Abstract
IN an address on “Science and the Civil Service,” given in November last to the Professional Institute of the Civil Service in Canada, Prof. J. C. McLennan reminded his audience, which included members of the Canadian Cabinet, of the benefits which scientific workers employed by the State have conferred on the populations in the Dominion. So far from scientific men being mere ‘high-brows,’ unpractical dreamers, and visionaries whose services are worth a mere pittance, they are more practical than the arm-chair politicians who despise science. It was a member of the Geological Survey of Canada, Dr. Dawson, who discovered the famous gold-bearing belt in the Yukon territory. It was largely owing to Prof. Miller and his colleague, Mr. Thomas Gibson, that a mining policy for the development of the silver, nickel, copper, gold, and other metallic mineral fields in Ontario was inaugurated. Canada's remarkable success in agriculture was based on the work of two public servants, Dr. William Saunders, who created the Experimental Farm System, and his son Dr. Charles Saunders, who discovered the Marquis variety of wheat. To another, Dr. Gordon Hewitt, who developed the Dominion Entomological Service and devised means for the control of grasshopper pests, must be given the credit of saving Canadian farmers millions of dollars yearly. The list of services rendered to the material prosperity of Canada by scientific workers in the public services could be extended indefinitely. For the most part they have worked for wretched salaries and, in some cases, with but the most meagre recognition of their great works. It is time the statesmen of the Dominion realised the immense potentialities of properly endowed scientific services.
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[News and Views]. Nature 121, 645–649 (1928). https://doi.org/10.1038/121645a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/121645a0