The sounds of today’s construction site are the sounds of heavy machinery – the sounds of dump trucks, bulldozers, excavators and pavers. It’s hard to imagine how these projects could be completed without this kind of machinery to do the heavy lifting – but it wasn’t long ago when construction wasn’t blessed with mechanical muscle. Flashback to Canada of the late 19th and early 20th centuries and the workhorses of the construction site were, well, horses.

As the muscle power behind all kinds of early construction projects, from road and bridge building to earth moving and hauling, horses played a critical role in building Canada from the ground up. In many ways, the history of horses’ role in construction is inextricably tied to the history of construction in Canada. These animals paid the price to help build Canada’s early infrastructure.

CANADA’S WORK HORSES – 2011 SERIES

To celebrate and document the important, yet often forgotten, role horses have played in our country’s history, Soul of Canada has developed the Canada’s Work Horses line of heritage products, including:

• Framed Vintage Photography
• 2011 Historical Showcase Calendar

To create these products, we have collected historic photographs and stories that offer a rare glimpse into the early history of Canada’s construction industry. These products not only create a visual and textual record of the history of some of Canada’s earliest infrastructure projects, including road, bridge and railway building, but they celebrate the people that made these projects a reality. They also shed light on the unheralded contributions that horses have made to Canada’s foundation.