| Shells | 65,343,647 | |
| Fuses | 29,638,126 | |
| Fuse parts | 16,174,073 | |
| Cartridge cases | 48,627,673 | |
| Percussion primers | 35,386,488 | |
| Exploder containers | 13,285,000 | |
| Shell and adapter forgings | 6,412,115 | |
| Explosives and Chemicals— | Lbs. | |
| T. N. T. | 14,754,950 | |
| Cordite | 28,542,157 | |
| Other (more than) | 41,000,000 | |
| Metals and Compounds— | ||
| Steel bars | 43,077,923 | |
| Zinc | 35,412,413 | |
| Nickel | 1,792,000 | |
| Other (more than) | 27,000,000 | |
| Lumber for Aeroplanes— | Feet | |
| Spruce | 16,289,227 | |
| Fir | 6,801,324 | |
| Other Lumber— | ||
| Douglas fir | 11,530,315 | |
| Pine—various kinds and qualities | 10,360,566 | |
| Spruce | 8,345,675 | |
This table bears a little amplification, more especially as to the disposition of the huge volume of lumber logged. Much of it, as will be seen, went into the manufacture of aeroplanes. A plant at Toronto, financed with British capital, but organized and operated by Canadians, manufactured 2,050 complete machines, turning out 350 a month. The airships represented a value of $6,700,000, and required over 2,000 workers in their construction. The plant also provided a number of flying boats for the United States Navy.
Canada's shipbuilding record was no less notable. Her yards turned out 103 vessels (45 steel, 58 wooden) with an approximate dead-weight carrying capacity of 367,367 tons. In addition, the Department of Naval Service undertook to build a number of small warcraft for various Allied governments. These little vessels were produced at various points on the St. Lawrence and the Great Lakes. For the British Government Canadian yards supplied 12 submarines, 60 armed trawlers, 100 armed drifters, 550 coastal patrol motor boats, and 24 steel lighters for use in Mesopotamia; for the French Government, 6 armed trawlers and 36 coastal patrol motor boats; for the Italian Government, 6 submarines; and for the Russian Government one large armed ice breaker and some submarines.
The outstanding feature of all the munition making was, as the table shows, the production of shells. It needed nimble feminine fingers to turn out the very nub of a shell, namely, the fuse. Consider the record of a huge factory near Montreal, which engaged in loading and assembling time and percussion fuses, completing in all 8,400,000. The work involved the blending of fast and slow burning powders; forcing the powder into the time rings under a pressure of 68,000 pounds per square inch; assembling the fifty-two component parts which made up the complete fuse; the packing, checking, and shipping the completed product. Women became expert in the work of fuse making, which meant being careful even to the 1-1000th of an inch.
"A shell with a defective fuse," wrote one observer of their work, "is worse than no shell at all. It may fail to explode, it may explode in the wrong place, at the wrong time, or in the wrong way." Canadian women made fuses that made the perfect shell. Not only in fuse making did they excel; heavy work became easy when machines, at the suggestion of the women themselves, were changed in position. Finally there was no difference in the work done by men and women. Within five weeks of the time they first heard of a 9.2-inch shell 400 women in one factory were successfully turning them out, performing every operation from that subsequent to the fabrication of the metal to and including that of shipping.
Before October, 1916, no women had ever worked in Canada as producers in a metal plant. There was a prejudice against employment of women. The need of shells and the need of shell makers dissipated prejudice and put women into Canadian munitions plants. At first they were given the light work to do and were set to tending a machine; work that required little intelligence on the part of the operator, but was extremely trying on the nerves. It soon became apparent that women excelled in work that required accuracy and delicate handling.
Women worked cheerfully and long. In the time of greatest need there were 35,000 women at work in the munitions factories of Canada; after the first call there was no shortage of women help. For various good reasons it was decided to give a badge without charge to any woman who worked for thirty days continuously. For each additional six months' service a bar was added. In all, 18,999 badges and 8,032 service bars were used in Canada. They were earned as follows: One bar, 4,003; two bars, 1,135; three bars, 447; four bars, 84; five bars, 16; six bars, 2.
In addition a commemorative badge was awarded to all workmen in the various plants who served continuously for a year or more. Far from disturbing labor conditions the entry of women into munitions plants aroused the most wonderful cooperation and enthusiasm and actually dispelled what might have been a serious drawback in "serving the man who serves the gun."
It began with a Shell Committee, composed of honorary members, which was formed when the British Government decided that Canada was a good field for producing shrapnel shells, especially as basic steel—the only steel Canada turned out—proved serviceable for shell making. The Shell Committee placed contracts on behalf of the British War Office, but the volume of business expanded to such a degree that the committee only gave place to a board directly responsible to the Imperial Ministry of Munitions. The work of this Munitions Board developed a number of auxiliary departments, directed by business men located in Ottawa, Toronto, Vancouver, and Victoria, who handled enormous purchases of materials for use in munition making, supervised construction, conducted logging operations, and checked and rectified all engineering gauges. The forging of steel had to be arranged and the forgings and components distributed to the machining plants situated in the various Provinces. Shipbuilding required the acquisition of much timber and supplies for the hulls and the construction of engines and boilers.
These national plants were erected at Trenton, Renfrew, and Nobel for producing nitrocellulose, cordite, and T. N. T., with acid plants, and a factory for turning out acetone and methyl-ethyl-ketone. In the forging operations steel turnings had to be melted in electric furnaces, the steel thus subsequently produced being converted into forgings. The manufacture of aeroplanes for the Royal Air Force included a constructional section which built all aerodromes, machine shops, barracks, and officers' quarters at the various camps. The logging operations, which were conducted in British Columbia, produced spruce and fir for aeroplanes, and called for fleets of tugs which delivered the logs to cutting mills. Every kind of material that could be made available for war purposes was explored for by the Munitions Board in areas of natural resources hitherto undeveloped, with the result that industries new to Canada were established. One development was an extensive production of alloys used in the manufacture of high-speed cutting tools. Another achievement was the creation of the explosive and propellent industry.