When John William Dawson arrived as the fifth principal of Montreal's McGill University in 1855, there was clearly a bright future ahead. The 35-year-old native of Pictou, Nova Scotia, had previously served as Superintendent of Education for his home province and was building a reputation as one of North American's leading authorities on fossil plants, but few could have predicted the breadth of influence that Dawson would exert during his 38-year tenure as head of McGill.

As an administrator, teacher, proponent of educational progress, and leader in civic affairs, he oversaw its growth from fledgling facility to world-class university. A groundbreaking geologist and paleobotanist as well as the author of more than 400 scientific papers and books, Dawson was destined to become the first Canadian-born scientist of international stature, laying down much of the foundation within his country for twentieth century science.

Dawson's fascination with natural history dated back to his boyhood when he began collecting fossil plants from the Nova Scotia coalfields as well as shells, insects, and rare birds. His discovery of fossil leaves in a shale which he and his schoolmates had excavated and shaved to make slate pencils earned favourable notice from a local authority. "And from that time on," Dawson would later observe, "I became a geological collector."
 

Canada's 20th century scientific community owes much to the foundation created by John William Dawson (1820-1899), the first Canadian-born scientist of worldwide reputation. [Photo, courtesy National Archives of Canada/C-49822]

In the summer of 1841, when Great Britain's foremost geologist, Sir Charles Lyell, paid a trip to Pictou's famed coalfields, the 21-year-old Dawson was selected as his principle guide. Lyell would become a lifelong mentor, inspiring Dawson's studies in Natural Science at Edinburgh University. Dawson returned to Canada in 1847 with a Scottish wife (Margaret Mercer) and qualifications as North America's first trained exploration geologist.

With a growing reputation as a scholar and lecturer, he was appointed Superintendent of Education for Nova Scotia in 1850. Over the next three years he worked tirelessly to raise school standards and founded a normal school and, in his off hours, he accumulated geological data on his travels around the province. In the same year that he assumed the principalship at McGill (1855), Dawson published one of his most acclaimed books, the comprehensive Acadian Geology, and was narrowly passed over for the position of chair of natural history at Edinburgh University.

He found a significant challenge waiting for him at McGill, an institution with low enrollment, minimal resources, and inadequate buildings. Dawson managed to gain the support of Montreal's business community and thereby transformed it, over the next 38 years, into one of Canada's leading universities.

A brilliant professor of natural history and agriculture, he dedicated himself to building a strong faculty in the physical and biological sciences and engineering, presided over the opening of the McGill University Library and the acclaimed Peter Redpath Museum of Science, and waged a successful 20-year fight to have a woman admitted into McGill's bachelor of arts program. He became the first president of the Royal Society of Canada (1882) and was long-time president of the Botanical Society of Montreal. Well-known Canadian humorist and McGill economics professor Stephen Butler Leacock once observed, "More than that of any man or group of men, McGill is his work."

Frustrated that his administrative commitments at McGill left him with little spare time for geolo-gical field trips, Dawson nevertheless published about 10 scientific papers per year at McGill while establishing himself among the top world scientists of his day.

A devout Christian, teetotaller, and anti-Darwinist, Dawson dedicated more than 100 articles to the relationship between religion and science, writing in 1860 that "a godless view of nature would lead to the degradation of man."

His refusal to accept the emerging theories on evolution and the presence of earlier continental glaciers across Canada led to Dawson's disrepute among a new generation of scientists. However, these failings should in no way discount his contribution as a leading nineteenth century expert on fossil plants and trailblazer of modern science in Canada (pushing for the institution of higher degrees, lifelong research, and the publication of research results).

Known in international circles as "Principal Dawson," he was the only person to ever serve as president of both the British and American Associations For the Advancement of Science, was awarded the Lyell Medal by the Geographical Society of London in 1881 for outstanding achievements, and was knighted by Queen Victoria in 1884 for his public services.

Along the way, he inspired many young Canadians to choose a career path in science, including sons George Mercer Dawson, geologist, who served as director of the Geographical Survey of Canada from 1895 to 1901, and William Bell Dawson, surveyor, who is best known as engineer and superintendent of the Tidal Survey, Canadian Department of Marine and Fisheries, 1893-1924.

Michael Beggs