Bridging the Border - the Structures of Canadian-American Relations

Bridging the Border traces the long and interesting history of the many international bridges connecting Canada and the United States. The book provides a provocative look at the relationship between joint bridge construction projects and the building of Canadian-American relations. In so doing, it provides a social, political, and cultural approach to bridges, rather than a technical, engineering history.

The book begins with the story of the construction of the Niagara Suspension Bridge in 1848 and ends with proposals for additional bridges along the Niagara and Detroit rivers in the 1990s. Along the way, it traces the development of all bridges and tunnels along the St. Lawrence, Niagara, Detroit, St. Clair, St. Mary’s, Pigeon, and Rainy rivers, from Cornwall in the east to Fort Frances and Rainy River in the northwest.

A native of Toronto, Dr. Robert Miles Stamp is currently a historian at the University of Calgary. Educated at the University of Western Ontario and the University of Toronto, it was at the latter that Stamp wrote his M.A. thesis on The Political Career of Sir James David Edgar. Canadian history, particularly social and transportation-related, has long held his interest and has been the subject of many of the books he has authored.