During the winter of 1945/46 a station was established by Brigade Signals at Baker Lake, NWT to provide communications and weather reports for Exercise "Muskox" while it fought its way across the Barren Lands on the long trek from Fort Churchill, Man to Fort Nelson, BC testing various types of military equipment under extreme northern conditions. NWT&Y Radio System stations at Edmonton, Ft. Simpson, Ft. Norman, Norman Wells and Port Radium also supplied communications for "Muskox" at various stages of its move. The Baker Lake Station did not actually become part of the System until after the successful completion of the Exercise in May 1946. The original intention was to operate the station only for the duration of the Exercise but, at the request of the Meteorological Department, to which reports from this area were invaluable, it was kept open as a weather reporting station and absorbed into the NWT& Y Radio System.

- Excerpt from the Official History of the NWT&Y Radio System.

For an account of Exercise Muskox see the text of a speech given by Col. JT Wilson
to the Empire Club of Canada in Toronto, 18 April 1946 go to Muskox page 2.

There is also an article from DND's C&E Branch at:
http://www.c-and-e-museum.org/chap6_e1.htm

And an article by JP Croal

If anyone can add details, or point us in the direction to find other accounts of this exercise please get in touch with us at:

Please Note: The graphic above is not a clickable link. You have to type the address into your e-mail.
We are forced to do this to prevent our e-mail address being harvested by spiders and robots
which use them for the distribution of spam and for other illegal purposes.

The following article in the Journal of Applied Physiology (PDF format) can be found at:http://jap.physiology.org/content/vol1/issue1/index.shtml
R. M. Kark, R. R. M. Croome, J. Cawthorpe, D. M. Bell, A. Bryans, R. J. MacBeth, R. E. Johnson, F. C. Consolazio, J. L. Poulin, F. H. L. Taylor, and R. C. Cogswell
Observations on a Mobile Arctic Force. The Health, Physical Fitness and Nutrition of Exercise "Musk Ox", February-May 1945
J Appl Physiol 1: 73-92, 1948 [PDF]

Return to Top of Page

Go to Muskox page two