Canadians fell in love with the car at first glance. They were scared by it too, and by its potential. Canada was quick to become a car nation, as the automobile was enthusiastically adopted by Prairie grain farmers, the new modern woman, travellers to the north, and rough-and-tumble adventurers looking for a thrill by traversing the immense length of the country. The automobile was the symbol of the modern Canada of the twentieth century, and the final victory of technology over landscape.
Canadians were building cars from the beginning. Independent firms and branches of the big American manufacturers vied for the lucrative Canadian market. Automaking has been an integral part of Canada's economy since the car's introduction.
For more than a century, Canadians have lived with this automobile revolution, and all the consequences and permutations that it represents. Blending social, cultural and economic history, Dimitry Anastakis's engaging text tells the fascinating story of the car across Canada from earliest days, when cars and horses jockeyed for parking space, to the multilane freeways of the twenty-first century.
Contents
Introduction: Machines, Peoples, Places and a World Transformed
One: The Auto Revolution Begins: Invention and Industry
Two: Canada's New Carscape: Town and Country Remade
Three: Canadian Motordom in Depression and War
Four: King Car: The Automobile's Golden Age
Five: Driving into the World, from Oil Crisis to Today
Conclusion: Cars, Canadians and the Twenty-first Century
Related Sites and Museums
Further Reading
Acknowledgements
Illustration Credits
Index
"Blending social, cultural and economic history, Anastakis tells the fascinating story of the car across Canada from the earliest days, when cars and horses jockeyed for parking space, to multilane freeways of today."
- Calgary Herald
"Dimitry Anastakis spins an epic, spellbinding tale that propels us through the Twentieth Century and across this great land of ours - in top gear."
- James Mays The Scoop
Dimitry Anastakis teaches history at Trent University in Peterborough, Ontario. A scholar of postwar Canada, his primary research examines Canada's role in the North American auto industry. He is the author of Auto Pact: Creating a Borderless North American Auto Industry, 1960-1971 (University of Toronto Press, 2005) and edited The Sixties: Passion, Politics and Style (McGill-Queens University Press, 2008. His work has appeared in various academic journals and magazines such as "The Walrus".
