History Prof, Environmental Historian, Dad, Skier, Basketball Player
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Articles by John Sandlos
Widespread North American pollution and health impacts from early twentieth century copper production
Abstract Rapid expansion of fossil-fuel burning and base-metal production during the Second Industrial Revolution resulted in widespread pollution and potentially important health impacts. Here we used an array of Arctic ice cores, atmospheric modelling and epidemiology to investigate arsenic and other toxic heavy metal pollution.
Mining history: A beginner’s guide
The Library and Archives Canada (LAC) in Ottawa, Ont. Credit: Jeff Whyte/Adobe Stock Much like exploration geologists, university-based historians do much of their field research in the summer months. Limited more by the demands of the teaching calendar than seasonal weather, historians have for decades converged on archives in Ottawa and other large cities in the summer months.
Asbestos and the quiet revolution
The Abandoned Jeffrey Asbestos Mine, Val des Sources, Quebec Credit: Adobe Stock The province of Quebec has a long and tangled history of asbestos mining. In the 1880s, the opening of two large asbestos mines — Thetford Mines, located south of Quebec City, and the second was the massive open pit Jeffrey Mine, located in the Eastern Townships adjacent to the mining town of Asbestos (recently renamed Val-des-Sources) — positioned Quebec as the undisputed leader in Canadian asbestos production.
Mining Data and Canada’s Great Acceleration
Each year in my “Canadian History Since Confederation” survey class, I take my students on a deep dive into something that has high potential to be boring: Statistics Canada tables on historical mineral and energy production. I usually put several data tables on a screen and ask the students to form as tight a semi-circle as possible.
The Springhill bump
Miner museum entrance in Springhill, N.S. Credit: RobNS/Wikipedia/Public Domain On Oct. 23, 1958, a bump at the Springhill coal mines in N.S. caused one of the worst seismic coal mining disasters in Canadian history, killing 74 miners. Springhill was no stranger to disaster: a major coal mine explosion in 1891 killed 125 miners while a dust explosion in 1956 killed 39 workers.
A tale of two gold mines: Yellowknife’s mining history
When the Robertson headframe was slated for demolition after Con Mine had closed in 2003, Yellowknifers fought to preserve a structure that, at 76-metres tall, had become an important monument to the city’s gold mining history. Although the mining heritage advocates lost their battle in 2016, when the headframe was destroyed with a controlled explosion, the debate reflected Yellowknife’s indelible pride in its gold mining history.
Yellowknife’s Giant Mine: Canada downplayed arsenic exposure as an Indigenous community was poisoned
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article. Decades of gold mining at Giant Mine in Yellowknife, Northwest Territories, has left a toxic legacy: 237,000 tonnes of arsenic trioxide dust stored in underground chambers.
People of the Rock: Inuit miners at Rankin nickel mine
The opening scene of the National Film Board documentary “People of the Rock” tells the story of an Inuit family who had hired a boat to take them from “their own people on the edge of the world” to “join the people who get the rock.” As the boat rounds a point, the workings of a mine come into view — the North Rankin Nickel Mine (NRNM).
This article was originally published on The Conversation, an independent and nonprofit source of news, analysis and commentary from academic experts. Disclosure information is available on the original site.
Yellowknife's giant mine: Arsenic exposure as Indigenous community was poisoned
Decades of gold mining at Giant Mine in Yellowknife, Northwest Territories, has left a toxic legacy: 237,000 tons of arsenic trioxide dust stored in underground chambers. As a multi-billion government remediation effort to clean up the mine site and secure the underground arsenic ramps up, the Canadian government is promising to deal with the mine's disastrous consequences for local Indigenous communities.
Yellowknife’s Giant Mine: Canada downplayed arsenic exposure as an Indigenous community was poisoned
Decades of gold mining at Giant Mine in Yellowknife, Northwest Territories, has left a toxic legacy: 237,000 tonnes of arsenic trioxide dust stored in underground chambers. As a multi-billion government remediation effort to clean up the mine site and secure the underground arsenic ramps up, the Canadian government is promising to deal with the mine’s disastrous consequences for local Indigenous communities.
Yellowknife’s Giant Mine: Canada downplayed arsenic exposure as an Indigenous community was poisoned
Giant Mine, just north of Yellowknife, N.W.T., in September 2011. The gold mine officially opened in 1948 and was operational for over 50 years before it was closed in 2004. (John Sandlos) Decades of gold mining at Giant Mine in Yellowknife, Northwest Territories, has left a toxic legacy: 237,000 tonnes of arsenic trioxide dust stored in underground chambers.
The mines across the tickle: Newfoundland’s Bell Island
When I first moved to St. John’s, I heard about Bell Island almost every morning on the radio. If the traffic report said the ferry is moving well on the tickle (a narrow straight in Newfoundland English), that meant commuters to and from what is essentially a bedroom community for the nearby provincial capital had escaped the common delays of rough seas, bad weather, or mechanical breakdown — at least for one day.
Mining and the idea of Canada
For me, every January begins with another trip through the key events of Canadian history since 1867, courtesy of a course I have taught for nearly 20 years at Memorial University of Newfoundland. As I write, I just stepped out of a class on Confederation, where we examine all the reasons that four tenuously related colonies decided to become the nation we call Canada.
History of Mining: The Afterlife of Pine Point
The gravel highway leading east from Hay River, Northwest Territories, features a relatively uniform (some might say monotonous) landscape of flat, spruce and jack pine forest. About 40 kilometers outside of the highway’s terminus at Fort Resolution, a few rock piles near the side of the highway stand out in bold relief. A quick left turn on an unmarked paved road, and one enters a grid of streets, sidewalks, and parking lots — but there are no buildings anywhere.
Remembering the Hillcrest mining disaster
Underground coal mining has been synonymous with danger for much of its history. While coal miners faced dangers found in all underground mines (falling rock, collapsing stopes, or a tumble down a shaft), the chemical makeup of coal presented its own unique perils. Chief among these is the fact that coal seams emit highly flammable methane (often called firedamp) that could be ignited from improperly placed explosives, a faulty gas lamp, or even a small spark from an electrical wire.
Port Radium and the atomic highway
Gilbert LaBine is one of the most celebrated heroes in Canada’s mining history. He began his career prospecting around Cobalt, the Porcupine and Kirkland Lake, but his success was limited. Everything changed, however, when LaBine found pitchblende near Great Bear Lake in 1930, a discovery that cemented his legend as a plucky explorer, willing to brave the harshest northern environments to strike paydirt.
The Big Nickel scandal of 1916
In 1854, the land surveyor A.P. Salter noticed the needle on his compass wiggle in strange way, a signal that the bedrock on which he stood contained a huge deposit of nickel (one of the few ferromagnetic minerals that affects the orientation of old-school magnetic compasses). Owing to its remoteness, Salter’s discovery was ignored at the time and soon forgotten.
Fire and the mining frontier
An old and rusted piece of mining equipment sits abandoned in a forest outside a mine in the small town of Cobalt, Ontario. CREDIT: JOHN/ADOBE STOCK The massive expansion of Canada’s mining industry in the early twentieth century brought miners into close contact with one of the most fire-prone ecosystems on the planet ― the great boreal forest.
Cobalt's boomtown blues - Canadian Mining Journal
Every mine develops at a different pace. The discovery of a major mineral deposits may create feverish excitement, but an actual mine may remain undeveloped for decades, waiting for a favourable alignment of investors, infrastructure developments, or market conditions. Some mines develop rather suddenly, however, leading to the “rush” conditions that have been romanticized in popular culture.
Graduate Student Opportunities: Mining Danger Project Call for Students
The Mining Danger Project is a new historical research initiative funded through an Insight Grant from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council. The project will examine the historical impacts of occupational disease, accidents and pollution on mine workers and mining communities in Canada.
Job - Assistant Professor, Indigenous History, Memorial University
Department of History Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences Tenure-track Assistant Professor Position Number: F01411-2023-234 The Department of History at Memorial University invites applications for a tenure-track Assistant Professor position in Indigenous History, commencing July 1, 2024 (subject to final budgetary approval). The areas of specialization are open.
Who was Skookum Jim?
Among the thousands of people who searched for gold amid the rivers and creeks of the Klondike in the late 1890s, Skookum Jim stands out as one of the most famous, but also perhaps the most enigmatic. The basics of Jim’s life story, and his role in the gold rush, are well-known. He was born among the Tagish people near Bennett Lake in 1854 (perhaps 1855), and his real name was Keish.
Unearthing Black history in the mining industry in Canada
In recent years, Black history in Canada has received growing attention, as topics such as slavery, civil rights struggles, the origins of Canadian hip hop, and Black labour struggles finally get their due. But what about Black people in the mining industry? In the U.S., there are several excellent full-length books on Black miners, such as Joe William Trotter’s, Coal, Class, and Color; Robert Woodrum’s Everybody was Black Down There; and Sylvia Alden Roberts’ Mining for Freedom.
Canada's first mining scandal
Most mining industry insiders remember the Bre-X scandal of 1997 as Canada’s, and possibly the world’s, worst case of stock and mining fraud. It was certainly a big deal, featuring geological samples salted with gold, the suspicious death of a geologist, a raft of lawsuits, non-stop national news coverage, and a speculative stock frenzy that accompanied the company’s false proclamation of the biggest gold find in the world at Busang, East Kalimantan, Indonesia.
History of mining: Mining the Americas in deep time
If you ask the average person in the street when they think the history of mining begins in the Americas, they might pinpoint the throng of the forty-niners who migrated to California in search of gold (bequeathing a name to San Francisco’s NFL team). Or perhaps they would recall the mad dash northward to the Klondike in 1898, made famous in the fiction of Jack London, the poetry of Robert Service, the popular history of Pierre Berton, and even a classic film by Charlie Chaplin.
Panel Discussion of Muskrat Falls: How a Mega-Dam Became a Predatory Formation
Memorial University Press, 2021 When: April 28th, 12:30-2 PM NL Time (11-12:30 EST) Where: Video conference (Click here for registration link) Description: Join authors and editors of the new, Memorial University Press, volume, Muskrat Falls: How a Mega Dam Became a Predatory Formation, for a roundtable discussion of key themes from the book.
Telling mining’s story, beyond “sourdoughs and gold pans”
In “Mining Country,” authors John Sandlos (top) and Arn Keeling set out to present a balanced history of mining in Canada. (Cover and author photos courtesy James Lorimer & Co.) Among the multitude of human economic activities, few inspire such romantic and nostalgic accounts as the discovery and development of mines.
Mining Country - A history of Canada’s mines and miners
Mining has had a significant presence in every part of Canada — from the east to west coasts to the far north. This book tells the stories of those who built Canada’s mining industry. It highlights the experiences of the people who lived and worked in mining towns across the country, the rise of major mining companies, and the emergence of Toronto and Vancouver as centres of global mining finance.
The best books that expose the environmental and health impacts of mining
This book was released when I was starting my own work on mining history, and it greatly influenced everything I have written since. I love how LeCain traces how the demand for copper to electrify American cities led to the creation of massive holes such as the Bingham and Berkeley pits.
Writing Health and History During a Global Pandemic
This post introduces Mica Jorgenson and John Sandlos‘ recently published Canadian Historical Review article, “Dust versus Dust: Aluminum Therapy in the Canadian and Global Mining Industries.” By John Sandlos and Mica Jorgenson When we started writing about the McIntyre Research Foundation and its silicosis ‘cure’ in 2016, we could not have predicted that our article would be published in the midst of a global (lung health) pandemic.
Dust versus Dust: Aluminum Therapy and Silicosis in the Canadian and Global Mining Industries
On 6 October 1924, Ontario Department of Health clinician Dr. A.R. Riddell cut into the body of Canada’s first official silicosis victim. As he opened the chest, the lungs bulged out. A dense fibrous tissue coated their surface – one and a half centimeters thick in places. The upper part of the lung should have been spongy and pink, but it was bluish grey in colour, and when Riddell submerged a piece in a beaker of water, it sunk like a rock.
Canadian Historical Review
Articles 102(1), pp. 1–26 First published online: January 16, 2021 Abstract | Full Text | PDF (578 KB) | ePub (578 KB) 102(1), pp. 27–52 First published online: February 3, 2021 Abstract | Full Text | PDF (174 KB) | ePub (39 KB) 102(1), pp. 53–78 First published online: January 16, 2021 Abstract | Full Text | PDF (326 KB) | ePub (217 KB) Historical Perspectives / Perspectives Historiques 102(1), pp.
Asbestos in Canada: Graduate Study Opportunities
Department of History and Department of Geography Memorial University of Newfoundland (2021-22) John Sandlos, Department of History, and Arn Keeling, Department of Geography, Memorial University of Newfoundland, are seeking a PhD student in history and an MA student in geography to study the history and historical legacies of the asbestos industry in Canada.
Canadian Environmental History: We Need to Talk More about Race
This post is part of an ongoing series called “Whose Nature? Race and Canadian Environmental History.” This series examines the intersections of race and environment in Canada’s past and asks how human-nature relations are affected by ideas of race and racism. Sometimes at conferences you hear something that wakes you up, the academic equivalent of jumping into the cold ocean or drinking a stiff cup of coffee. At the last in-person ASEH in Columbus, Ohio, I had two of these moments.
Papers in Canadian History and Environment
Network in Canadian History & Environment | Nouvelle initiative Canadienne en histoire de l'environnement All Posts Under Papers in Canadian History and Environment
Nexus Centre for Humanities and Social Sciences Research
By John Sandlos January 15, 2020 Episode 12 of Crosscurrents is an interview with Raul Pacheco-Vega, an Assistant Professor in the Public Administration Division of the Centre for Economic Research and Teaching in Aguascalientes, Mexico.
There is a Monster Under the Ground: Commemorating the History of Arsenic Contamination at Giant Mine
Papers in Canadian History and Environment, no. 3 (October 2019): 1-55 http://dx.doi.org/10.25071/10315/36516 Download PDF Copy Interview with the authors: The great industrial acceleration of the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries can be remembered for many things, not least the technological developments that have changed almost every aspect of the way humans work, communicate with each other, and interact with the natural world.
Reckoning with the Environmental Humanities
Editor’s Note: This is the introduction to a series of posts focused on environmental humanities and public engagement. These posts emerged from a workshop held at Memorial University of Newfoundland’s Nexus Centre for Humanities and Social Science Research in May 2018 called, “Environmental Humanities in the Public Realm.” Click here to read the entire series.
Episode 5 of Crosscurrents: Sean Kheraj and Ashlee Cunsolo
Episode 5 of Crosscurrents, the podcast of Memorial University’s Nexus Centre for Humanities and Social Science Research, is now up online. Over the next several episodes of Crosscurrents, we offer recordings of the key talks that were presented the Nexus Centre Workshop, the Environmental Humanities in the Public Realm.
Nexus Centre for Humanities and Social Sciences Research
By John Sandlos January 16, 2019 Over the next several episodes of Crosscurrents, we offer recordings of the key talks that were presented the Nexus Centre Workshop, the Environmental Humanities in the Public Realm. In this episode, we begin with Ashlee Cunsolo, Director of the Labrador Institute of Memorial University, who talks about the concept of ecological grief, or mourning, among Indigenous people in Labrador who are already experiencing some of the worst effects of Climate Change.
Environmental Humanities Workshop
Memorial University’s Nexus Centre for Humanities and Social Sciences Research is hosting a four day workshop, “Environmental Humanities in the Public Realm,” May 8-11, 2018. The workshop will ask how scholars can better insert their work into policy processes, serve the needs of communities facing environmental challenges, and disseminate their work (primarily through digital media) to the general public.
Zombie Mines and the (Over)burden of History
In humanity’s relentless search for the industrial minerals that undergird our modern technology and economy, we have extensively and comprehensively ravaged natural landscapes. Sites like the Berkeley Pit in Montana or Western Australia’s Kalgoorlie Super Pit exemplify the awesome scale of these transformations. Indeed, as an industry quip has it, mining is primarily a waste management business.
Environmental Humanities Workshop: Call for Student Participants
In partnership with NiCHE, the Nexus Centre for Humanities and Social Sciences Research is hosting a workshop, “Environmental Humanities in the Public Realm,” May 10-11 at Memorial University of Newfoundland. The goal of the workshop is to explore ways to better assert the influence of the environmental humanities perspectives in the public policy process, and better disseminate environmental humanities content in the public realm (through podcasts, webcasts, blogs, social media, etc.).
Undermining subsistence: Barren-ground caribou in a “tragedy of open access”
Sustaining arctic/subarctic ecosystems and the livelihoods of northern Indigenous peoples is an immense challenge amid increasing resource development. The paper describes a “tragedy of open access” occurring in Canada’s north as governments open up new areas of sensitive barren-ground caribou habitat to mineral resource development.
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