Suffield Experimental Station 1965.--PHOTO COURTESY Esplanade Archives
In 1941, the Department of National Defence (DND) expropriated almost 2,600 square kilometres of land in southeastern Alberta, paying $1 per acre to develop a chemical warfare experimental station, a joint venture between Canada and the United Kingdom.
The previous British chemical weapons testing facility located in French Algeria was lost earlier in World War II. Several potential sites in Canada were considered, including Maple Creek, but the Suffield area near Medicine Hat was chosen. At a cost of $240,000 (around $4,600,000 today), Calgary company Bennett & White Construction was hired to build the facility.
Locally, in 1941, unemployment disappeared primarily due to the construction of both the #34 Service Flying Training School and the Experimental Station Suffield (ESS).
Instrumental in promoting the new facility was Canadian Nobel Prize winner Sir Frederick Banting. A captain with the Royal Canadian Army Medical Corps in World War 1, Banting continued his military career with several projects in the Second World War. Motivated by a fear of German efforts in manufacturing chemical and biological weapons of mass destruction, Banting supported the ESS.
His connection has been overshadowed by his worldwide fame as the co-discoverer of insulin in 1923 and by his sudden death. En route to England on a military mission, Major Banting was killed in a plane crash in February 1941, four months before the ESS opened.
Growing up in Medicine Hat, our next Suffield Nobel prize laureate is Richard (Dick) Taylor. Dick’s father was Clarence Taylor, once a manager of Ogilvie Mills. His uncles and cousin were well-known local grocers.
While attending the University of Alberta in the early 1950s, Taylor spent two summers at the Suffield Experimental Station where he participated in military projects. Continuing his education at Stanford, Taylor received a doctorate in physics. In the early 1960s, Taylor led a team of scientists in the study of quark particles. In 1990, Dr. Taylor and two members of his team won the Nobel Prize in Physics.
Next is Scott Cairns, who soon after receiving his BSc in chemistry was hired as a chemist for the Defence Research and Development Canada-Suffield Research Centre (name change April 1, 2000). His work at the DRDC led to a career with the United Nations Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) where Cairns led a team of chemical inspectors in highly dangerous missions. The OPCW won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2013.
Final mention is 2005 Nobel laureate Dr. Barry Marshall whose assistant attended a training session at DRDC-SRC on chemical and biological warfare agents.
The Suffield centre has, and continues to have, direct and indirect influences with Nobel laureates. The original “Experimental Station,” created over eight decades ago, may well be on the rise for greater contributions. DND recently announced a multimillion-dollar plan to modernize the Suffield base, ensuring a bright future for the Suffield facility and its dedicated scientists.
Sally Sehn is a past member of the Heritage Resources Committee, City of Medicine Hat. Considerable data provided by Dr. John W. Cherwonogrodzky, retiree of DRDC-SRC.
