in the engineering workshop; sailors amidst sailors on the sea, and fishers in the fishing boat, wood-cutters in the forest, tillers of the soil in the field. Our teachers in art have repeatedly told us of late that we must not expect a revival of art as long as handicraft remains what it is; they have shown how Greek and mediæval art were daughters of handicraft, how one was feeding the other. The same is true with regard to handicraft and science; their separation is the decay of both. As to the grand inspirations which unhappily have been so much neglected in most of the recent discussions about art — and which are missing in science as well — these can be expected only when humanity, breaking its present bonds, shall make a new start in the higher principles of human solidarity, doing away with the present duality of moral sense and philosophy.

It is evident, however, that all men and women cannot equally enjoy the pursuit of scientific work. The variety of inclinations is such that some will find more pleasure in science, some others in art, and others again in some of the numberless branches of the production of wealth. But, whatever the occupations preferred by everyone, everyone will be the more useful in his own branch if he is in possession of a serious scientific knowledge. And, whosoever he might be — scientist or artist, physicist or surgeon, chemist or sociologist, historian or poet — he would be the gainer if he spent a part of his life in the workshop or the farm (the workshop and the farm), if he were in contact with humanity in its daily work, and had the satisfaction of knowing that he himself discharges his duties as an unprivileged producer of wealth. How much better the historian and the sociologist would understand humanity if they knew it, not in books only, not in a few of its representatives, but as a whole, in its daily life, daily work, and daily affairs! How much more medicine would trust to hygiene, and how much less to prescriptions, if the young doctors were the nurses of the sick and the nurses received the education of the doctors of our time! And how would gain the poet in his feeling of the beauties of nature, how much better would he know the human heart, if he met the rising sun amidst the tillers of the soil, himself tiller; if he fought against the storm with the sailors on board ship; if he knew the poetry of labour and rest, sorrow and joy, struggle and conquest! Greift nur hinein in’s volle Menschenleben! Goethe said; Ein jeder lebt’s — nicht vielen ist’s bekannt.[d] But how few poets follow his advice!

The so-called division of labour has grown under a system which condemned the masses to toil all the day long, and all the life long, at the same wearisome kind of labour. But if we take into account how few are the real producers of wealth in our present society, and how squandered is their labour, we must recognise that Franklin was right in saying that to work five hours a day would generally do for supplying each member of a civilised nation with the comfort now accessible for the few only, provided everybody took his due share in production. But we have made some progress since Franklin’s times, not to say a word of further progress. More than one-half of the working day would thus remain to everyone for the pursuit of art, science, or any hobby he might choose to like; and his work in those fields would be the more profitable if he spent the other half of the day in productive work — if art and science were followed from mere inclination, not for mercantile purposes. Moreover, a community organised on the principles of all being workers would be rich enough to consider that every man and woman, after having reached a certain age — say, of forty or more — ought to be relieved from the moral obligation of taking a direct part in the performance of the necessary manual work, so as to be able entirely to devote himself or herself to whatever he or she chooses in the domain of art, or science, or any kind of work. Free pursuit in new branches of art and knowledge, free creation, and free development thus might be fully guaranteed. And such a community would not know misery amidst wealth; it would not know the duality of conscience which permeates our life and stifles every noble effort. It would freely take its flight towards the highest regions of progress compatible with human nature. But it is not by resorting to such poor means as some training of the hand in a handicraft school, or some teaching of husbandry under the name of Slöjd,[e] that great things are achieved. Great problems must be faced in their full greatness.

P. KROPOTKIN
POSTSCRIPT

Since the above was written I have had the pleasure of visiting the Gordon College at Aberdeen. There I found the system described in the preceding pages had been applied with full success, for some years, under the direction of Dr. Ogilvie. It is the Moscow, or Chicago, system on a limited scale.[f]

While receiving substantial scientific education, the pupils are also trained in the workshops — but not for one special trade, as it unhappily too often is the case. They pass through the carpenters’ workshop, the casting in metals, and the engineering workshop; and in each of these they learn the foundations of each of the three trades, sufficiently well for supplying the school itself with a number of useful things. Besides, as far as I could ascertain from what I saw in the geographical and physical classes, as also in the chemical laboratory, the system of ‘through the hand to the brain,’ and vice-versa, is in full swing, and it is attended with the best success. The boys work with the physical instruments, and they study geography in the field, instruments in hands, as well as in the class-room. Some of their surveys filled with joy my geographer’s heart. It is evident that the Gordon College’s industrial department is not a mere copy of any foreign school; on the contrary, I should permit myself to suggest that if Aberdeen has made that excellent move towards combining science with handicraft, the move was a natural outcome of what has been practised long since, on a smaller scale, in the Aberdeen daily schools.

1. Manual Training as the solution of Social and Industrial Problems, by Ch. H. Ham, London: Blackie & Son. 1886. I can add that like results have been achieved again at the Krasnoufimsk Realschule in the province of Orenburg, especially with regard to agriculture and agricultural machinery. The achievements of the school, however, are so interesting that they deserve more than a short mention.[Back]

2. Take, for instance, the description of Atwood’s machine in any course of elementary physics. You will find great attention to the wheels on which the axle of the pulley is made to lie , hollow boxes, plates and rings, the clock, and other accessories will be mentioned before one word is said upon the leading idea of the machine, which is to slacken the motion of a falling body by making a falling body of small weight move a heavier body which is in the state of inertia, gravity acting on it in two opposite directions. That was the inventor’s idea; and if it is made clear, the pupils see at once that to suspend two bodies of equal weight over a pulley, and to make them move by adding a small weight to one of them, is one of the means (and a good one) for slackening the motion during the falling; they see that the friction of the pulley must be reduced to a minimum, either by using the two pairs of wheels, which so much puzzle the textbook makers, or by any other means; that the clock is a luxury, and the ’plates and rings’ are mere accessories: in short, that Atwood’s idea can be realised with the wheel of a clock fastened, as a pulley, to a wall, or on the top of a broomstick secured in a vertical position. In this case, the pupils will understand the idea of the machine of its inventor, and they will accustom themselves to separate the leading idea from the accessories; while in the other case they merely look with curiosity at the tricks performed by the teacher with a complicated machine, and the few who finally understand it spend a quantity of time in the effort.[Back]

3. The sale of the pupils’ work is not insignificant, especially when they reach the higher classes, and make steam-engines. Therefore the Moscow school, when I knew it, was one of the cheapest in the world. It gave boarding and education at a very low fee. But imagine such a school connected with a farm school, which grows food and exchanges it at its cost price. What will be the cost of education then?[Back]

4. In an otherwise also remarkable memoir on the Arctic Regions.[Back]>

5. The rate of progress in the recently so popular Glacial Period question was strikingly slow. Already Venetz in 1821 and Esmarck in 1823, had explained the erratic phenomenon by the glaciation of Europe. Agassis came forth with the theory of glaciation of the Alps, the Jura mountains, and Scotland, about 1840; and five years later, Guyot had published his maps of the routes followed by Alpine boulders. But forty-two years elapsed after Venetz wrote, before one geologist of mark (Lyell) dared timidly lo accept his theory, even to a limited extent — the most interesting fact being that Guyot’s maps, considered as irrelevant in 1843, were recognised as conclusive after 1863. Even now — half a century after Agassiz’s first work — Agassiz’s views are not yet either refuted or generally accepted. So also Forbes’s views upon the plasticity of ice. Let me add, by the way, that the whole polemics as to the viscosity of ice is a striking instance of how facts, scientific terms, and experimental methods quite familiar to building engineers, were ignored by the scientists who took part in the polemics. If those facts, terms and methods were taken into account, the polemics would not have raged for years with no result. Like instances, to show how science suffers from a want of acquaintance with facts and methods of experimenting well known to engineers, florists, cattle-breeders, and so on, could be produced in numbers.[Back]

6. Chemistry is, to a great extent, an exception to the rule. Is it not because the chemist is so much of the manual worker?[Back]
Additional Notes by MIA

a. Sir Frederick Bramwell, civil engineer and newly appointed President of the British Association, gave a speech in Bath on 5th September 1888 in praise of civil engineering. One of his themes was the importance of the practicing engineer noticing the “next-to-nothing” which had a major effect – such as the doping of conductors with tiny amounts of impurities to improve conductivity. The speech was reported in the Pall Mall Gazette for 6 September 1888 (pp. 11-12).[Back]

b. Kropotkin added a footnote to this essay in Factories, Fields, and Workshops stating: ‘With the reaction which began after 1881, under the reign of Alexander III., this school was “reformed”; that means that all the spirit and the system of the school were destroyed.’ The Institure itself still exists as the Moscow State Technical University, and the original teaching methods developed were influential in the development of in the development of MIT and other American technical schools (see Wikipedia).[Back]

c. James Murray asked the public to submit sample quotations for the Oxford English Dictionary; an early example of crowsourcing, he received up to 1,000 slips a day (see Wikipedia). [Back]

d. Faust, Part 1, Prelude, lines 167-8 “Grasp the life of man complete! Everyone lives, though it seldom is confessed”. [Back]

e. The Slöjd system of education in handicrafts (generally known as ‘Sloyd’ in English) was invented in Finland in 1865 and is still part of the Swedish national curriculum (See: Wikipedia).[Back]

f. Now Robert Gordon University; the original system was based on work done by the local Mechanics’ Institution. Some of the history is available from the university archives.[Back]

The Navvies

REST IN POWER

Gordon Lightfoot, Canadian Singer/Songwriter, Dies at 84

Story by Katie Atkinson • Yesterday 

Billboard

Gordon Lightfoot, Canadian Singer/Songwriter, Dies at 84

Related video: Gordon Lightfood dead at 84 (cbc.ca)
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Gordon Lightfoot, the Canadian singer/songwriter behind the folk hits “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald,” “Sundown” and “If You Could Read My Mind,” died at age 84 on Monday (May 1), his family has announced.

“Gordon Lightfoot passed away this evening in a Toronto hospital at 7:30 p.m.,” a statement on Lightfoot’s Facebook page announced, promising “more to come.”

Earlier this month, Lightfoot had canceled his upcoming U.S. and Canada tour dates due to health issues. “Gordon Lightfoot announces the cancellation of his U.S. and Canadian concert schedule for 2023,” a statement read at the time. “The singer is currently experiencing some health related issues and is unable to confirm rescheduled dates at this time.”

Lightfoot’s six-decade career began in the early 1960s on the Toronto folk circuit and went worldwide in the 1970s thanks to a string of influential hits. He scored four top 10 hits on the Billboard Hot 100 in the ’70s, starting with “If You Could Read My Mind,” which peaked at No. 5 in 1971. Next up were “Sundown” — his lone No. 1 — and “Carefree Highway” (No. 10), both from 1974’s Sundown — also his only No. 1 album on the Billboard 200.



Finally, there was the most epic song of his catalog, “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald,” which was released in 1976 and peaked at No. 2 on the Hot 100. The song told the story of the fatal sinking of the SS Edmund Fitzgerald a year earlier in Lake Superior, which killed all 29 men aboard the Great Lakes freighter. “They might have split up or they might have capsized/ They may have broke deep and took water/ And all that remains is the faces and the names/ Of the wives and the sons and the daughters,” the poetic lyrics read.

Lightfoot was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2012. He won 13 Juno Awards in his native Canada, capped by his induction into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame in 1986. He won four Juno Awards for male vocalist of the year (1971-73 and 1975) and two for composer of the year (1973 and 1977). Lightfoot was nominated for four Grammys (but never won) — best folk performance for Did She Mention My Name (1968), best pop vocal performance, male for “If You Could Read My Mind” (1971) and song of the year and best pop vocal performance, male for “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald” (1976).

Lightfoot is survived by his wife, actress Kim Hasse, whom he married in 2011. He had six children from his past relationships, including two previous marriages.

Gordon Lightfoot, Canadian Folk-Rock Troubadour, Dead at 84

Story by Andy Greene • Yesterday 

 Rolling Stone

Gordon Lightfoot, Canadian Folk-Rock Troubadour, Dead at 84

Gordon Lightfoot — a genius-level Canadian singer-songwriter whose most enduring works include “If You Could Read My Mind,” “Sundown,” “Carefree Highway,” “Early Morning Rain,” and “Rainy Day People” — died on Monday, the CBC confirmed. He was 84.

Lightfoot’s deceptively simple songs, which fused folk with pop and country rock, have been covered by everyone from Bob Dylan, Neil Young, Elvis Presley and Johnny Cash to the Grateful Dead, Barbra Streisand, Jerry Lee Lewis, Eric Clapton, Jimmy Buffett, and the Replacements.

He scored a series of hits in his native Canada throughout the Sixties, but most Americans first heard his work in 1970 when “If You Could Read My Mind” reached Number Five on the Hot 100. The deeply personal song chronicles the agonizing breakdown of his marriage, casting much of the blame on himself. “I never thought I could act this way,” he wrote. “And I’ve got to say that I just don’t get it/I don’t know where we went wrong/But the feeling’s gone and I just can’t get it back.”

“I can’t think of any Gordon Lightfoot song I don’t like,” Bob Dylan once said. “Every time I hear a song of his, it’s like I wish it would last forever.”

Lightfoot was born November 17, 1938 in Orillia, Ontario. His parents recognized his singing ability at a young age and placed him in Orillia’s St. Paul’s United Church. He eventually taught himself piano and guitar, playing in large-ensemble pop-folk groups across Canada. After a stint at the Westlake College of Music in Los Angeles, he began playing in folk clubs around Canada. He released two singles in 1962 (“It’s Too Late, He Wins” and “(Remember Me) I’m the One”) that charted regionally, and his profile grew considerably when Ian and Sylvia, the Kingston Trio, Peter, Paul and Mary, and Judy Collins turned his songs — most notably “Earning Morning Rain” — into hits.

He signed a management contract with famed manager Albert Grossman in 1965 that helped land Lightfoot spots on The Tonight Show and the Newport Folk Festival. He played an acoustic set shortly before Dylan made history by playing his first electric set. “I remember Albert and the musicologist Alan Lomax getting into a wrestling match in the afternoon of that day,” Lightfoot told Rolling Stone in 2019. “Joan Baez, Donovan and I, we all stood around and watched. It was over the drum kit. They were trying to stay traditional, and somebody brought the drum kit onstage for the first time. It was quite a kerfuffle over it. It was a hot day in Newport. And a dry day. And I remember the dust was flying.”

In 1966, he released his debut LP Lightfoot!, which he followed up the next year with The Way I Feel. The latter album featured drummer Kenny Buttrey and guitarist/bassist/harmonica player Charlie McCoy. Later that year, Dylan used them as his backing band on John Wesley Harding. “I heard the sound that Gordon Lightfoot was getting,” Dylan told Rolling Stone in 1969. “I figured if he could get that sound, I could. But we couldn’t get it.”

The success of “If You Could Read My Mind” in 1970 was the start of a stunning run of hits, including “Sundown,” “Carefree Highway,” and “Rainy Day People.” The biggest came in 1976 after he read an article in Newsweek about the the sinking of the bulk carrier SS Edmund Fitzgerald on Lake Superior on November 10, 1975. He called the epic maritime disaster song, “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald.”

“It was quite an undertaking to do that,” he said in a 2014 Reddit AMA. “I went and bought all of the old newspapers, got everything in chronological order, and went ahead and did it because I already had a melody in my mind and it was from an old Irish dirge that I heard when I was about three and a half years old….I think it was one of the first pieces of music that registered to me as being a piece of music.”

Despite the huge success he had as a recording artist, many of his songs are best known by their cover versions. Bob Dylan included his own rendition of “Early Morning Rain” on his 1970 LP Self Portrait, and Elvis Presley covered the same song two years later. “I was really impressed with the recording,” Lightfoot said in 2015. “It was probably the most important recording that I have by another artist.”

Lightfoot developed a severe drinking problem in the late Seventies that took a tremendous toll on his personal life and career. “I was either writing, recording, touring, or doing television,” Lightfoot once told Low Country Today. “I drank way too much. But I gave that up in 1982 thanks to the help of my sister and a bad breakup. I knew I had to quit to keep myself sharp and stay in the game.”

By the time he sobered up, MTV was ascendent and his album sales took a major shift downward. But he continued to tour and record heavily. He was back in the news in 1986 when he noticed that Whitney Houston’s “The Greatest Love of All” was melodically very similar to “If You Could Read My Mind.”

“The first time I heard [“The Greatest Love of All”] was on an elevator,” he told Alabama.com in 2015. “What I finally figured out was there was a total of about 24 bars that were just really, really … It was really obvious and I noticed it. So what I did was I actually initiated a lawsuit for plagiarism but three weeks later I let it go because I understood that it was affecting Whitney Houston who had an appearance coming up at the Grammy Awards and the suit wasn’t anything to do with her. The suit was against her producer (and the song’s cowriter), Michael Masser. Now they’re dragging Whitney into this and I withdrew it. I said, ‘Forget it. We’re withdrawing this.'”

In 2002, Lightfoot suffered an abdominal aortic aneurysm and spent six weeks in a coma. He eventually recovered after four surgeries. “I was ashamed at the amount of blood they went through,” he told Rolling Stone. “It would have been better off if I had died. I think it was 28 units.”

Doctors performed a tracheotomy on him during his hospital stay, causing vocal cord damage that greatly weakened his singing voice, but he was back onstage by 2004. “I wanted to recover, I wanted to sing again,” he told the State Journal-Register. “I wasn’t sure — they had to take a lot of muscles out of my stomach and I wasn’t sure if I would have the kind of breathing control that I would need. But gradually it worked back and I started practicing.”

In 2019, he was the subject of the documentary Gordon Lightfoot: If You Could Read My Mind. Around that time, he celebrated his 80th birthday with an extensive tour that wrapped up last October at the Club Regent Casino in Winnipeg. He was due to return to the road in April, but canceled at the last minute due to unspecified health problems. “We thank you for respecting his privacy,” his team wrote in a statement. “He continues to focus on his recovery.”

Gordon Lightfoot Dies: Canada’s PM Justin Trudeau Remembers ‘One of Our Greatest Singer-Songwriters’

Story by Lars Brandle • Yesterday

Billboard


Gordon Lightfoot, the late, legendary Canadian singer and songwriter, is being remembered for his contribution to his country’s folk songbook, and for inspiring generations of musicians and fans.

Lightfoot, who wrote the songs “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald,” “Sundown” and “If You Could Read My Mind,” and many other across a celebrated, decades long-career, died Monday (May 1) in a Toronto hospital at age 84.

Born in Ontario, Lightfoot’s six-decade career began in the early 1960s on the Toronto folk circuit and went worldwide in the 1970s thanks to a string of influential hits. He scored four top 10 hits on the Billboard Hot 100 in the ’70s, starting with “If You Could Read My Mind,” which peaked at No. 5 in 1971. Next up were “Sundown” — his lone No. 1 — and “Carefree Highway” (No. 10), both from 1974’s Sundown — also his only No. 1 album on the Billboard 200.

During his lifetime, he collected 13 Juno Awards in his native Canada, capped by his induction into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame in 1986, and in 2012 was elevated into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2012.

Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau led tributes. “We have lost one of our greatest singer-songwriters,” he states. Lightfoot “captured our country’s spirit in his music – and in doing so, he helped shape Canada’s soundscape. May his music continue to inspire future generations, and may his legacy live on forever. To his family, friends, and many fans across the country and around the world: I’m keeping you in my thoughts at this difficult time.”

As the sad news spread on social media, fans and fellow artists chimed in.

“This one is really hard to write,” reads a statement from countryman Bryan Adams. “Once in a blue moon you get to work and hang out with one of the people you admired when you were growing up. I was lucky enough to say Gordon was my friend and I’m gutted to know he’s gone. The world is a lesser place without him. I know I speak for all Canadians when I say: thank you for the songs Gordon Lightfoot. Bless your sweet songwriting heart, RIP dear friend.”

Brian Wilson, Belinda Carlisle, author Stephen King and many others weighed in on the passing of a great. See the reaction on social media below.

Online tributes pour in for Gordon Lightfoot
Story by Postmedia News • Yesterday 

Canadian folk legend Gordon Lightfoot.© Provided by Toronto Sun

Tributes came fast across social media following the news of the death of beloved Candian singer-songwriter Gordon Lightfoot on Monday night.

The folk icon died Monday at the age of 84, according to his tour publicist.

The Orillia, Ont.-born singer-songwriter, known for such hits as The Wreck of Edmund Fitzgerald and If You Could Read My Mind , had most recently cancelled all of his North American tour date due to “health issues” that weren’t specified.

A cause of death wasn’t immediately known.

“We have lost one of our greatest singer-songwriters. Gordon Lightfoot captured our country’s spirit in his music – and in doing so, he helped shape Canada’s soundscape. May his music continue to inspire future generations and may his legacy live on forever,” Prime Minster Justin Trudeau tweeted.

Added author Stephen King: “He was a great songwriter and a wonderful performer. Sundown, you better take care/If I catch you creepin’ ’round by back stairs.”

Broadcaster Joe Bowen added: “Very sad day with the passing of Canadian Icon Gordon Lightfoot. His longtime drummer Barry Keane arranged for us to meet Gordon several times. A huge piece of Canadian Music History has left us. RIP Gordon

Canadian George Stroumboulopoulos also shared a tribute. “He sat on top of the mountain. He shared what he saw. For so many around the world, they knew our stories because of him. Rest in peace Gord. Golden forever. Gordon Lightfoot 1938-2023.”

Listen To Lightfoot's New Music Exclusive 'I Got Sick And Was Out Of The Game'
 Postmedia News • Yesterday 

Awards, admirers and key albums: Some facts about Gordon Lightfoot
Story by The Canadian Press • Yesterday


Some facts about Gordon Lightfoot, the folk singing legend who died Monday night at age 84.

Born: Nov. 17, 1938, Orillia, Ont.

Musicians who have performed Lightfoot songs: Bob Dylan, Peter, Paul & Mary, Ian & Sylvia, Richie Havens, Glen Campbell, Anne Murray, Nana Mouskouri, Harry Belafonte, Elvis Presley, Barbra Streisand, George Hamilton IV.

Awards: Order of Canada, Governor General's Award, inducted into the Canadian Music Hall Of Fame, the Canadian Broadcast Hall of Fame and the Canadian Country Music Hall of Fame, 12 Juno Awards (including one in 1970 when it was called the Gold Leaf), as well at four top folk singer RPM Awards — the 1960s predecessor to the Junos — and four Grammy nominations.

Albums include:

"Lightfoot!" (1966)

"The Way I Feel" (1967)

"Did She Mention My Name" (1968)

"Back Here On Earth" (1968)

"Sunday Concert" (1969)

"If You Could Read My Mind" (1970)

"Summer Side Of Life" (1971)

"Don Quixote" (1972)

"Old Dan’s Records" (1972)

"Sundown" (1973)

"Cold On the Shoulder" (1975)

"Summertime Dream" (1976)

"Endless Wire" (1978)

"Dream Street Rose" (1980)

"Shadows" (1982)

"Salute" (1983)

"East Of Midnight" (1986)

"Waiting For You" (1993)

"A Painter Passing Through" (1998)

"Harmony" (2004)

"Solo" (2020)

This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 1, 2023.

The Canadian Press

Gordon LightFoot Last Video 3 hours Before Death. He Knew it

Cricket Star

 Premiered 10 hours ago  #gordonlightfoot #gordonlightfootdied

Gordon Lightfoot's musical career began at a young age. Growing up in Orillia, Ontario, he learned to play piano and drums before picking up the guitar at the age of ten. His parents were both musically inclined, and his mother was a choir director and pianist. His interest in music led him to perform at local events and eventually to form a band, The Two Tones, with his friend, Terry Whelan.

In 1958, Lightfoot moved to Los Angeles to pursue a career in music, but he struggled to find success in the competitive music scene. He returned to Canada and settled in Toronto, where he began to make a name for himself in the city's burgeoning folk scene. He was soon signed to United Artists Records and released his first album, "Lightfoot!", in 1964.

The album featured the hit single "Early Morning Rain," which quickly became a classic and has since been covered by countless artists. Lightfoot's distinctive voice and intricate guitar work caught the attention of music fans and critics alike, and he soon became one of Canada's most popular folk singers.

Over the next few years, Lightfoot continued to release successful albums, including "The Way I Feel" (1967), "Did She Mention My Name?" (1968), and "Sit Down Young Stranger" (1970). His songs often dealt with themes of love, loss, and nature, and his poetic lyrics and haunting melodies captured the hearts of listeners around the world.

In the 1970s, Lightfoot's popularity continued to soar. His albums "Don Quixote" (1972), "Sundown" (1974), and "Summertime Dream" (1976) all received critical acclaim and were commercial successes. He also became known for his powerful live performances, and his concerts drew crowds of devoted fans.

In 1976, Lightfoot suffered a near-fatal illness when an abdominal aortic aneurysm ruptured. He underwent multiple surgeries and spent several months in the hospital, but he eventually made a full recovery and returned to music. He continued to tour and record throughout the 1980s and 1990s, releasing albums like "Salute" (1983), "East of Midnight" (1986), and "A Painter Passing Through" (1998).

Throughout his career, Lightfoot has received numerous awards and accolades. He has been nominated for 16 Juno Awards, Canada's top music award, and has won six times. He was also inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2012 and received a Lifetime Achievement Award at the 2017 SOCAN Awards.

Lightfoot's impact on Canadian music and culture is immeasurable. His songs have become part of the national consciousness, and his voice and guitar work have inspired countless musicians. He is often referred to as Canada's greatest songwriter and is considered a national treasure in his home country.

Despite health issues and a slowing of his touring schedule in recent years, Lightfoot continues to perform and record. He remains an active presence in the music world and a beloved figure to his legions of fans.

HE WROTE THE REAL CANADIAN ANTHEM

GORDON LIGHTFOOT CANADIAN RAILROAD TRILOGY 

REACTION

The Navvies

The Navvies were traveling labourers who built the Great Lakes Canals, the railroads and the mines in Canada and England. They were exploited by the upper classes in body and spirit even after death. This is an excerpt from an online biography of the Navvies. Those in Canada were Irish labourers, Catholics whose bosses were Orangemen. In England they came from the North, Scotland and Ireland. They were the epitome of the English proletarianized peasantry.
In Canada they are celebrated in song by Gordon Lightfoot with his Great Canadian Railway Triology.

The story of the Edmund Fitzgerald endures

Tom Emery
Wed, November 10, 2021

The Edmund Fitzgerald sunk in Lake Superior on today's date in 1975 taking 29 men with her.

It was far from the deadliest shipwreck in the history of the Great Lakes. But none are more enduring.

November 10 marks the anniversary of the loss of the Edmund Fitzgerald, a 729-foot ore carrier in Lake Superior that was lost amid one of the worst storms in Great Lakes history on Nov. 10, 1975. All 29 men on board the Fitzgerald were lost and researchers still debate the cause of the wreck, which remains in the public consciousness.

“I think that’s one of the reasons that the Fitzgerald stays with people,” said Bruce Lynn, executive director of the Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum at Whitefish Point. “No one really understands why it sank, and it’s still a mystery. It’s sort of the age old, man-versus-elements aspect.”

The Fitzgerald, which was based in Milwaukee, was the flagship of the Columbia Transportation division of Cleveland mineral concern Oglebay Norton. It was launched on June 7, 1958 and quickly became one of the most revered ships on the lakes. Though it was no longer the longest ship on the inland seas by 1975, it was still considered the “Queen of the Lakes” both on and offshore.

The ship regularly made ore runs between upper Lake Superior and ports southward, and on the morning of Sunday, Nov. 9, 1975, loaded at Superior, Wisc. for another routine voyage. In the past week alone, the Fitzgerald had sailed from Toledo to Silver Bay, Minn., loaded for a run to Ashtabula, Ohio, and sailed back to Superior to load again for a scheduled run to the Detroit area.

The Fitzgerald finished loading 26,000 tons of taconite pellets, which held substantial qualities of iron, and left Superior just after 2 p.m. in mild conditions. By evening, though the weather started to deteriorate, and by Monday afternoon and evening, recorded gusts of 90 miles per hour were coupled with blinding snow squalls and 30-foot seas.

"It’s hard to compare the bad storms throughout the years, and shipping has changed over time, with better weather reporting and safety procedures,” remarked Lynn. “But there’s no doubt that the 1975 storm was clearly one of the worst.”

One of the few options was to reach safety in Whitefish Bay in northern Michigan. Trailing behind the Fitzgerald was another giant ore carrier, the Arthur M. Anderson, which kept in radio contact with the Fitzgerald during the storm.

Seeking some protection, the Fitzgerald hugged the northern shoreline of Lake Superior, but around 3 p.m., the ship is believed to have sailed over Six Fathom Shoal, a treacherous reef that was not properly documented on industry maps. Shortly after, Fitzgerald captain Ernest McSorley radioed the Anderson that he had “a bad list” to starboard and indicated his pumps were not keeping up.

Many, including Anderson captain Bernie Cooper, believe the Fitzgerald suffered damage in the incident that may have proven fatal. Around 4 p.m., the storm disabled both of the Fitzgerald’s radars, and to make matters worse, the weather also knocked out the light beacon at Whitefish Point, at the top of the bay.

Around 7:10 p.m., with the Fitzgerald nine miles from Whitefish Bay and traveling at reduced speed because of the horrific conditions, the Anderson made its last radio contact. McSorley’s last words were “we are holding our own.”

Shortly before that, Cooper reported two massive waves as high as 35 feet that rocked his ship. Cooper and others since have wondered if the enormous waves caused the Fitzgerald, riding low from its earlier damage, to be lifted from the rear and driven downward into the frigid, swirling water.

No distress calls from the Fitzgerald were made, and only fragments of debris, including remnants of two lifeboats and several unused life preservers, were found in a three-day search. The ship was later discovered laying in two sections at the bottom, with debris and its load of pellets spilled in between.

In a highly controversial finding, a Coast Guard Marine Board of Inquiry determined in 1977 that hatch covers on deck had not been properly tightened, causing water to infiltrate the ship. The finding has been bitterly denounced by many mariners and researchers.

"The truth is, we really don’t know why the Fitzgerald went down,” commented Lynn. “There are a number of theories, and it’s a tough call. It’s still being debated today.”

In 1976, Canadian folk-pop singer Gordon Lightfoot wrote The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald, which further captured the imagination of the North American public and helped ensure the ship’s place in lore. The haunting melody and lyrics launched the song to #2 on the Billboard charts and remains a favorite on classic radio today.

The Fitzgerald is the last major shipwreck on the Great Lakes, where Lynn and others estimate that over 6,000 ships have been lost. However, small planes and watercraft are routinely reported missing on the five lakes.

Lynn says the Fitzgerald is “by far, the most famous shipwreck on the lakes. It’s the one that most visitors to our museum talk about, and our exhibit on the Fitzgerald draws the most attention. The Lightfoot song, the mystery that surrounds the ship, it’s a combination of factors. It’s a really good story, and one that still resonates.”

Tom Emery is a freelance writer and historical researcher from Carlinville, Illinois. He may be reached at ilcivilwar@yahoo.com.

This article originally appeared on The Monroe News: The story of the Edmund Fitzgerald endures

Edmund Fitzgerald and Crew - Rare Footage

 

The sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald in vehicle simulator