In 1916, Canada was a little less than 50 years old, but it was deeply embroiled in one of the most cataclysmic conflicts the world had known to that date: World War I. The federal government was doing everything it could to bring all of the young country’s resources to bear on the conflict at hand.

One of the smaller, but significant steps it took was the creation that year of the Honorary Advisory Council for Scientific and Industrial Research. The fledging council was asked to come up with brilliant solutions to crisis such as wartime shortages of fuel, sugar and fertilizer, but the government didn’t have (or wouldn’t provide) the necessary money and equipment. In addition, most of the people who had the skills and knowledge to do such research were in uniform and out of the country. Still, the council was the forerunner of an organization that would go on to play a pivotal role in countless innovations and scientific research during WW II and peacetime.

Today, the National Research Council of Canada employs 3,400 people and has an annual operating budget of more than $650 million. Its research scientists have helped develop everything from heart pacemakers and electric wheelchairs to the Canadarm. In short, the NRC has come a long way since it first set up shop in a converted office building in downtown Ottawa, and then moved in 1932 into a “gleaming temple of science” on what is now Sussex Drive.

But while the NRC has been a success, the same cannot be said about the Canadian government’s more recent record of spending money on research and development. In fact, federal funding for R&D decreased through the 1990s and Canada is now ranked seventh among G-7 countries when it comes to government investments in R&D.

But despite this poor record, Canadian businesses have boosted their R&D spending at the second fastest rate among G-7 countries. The spinoffs from this have been more jobs and more innovation. Unfortunately, there is still a large gap between the amount of innovation that takes place here and in other industrialized countries.

From its earliest days, the NRC has recognized the importance of scientific research and innovation. When its Sussex Drive location opened in the midst of the Depression, there was a lot of excitement. The elegant neo-classical building was pretty impressive for the time. Unfortunately, says Dick Bourgeois-Doyle of the NRC’s executive office, it had been commissioned before the stock market crashed. And while the government was able to find enough money to finish the structure, there was little money left over to equip or staff the facility. Throughout the early 1930s, the NRC operated a rather shoestring operation–at one point, it couldn’t even pay its graduate student researchers.

All that changed, ironically enough, with rumblings of war from Europe. In 1935, WW I veteran Major-General Andrew McNaughton was Chief of the General Staff, and he was watching Adolf Hitler’s activities with foreboding–and not a little sense of déjà vu. According to one story, on Nov. 11, 1918, he told his staff major that the Armistice was a mistake. “Bloody fools!” he reputedly said. “We have them on the run. That means we shall have to do it all over again in another 25 years.”

Whether that story is fact or fiction, most historians seem to agree that McNaughton correctly anticipated WW II before many other people saw it coming.

In 1935, Prime Minister R.B. Bennett asked McNaughton to take over as president of the NRC. McNaughton was reluctant. Although he held a master of science degree in engineering from McGill University in Montreal, and had played a role in developing navigational radar, he considered himself more of a military man than a scientist. He was also loath to leave the military just when it seemed his expertise might soon be crucial. But Bennett persisted, and McNaughton acquiesced–on the condition that he could return to the military without question if war was imminent. Bennett agreed to that, and McNaughton moved into the NRC president’s office.

The appointment was not without controversy. Many NRC staffers felt that the outgoing president, Dr. Henry Marshall Tory, had been shoved from office rather unceremoniously by Bennett. Suspicions also ran rampant among NRC’s scientists that McNaughton would turn the organization into a quasi-military establishment. “There was speculation as to how a lab coat would hang from shoulders that were used to epaulettes,” wrote author Wilfrid Eggleston in his book National Research in Canada: The NRC, 1916-1966. Eggleston added that “McNaughton himself may have failed for a time to see that a scientific laboratory was a far cry from a military parade ground.”

The soldier soon won over the majority of his colleagues, however. Eggleston quotes McNaughton’s NRC colleague and eventual successor as president, Dr. C.J. Mackenzie: “(McNaughton) just operated the way all good research scientists operate…and so he never interfered with your liberty and soon the people just worshipped him, and they loved to see him come around. And he loved to see what they were doing.”

Another colleague and future NRC president, Dr. Guy Ballard, once recalled McNaughton striding through the halls, “his coattails trailing in the slipstream he created as though they found it difficult to keep up with him. It was equally difficult for members of council to keep up with his far-ranging mind.”

While the NRC continued to conduct research in such fields as acoustics and air pollution with McNaughton’s blessing, there was no doubt McNaughton also prepared the council to serve Canada in war. During the late 1930s, NRC scientists were working in areas such as aviation medicine and measurement standards. While the latter field was already an NRC specialty, McNaughton was particularly interested in it because he had long argued that inaccurate manufacturing measurements had been the main reason for the Ross rifle’s notorious tendency to jam–a tendency that led to countless soldiers’ deaths in WW I.

When war broke out in September 1939, NRC was ready to meet the call, largely thanks to McNaughton’s guidance. McNaughton himself, however, would spend the war elsewhere–first as a commander in Europe, and then later as minister of defence. His colleague Mackenzie–whom McNaughton had recommended Bennett appoint as NRC president in 1935, rather than McNaughton himself–took the reins as acting president during the war years. He and McNaughton maintained a lively correspondence throughout the war, often in code, discussing the council’s work in radar, explosives and other fields.

When the war ended in 1945, McNaughton did not return to the NRC. Mackenzie moved into the post of president, and the NRC moved back toward its pre-war focus–a combination of military and non-military applications.

Almost since its inception, the NRC has had to consider whether it should focus more on basic or “pure” research (science with no foreseeable commercial value) or “applied” research (investigations designed to help industry develop profitable tools and services). During a meeting in January 1936, not long after McNaughton took over, members debated this question vigorously. McNaughton listened to all sides and then, according to Eggleston, came down squarely in the middle. “General McNaughton agreed with the theoretical scientists that pure research was important. However, he reviewed the practical problem which he faced. It is essential, he stressed, for the research council to serve the government, and to carry out the duties which government lays on the council.”

Bourgeois-Doyle says the tension between the two poles has always been there, and it will likely always be there–and that’s a good thing. “Anytime the pendulum swings too far in one direction or the other, then we definitely undermine our capacity to be useful,” he says.

The NRC has to do long-term research, he argues, because that’s its niche–the expertise it brings to the table. Most companies don’t have the resources to commit to pure exploration, even though such research may eventually lead to major innovations. However, Bourgeois-Doyle says the NRC is careful to keep a “foot in the real world of our clients.”

As the NRC grew and as humankind’s field of knowledge expanded, even the NRC couldn’t keep up with all the new specialties. In some cases, whole areas of research became so complex that separate agencies evolved from the NRC to handle them: The Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council in 1978, for example, and the Canadian Space Agency in 1989.

In other cases, investigations at the NRC have led to the foundation of new, private-sector companies. Early in the NRC’s history, that interaction happened almost by accident. But these days, the council is taking a much more direct approach to ensuring that its research not only broadens our knowledge of science, but also boosts Canada’s economy.

Since the early 1990s, the buzzword at the NRC has been “clusters.” These are agglomerations of companies and expertise that have evolved naturally in various regions of the country–such as information technology companies in Ottawa or biotechnology firms in Montreal.

One of the ways it does so is by establishing specialized institutes. The NRC has 18 of these across the country, ranging from the Herzberg Institute of Astrophysics in Victoria and Penticton, B.C., to the Institute for Marine Biosciences in St. John’s, Nfld. The institutes bring together Canada’s top minds in various fields. The NRC and the institutes’ host communities say that concentration of brainpower means great things for local economies.

Take the National Institute of Nanotechnology, NINT, in Edmonton, for example, one of NRC’s newest institutes. Nanotechnologists manipulate atoms and molecules to create new products, such as tinier, faster computer chips. It’s one of the hottest areas of research around the world right now.

Founded in 2001, NINT has set up shop in a temporary facility at the University of Alberta until it can move into a new $120-million, 12,000-square-foot laboratory, due to be completed within the next five years. John Martin, managing director, site location with Economic Development Edmonton, EDE, is confident NINT will bring great things to the city. “We’re very excited about the opportunity for the institute to drive economic development in a number of areas,” says Martin. Indeed, EDE is predicting that the institute will eventually inject $10 billion a year into the local economy.

NRC is also working to give new companies their start through small business “incubators” in many institutes. The NRC refers to them as industrial partnership facilities.

These incubators give brand-new firms a place to work and access to expertise, until they get on their feet. Then those companies move out and a new crop of starry-eyed visionaries moves in. “That’s where a lot of the strategic focus is being placed right now…not just undertaking pure research, but taking that research and creating new ventures,” says Martin.

An entrepreneur with a bright idea doesn’t have to live near an NRC institute to get a helping hand from the council, however. One of the council’s most popular initiatives is the Industrial Research Assistance Program, IRAP, which provides advice and funding to small- and medium-sized businesses through IRAP advisers in 150 locations across Canada.

Alan MacDonald is just one of countless entrepreneurs who extol the virtues of IRAP and NRC. A few years ago, the businessman from Prince Edward Island had talked to NRC about some potato-related research. That connection came in handy in 1998, when MacDonald ran into a local IRAP adviser. The adviser told him about a new technology being developed in Germany to make biodegradable packaging out of food starches.

The idea intrigued MacDonald, and with IRAP’s financial help he made several trips to Germany to meet with the technology’s developers and bring the knowledge to Canada. In the fall of 2002, APACK Canada Inc.–MacDonald’s company–was finalizing plans to set up a plant in P.E.I. to make environmentally friendly wrappings from potato starch. The company initially plans to hire 30 to 40 employees to staff three production lines.

APACK’s product is just one example of the myriad of ways the NRC’s research has benefited the everyday lives of Canadians. The council’s work, combined with that of other scientists, engineers and other experts all over the world, has played a role in dozens of discoveries or inventions.

* In the 1920s, NRC funded research that led to a way to keep canned lobster from losing its colour–a discovery that saved the canning industry thousands of dollars.

* In the 1930s, NRC worked with other federal government departments and several Prairie universities to control wheat rust, a devastating plant disease.

* In the 1940s, NRC innovations such as portable refrigeration units and a process for making powdered eggs helped Canada ship food to Britain during WW II. After the war, NRC developed one of the first electric wheelchairs for quadriplegics.

* In the 1950s, medical researchers at the Banting Institute in Toronto used NRC’s expertise while developing a heart pacemaker.

* In the 1960s, NRC scientists helped develop a more effective breakwater to protect harbours.

* In the 1970s, dry strippable wallpaper–developed and marketed by Toronto-based Color Your World, based on research done by NRC–was one of IRAP’s early success stories.

* In the 1980s, NRC scientists celebrated when the Canadarm made its maiden voyage into space. NRC and numerous partners developed the robotic arm, used to this day in space missions.

* In the 1990s, NRC scientists helped develop a vaccine to prevent infant meningitis.

The Canadarm is just one example of the role the NRC plays on the international stage. These days, NRC frequently collaborates with its counterparts around the world on major initiatives, such as the Canada-France-Hawaii telescope. Canada owns a 42.5-per cent share of this 3.6-metre telescope, which opened on Mauna Kea on the island of Hawaii in 1979. “We participate in the international collaborations, because these things are getting so big and expensive that…single countries can’t build them,” Bourgeois-Doyle explains.

But one of NRC’s most important claims to fame outside Canada is the Canadian Institute for Scientific and Technical Information, CISTI. Founded in 1924, it has evolved to become one of the largest repositories of scientific information and literature in the world.