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Abstract
A transformation took place in Upper Canada/Ontario and Nova Scotia during the nineteenth century in institutional care for Canada’s indigent “aged” population, and key provincial initiatives towards the end of the century led to the formation of state funded homes for the aged. The shift from frontier to agricultural and early industrial economies brought a host of social problems. Voluntary organizations were established to provide assistance to needy individuals without family. As demand increased, private charity and local governments looked to the state to provide assistance. Government representatives were determined to be fiscally responsible and state regulated institutions offered a form of social control and cost efficiency. Those in need received assistance in state subsidized institutions such as the Halifax Poor’s Asylum or Toronto’s House of Industry–eventually some residents began to be termed “aged.”
The process of categorizing all inmates within some state funded institutions as either worker or non-worker led to the eventual segregation of older inmates from those who could contribute towards the cost of their care. As workers were transferred to newly built or renovated sections of an institution, aged inmates remained behind in the older sections. Further, as hospitals and asylums were identified as specialized institutions for those who could be cured and returned to the working community, older patients with nowhere else to go were transferred to houses of industry in Ontario or poor farms in Nova Scotia. By the end of the century, this group was identified as unique and as a result in both provinces, homes for the indigent aged emerged by default rather than design.
A comparison of the development of institutional care for the poor aged in Nova Scotia and Upper Canada/Ontario reveals that institutions for the aged developed quite differently in each of the two provinces. The fundamental difference between the two provinces such as when they were settled and by whom, and the very nature of these colonies, serve as the bases for a comparison of the two regions and affords a better understanding of how regional differences shaped the development of institutional care for the indigent aged.
