A Bibliography of the History of Canadian Science and Technology by Arnold E. Roos

Abstract

TECHNOLOGY AND CULTURE Book Reviews 1013 tually computing will disappear into the infrastructure of modern life, when every machine is “smart,” every human activity has been or is being computerized. Thus, as the entries progress in time, Cortada ’s subject divisions get muddy. For example, I found entries for my own area ofinterest, aerospace, under a variety ofsubjects: “mili­ tary,” “airline reservation systems,” “aerospace,” “aviation,” even “science” (e.g., an article on Russian computers in Aviation Week) and “engineering” (e.g., an entry on the use ofan analog computer to aid in the design ofan airplane). I cannot offer a better alternative except the obvious one: to make no subject or temporal divisions whatsoever, and order things either chronologically or alphabeti­ cally by author. One strength of the bibliography is that the author has searched through trade and popular literature often neglected or overlooked by the scholar. At the same time he seems overly to rely on a few periodicals that never purport to go into much depth, such as Science News Letter and Science Digest. To sum up, this work may have some value for those beginning a study on one or more computer applica­ tions, but one would quickly have to proceed beyond it to something more substantial. Paul Ceruzzi Dr. Ceruzzi is a curator at the National Air and Space Museum. A Bibliography of the History of Canadian Science and Technology. By Arnold E. Roos. Ottawa: Canadian Science and Technology His­ torical Association, 1995. Pp. x+272. Arnold E. Roos’s Bibliography ofthe History of Canadian Science and Technology is a useful resource that will be welcomed by researchers. Roos accurately describes it as “a working bibliography, which, be­ cause ofits size, allows a quick entry into the field’’ (p. iii). Although it is notable for breadth rather than depth and could not be de­ scribed as a one-stop-shopping research tool, it offers a good starting point for many research projects and a worthwhile addition to re­ search libraries. The first 240 pages of the book comprise the bibliography of the history of technology, and are followed by a thirty-page bibliography of the history of science. The elaborate breakdown of subject areas draws heavily on categories used by the Technology and Culture and Isis bibliographies. The history of technology section is divided into nineteen major categories. Most of these are divided into subcatego­ ries, some of which are further subdivided. The book’s system of cross references means that even though there is no index there is plenty of guidance for the user. Nonetheless, users should heed Roos’s “suggestion . . . that it would be wise to scan any heading that might be remotely connected with a research topic” (p. iv). 1014 Book Reviews TECHNOLOGY AND CULTURE No guide to sources used accompanies the bibliographies, and it is important to realize that this is because they were not compiled by systematically examining selected sources. For example, finding a 1944 reference to a paper on the Houghton Iron Works in the Ontario Historical Society Papers and Records does not mean an equally important article from a year or two earlier or later will be listed. Instead, the bibliographies evolved historically. Roos began work on them about 1970 when he was a graduate student at the Institute for the History and Philosophy of Science and Technology at the University ofToronto. Bruce Sinclair taught a course on the history of Canadian technology and asked his students “to survey periodi­ cals, books and so forth to collectively put together a preliminary bibliography dealing with the history of Canadian technology” (p. iii). This effort was to have formed part of a larger bibliographic project, which fell by the wayside. After Roos joined Parks Canada as a historian of technology he dug out the mimeographed sheets and transferred the entries to index cards. Over the years the grow­ ing card catalogue became a useful in-house resource at Parks Can­ ada as well as the basis for brief bibliographies published by the Ca­ nadian Science and Technology Historical Association. Eventually the card file was computerized and formed the basis for this publica­ tion by the Canadian Science and Technology Historical Associa...