Christina Tessier, Director, The Bytown Museum, presented her topic "Engineers and Navvies: The Builders of the Rideau Canal."
Christina started with an overview of the canal and its construction, illustrated by a short animated video.
The presentation focused on what we know about the Royal Engineers involved and the senior managers of the companies contracted to do the actual construction.
The scant information available on the navvies employed by those companies was also covered.