Canada, a country filled with entrepreneurs, railway workers, salespeople, brewers, brand icons, the tech savvy and corporate wizards, is turning 150 years old this year!
So, to celebrate this landmark occasion, and the business men and women who helped shape the last 150 years, we wanted to showcase some of the highs (and the lows) of the Canadian business world. Our latest book display highlights all different aspects of Canadian business: from the birth of Hudson’s Bay, Canada’s iconic department store to the rise and fall of Blackberry, and to even the importance of sugar in Canadian history. As we discovered in putting this post together, charting the history of Canadian business can be as tumultuous and adventurous as the birth of the nation itself.
Some of the highlights of this book display includes:
- Last Canadian Beer: the Moosehead Story by Harvey Sawler
- Founded in 1867, Moosehead beer remains Canada’s largest independent brewery. Sawler’s book charts the history of this company from when Susannah Oland began brewing beer in her backyard in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia and explores how Moosehead has managed to stay fiercely independant for the last 150 years.
- Emperor of the North: Sir George Simpson & the remarkable story of the Hudson’s Bay Company by James Raffan
- No other name is as synonymous with Canada as Hudson’s Bay. Raffan’s book explores the tumultuous beginnings of Hudson’s Bay Company as a fur trading company and its founder George Simpson. Both the man and the company played a pivotal role in shaping Canada’s expansive reach from coast to coast.
- Losing the Signal: The spectacular rise and fall of Blackberry by Jacquie McNish and Sean Silcoff
- Blackberry and Research in Motion would change the way Canadians and people across the globe communicate. From their humble beginnings in Waterloo, Ontario to their meteoric rise as a telecommunications and smartphone leader to their inability to compete with disruptive technologies and eventual collapse, McNish and Silcoff examine one of Canada’s greatest business successes and failures.
- Redpath: The history of a sugar house by Richard Feltoe
- Redpath sugar is a household name in Canada - found in every Canadian’s cupboard and on the counters of hundreds of restaurants and coffeeshops across the country. But how did they become Canada’s sugar company? Feltoe’s book looks at the birth of John Redpath’s sugar refinery (Canada’s first) in 1854 and examines Redpath’s impact on Canada’s growing industrialization during the 19th and 20th centuries.
- Who owns Canada now?: Old money, new money and the future of Canadian business by Diane Francis
- While looking at our past is essential, we should also think about the future of Canadian business. Francis’ book highlights how Canadian business has shifted away from consolidating power in the hands of a few wealthy families. Instead, a positive transformation has taken place in the recent past due to free trade and the establishment of tough competition legislation. She keeps one eye on the past, while examining the future of Canadian business.
Check out the full list of books here, or come by our Fireplace lounge to see the full display. Take some time this Canada Day long weekend to explore and discover the stories and people of the past 150 years of Canadian business history.