Canadian Patents of Invention were granted starting with the beginning of the Patent Office in June 1824 and were enforced in Lower Canada and Upper Canada under the provisions of various statutes.
Patent No. 1 was for a washing and fulling machine granted June 8, 1824 to the inventor, Noah Cushing of the city of Quebec.
Patent No. 2852 (see photo of the original patent grant printed on parchment for the invention of a new and useful improvement on the art or method of fastening or securing plank walks, flooring and other things) was granted to the inventor George Thomas Williamson of the City of Toronto, on December 1, 1868.
Although this patent was granted after Confederation, since the Dominion of Canada did not enact new legislation pertaining to patents of inventions until 1869, the patent was granted under the existing Act respecting Patents for Inventions in force in the Province of Canada (which was comprised of Upper and Lower Canada, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick).
At the top of the official grant, the signature of the then Governor of the Province of Canada, John Young, appears.
The grant is signed (at the bottom of the document) by John A. Macdonald, Attorney General of Canada, a title which he held in addition to being the Prime Minister of the Dominion of Canada at the date this patent was granted in 1868.
| Drawing of Patent No. 2852 | Link |
