Against the Tides: Reshaping Landscape and Community in Canada’s Maritime Marshlands

The untold story of the engineers who dammed Canada’s Maritime marshlands.

For centuries, an intricate system of levees and ditches in Canada’s Bay of Fundy held back the highest tidewaters in the world. These ＂dykelands＂ transformed ancient saltmarsh into rich soil, but by the 1940s, the floodwalls had fallen into disrepair. Against the Tides is the never-before-told story of how the 1948 Maritime Marshland’s Rehabilitation Administration dammed the waters and reshaped the landscape forever. In this richly detailed account, Ronald Rudin reveals how federal hubris won a unique tug-of-war between state and local knowledge and compromised the region’s rivers for decades.

Ronald Rudin is distinguished professor emeritus of history at Concordia University. He is the author of numerous books, including Kouchibouguac: Removal, Resistance, and Remembrance at a Canadian National Park, and producer of eight documentary films, including, most recently Unnatural Landscapes.