16 A Cotton Picking Good Idea 1882

Cotton is the world's oldest commercial crop. It was grown as early as 5000 BC. Today, the three countries that make the most cotton are the United States, China, and India.

Canada is a huge country with good land to grow cotton. It has plenty of water which cotton needs. It can take more than 20,000 litres of water to make a single T-shirt and pair of jeans from cotton. However, it is not possible to grow cotton in Canada. Cotton likes long, hot, dry summers with lots of sun. In Canada, it is too cold and not dry enough for cotton to grow.

In the 1800's the fur trade (see 1881) was no longer the biggest part of Canada's economy. Europeans did not want animal hair any longer to make hats. When fewer people wanted to buy this animal fur, Canada started selling natural resources like the wood from trees, or oil and gas.

There were no more big trees in Britain. They had been cut and the wood used to build ships. Canada had many trees and could sell wood to Britain. Many men would come to a forest to cut down the trees. They were called lumberjacks. The lumberjacks camped in tents, in one place, for a long time. These men needed to eat a lot of food. Farmers started planting large crops of vegetables to sell to the lumberjacks.

From 1896-1914, Canada had the world's fastest-growing economy. So many people came to live in Canada that selling or renting land, houses, or farms became the easiest way for a Canadian to make money. First was real estate and next was agriculture.

The Americans had used up all their good land and could not farm anymore. Canada had the best farmland in North America. There was so much good land that farmers could grow many crops, like corn or wheat and sell them to other countries. Soon, agriculture was a big part of Canada's economy. Most of the food in Canada was grown in the west.

In Nova Scotia, in the east, many people made money by fishing. Fishing was not a big part of the Canadian economy. The people living in the east could not make a lot of money. Some of them built ships. This was also a strong part of the economy in the east. However, when people started using trains and cars they did not travel as much by boat. There were fewer ships sold in Nova Scotia.

The world was becoming industrialised and people were using their money to buy expensive clothes, radios, cars, and more. Countries were starting to build factories to make things that others wanted to buy. Canadian farmers were moving into the cities to work in these factories. Industrialisation changed the Canadian economy forever. Manufacturing became the second best way to make money in Canada, ahead of agriculture.

The fishermen in Nova Scotia wanted to work in factories too. Nova Scotia wanted to try to manufacture something that others would want to buy. At that time, cotton was very popular. In 1882, the first cotton factory, called a cotton mill, was built in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Cotton was so popular, that six cotton mills were built in Canada in 1882. Three years later, there were 17 in all of Canada. The Canadian economy was changing again.

Since it was not possible to grow cotton in Nova Scotia, raw cotton was shipped from the southern states of the USA. It was unloaded at the factory to be made into fabric. The finished cloth had many different colours and patterns. A million square yards of cotton that were “Made in Canada” were sold every year. The owners of the cotton mills got rich. Canada's economy got strong.

There were problems in the cotton mills, however. The owners cared about making money, but they did not care about the people working for them. They did not pay their workers much money. The water in these factories was not good to drink. There were many children working in the cotton mills. Some of them were as young as 10 years old. They were poor and they did not have shoes to wear in the winter. There were many accidents and some workers were hurt or died. Many workers complained, but it did not stop the manufacturing of fabric.

So many people wanted to buy fabric for clothes; to cover furniture; for bed sheets and other things in the house that these factories soon had more workers than any other business. Even today, there are more than 1,000 factories making fabric in Canada.

The Nova Scotia Cotton Manufacturing Company was very successful. It became the second largest employer in Halifax. More people worked at the sugar company, but even so, the cotton mill had about 300 women and 300 men working there. In 1883, the first fabric was made at the Nova Scotia Cotton Manufacturing Company. The mill continued to be successful for 14 more years.

Then, on December 6, 1917, the cotton mill was completely burned to the ground.That day a terrible accident happened on the water, near the city of Halifax. A French ship came to Halifax. It had guns and other things for Canadians to use to fight in the World War. There was a fire on the ship which made a huge explosion, like a bomb. The shaking from the explosion broke the cotton mill's floor and walls. The fire from the ship went up into the air, very high. The fire was carried two kilometres to the cotton mill and fell inside it. This started a fire in the mill which killed many of the workers and ended cotton manufacturing in that factory. The Halifax explosion was the worst accident that had ever happened in Nova Scotia and it still is to this day.

Manufacturing is still strong in Nova Scotia. It is the closest mainland port to Europe and Asia, through the Suez Canal. These days it is mostly plastic and rubber that are made in the factories of Nova Scotia and sent to other countries by sea.