Small Arms Restricted (SAL) broke floor close to Lengthy Department (now a part of Mississauga) in late August 1940. Inside 10 months, it constructed and outfitted a 212,000-square foot plant.
It handed Lee-Enfield’s rigorous trials and started introducing the Lengthy Department No.4 Mk I .303. Over the following 4 years, SAL produced virtually 1,000,000 rifles, different firearms, equipment, and ammunition, with a predominantly feminine workforce. Now coveted, these Lengthy Department rifles have a good time these wartime home-front accomplishments.
Satirically, the SAL plant was not within the village of Lengthy Department. It was a number of kilometres west.
The Lengthy Department moniker most likely stems from the Lengthy Department Rifle Ranges and the Lengthy Department Aerodrome positioned close by.
Small Arms Restricted
As soon as the Second World Struggle began, the Canadian authorities determined to construct an arms manufacturing plant east of the aerodrome. It appointed Colonel Malcolm P. Jolley, a former engineer within the Royal Canadian Ordnance Corp, as venture lead.
Small Arms Restricted was created as a non-profit Crown company on Aug. 7, 1940. Geared up by American suppliers and the Ross Rifle manufacturing unit in Quebec, SAL produced 5 No. 4, Mk I rifles for Lee-Enfield’s approval in June 1941. SAL despatched their first 200 rifles to Europe that September.
Lee-Enfield No. 4 Mk I
My .303 Lee-Enfield (see the April 2020 challenge) traces the gun’s evolution. The No. 4 Mk I has a cutout on the bolt monitor close to the receiver bridge. It changed the bolt-release button on the British No. 4 Mk I. This made the Lengthy Department and American-made Savage/Stevens Mk I simpler and cheaper to mass produce. The Lengthy Department model grew to become the usual infantry rifle for Canadian troops within the WWII, the Korean Struggle, and for Canadian Rangers on Arctic patrols from 1947 to 2018.
“I carried mine for about 30 years within the service of Canada, with little coaching, and it nonetheless amazes me what it’s able to,” gun afficionado Steve Pederson mirrored.
Girls dominate line
Ron Craig, who has written extensively on Lengthy Department’s historical past, says extra credit score must be given to the ladies who labored there. Throughout SAL’s peak employment of 5,500 employees, almost two-thirds have been ladies, “who took nice satisfaction in assisting the struggle effort,” he wrote.
In 1939, most ladies labored as homemakers or in low-paying service and administrative jobs for $12-$13 per week. Wartime industries like SAL recruited ladies throughout Canada to switch males who enlisted. They focused single ladies aged 18-35 and married ladies with out kids however with enlisted husbands. The federal government offered free practice fare to Toronto. Then, SAL buses took them to the YWCA’s Rooms Registry Service.
Right here, they discovered appropriate lodging in native houses, in one of many 200 new prefabricated items, or in Wartime Housing Ltd.’s big dormitory throughout the road.
By 1943, SAL had three shifts of expert workers. They labored eight hours a day, six days per week, for $20-$30 and produced greater than 30,000 items monthly. With suggestion incentives, manufacturing bonuses, Blue Cross Hospital Plan, and after-hours leisure packages, SAL grew to become often called “The plant the place you get a sq. deal.”
“I grew up in Lengthy Department. So many individuals from the neighborhood labored there. For me, it’s a reminder of how our neighborhood contributed to the largest change of the struggle and permitting the Allied Forces to take cost,” historical past buff Sean Ratcliffe mentioned. “Till our rifle was launched, we weren’t profitable the struggle. Our rifle and the sniper variations gave the troopers a bonus.”
Different firearms made
SAL additionally made different firearms. Employees cherry-picked greater than 1,000 rifles discovered with superior accuracy throughout testing. They modified the receivers and rear sights; and added beechwood cheek items, third sling swivels, and scopes to transform them to No. 4 Mk I (T) Sniper rifles. SAL additionally made CNo. 7 .22 calibre Lee-Enfield Coaching Rifles. In addition they produced greater than 100,000 Sten Mk II submachine weapons.
SAL winds down
After the 1944 D-Day invasion, SAL acquired order cancellations. Regardless of the ensuing layoffs, many ladies stayed within the space. Col. Jolley inspired the federal government to transform the plant to post-war use. He advisable that 20% of the area be retained for small arms upkeep and that 80% be leased to personal business. When SAL ceased operations on Dec. 31, 1945, its remaining 200 workers cleaned up and arranged tools for disposal.
New company created
The federal government transferred SAL’s belongings to a brand new Crown Company, Canadian Arsenals Restricted, Small Arms Division (CAL). CAL manufactured and repaired firearms and offered navy technical coaching. To remain afloat, CAL additionally made components for Harrington & Richardson M48 Topper shotguns and for Browning .50- and .30-calibre machine weapons. Their subsidiary, Important Businesses Restricted, made Airforce survival rifles from surplus components.
And at last, from 1955 till its dissolution in 1974, CAL produced 80,000- 90,000 FN C1 7.62mm self-loading rifles for the Canadian navy. “Canadian LB’s are the perfect manufactured from all different nations. Submit struggle fashions even higher,” fan Stephen Rogers wrote.
Tragedy averted
The power served as a Canada Submit distribution centre for the following twenty years. After it left, the authorities demolished the manufacturing plant and all however one of many assist buildings in 1996.
Constructing No. 12, the previous SAL Inspection Constructing and adjoining Administration Wing, remained leased as coaching services for Ontario Energy Company and for the RCMP’s Cadet Group Police Faculty till 2008. As soon as the lease expired, the brand new house owners, the Toronto Regional Conservation Authority, utilized for a demolition allow.
The encircling neighborhood rapidly rallied below the Lakeview Legacy Group Basis and the Small Arms Society. The Metropolis of Mississauga subsequently designated the Small Arms Inspection constructing and the Water Tower below the Ontario Heritage Act.
Legacy stays
By all accounts, the Lengthy Department No. 4 Mk I used to be properly constructed, rugged, dependable, and correct. You’ll be able to discover them immediately, however at premium costs: intact No. 4 Mk 1s, go for $2,000; a Sporter, $500; Lengthy Department C NO. 7 .22 Coaching rifles, for $3,500; and the uncommon Lengthy Department Sniper No. 4 Mk I (T), for extra than $10,000.
When you’re pondering of promoting, please contemplate donating your Lengthy Department firearm to your native regimental or a neighborhood museum for a tax receipt. They’re rather more than a navy rifle, in spite of everything. “They’re a logo of Canada coming of age through the Second World Struggle,” historian Matthew Wilkinson mentioned.
“My Lengthy Department is the capstone of my Enfield assortment, as a result of … it completes my love of high-quality rifles,” wrote Frank Mullen.
In 2017, the Metropolis of Mississauga acquired the property and now operates it as a historic multi-goal neighborhood hub.
Initially revealed within the August 2024 of Ontario OUT of DOORS
