Henry Youle Hind

Hind, Henry Youle

Henry Youle Hind, geologist, naturalist (b at Nottingham, Eng 1 June 1823; d at Windsor, NS 8 Aug 1908). Hind was educated at the Nottingham Free Grammar School, a Leipzig commercial college, and Caius College, Cambridge, but graduated from neither of the latter. In 1846 he immigrated to Canada to become in October 1847 second master of science and mathematics at the Normal School at Toronto and 1851-63 professor of chemistry at Trinity College. He then supported himself as a consulting geologist in the Maritimes. Hind was closely associated with the establishment of the Canadian Institute, a loose association of engineers and surveyors, and acted as editor of the Institute's journal, the Canadian Journal 1852-57. It reflected the growing nationalist spirit, as did Hind's other work.

He was a prolific author of popular scientific and exploration materials, producing 4 major government reports on the North-West and Labrador, and 6 books, 25 pamphlets and 22 articles on subjects ranging from railway policy to geology to spectrum analysis. The high points of his career were the 2 expeditions into the Red River, Assiniboine and Saskatchewan countries in 1857 and 1858, for which Hind was the scientific observer, naturalist and geologist. These expeditions did much to effect an awareness of the potential of the great North-West in the Canadas. The most important work resulting from these explorations is the 2-volume Narrative of the Canadian Red River Exploring Expedition of 1857 and of the Assiniboine and Saskatchewan Exploring Expeditions of 1858 (1860).