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 he Island's modern
fishing industry is founded on the tin can. Without the tin can
and commercial-scale canning technology, lobster would never
have found its way from Island waters - where it was
despised - to markets in Great Britain and the United
States, where it was considered a delicacy.
Before canning, the only way to get a lobster to market was as
a live catch. Lobster defied pickling or drying - the only
available methods of food preservation. Pioneered in Europe,
efficient and safe canning technology developed in the United
States and by the 1850s was spreading north into the Maritimes.
The first known cannery on Prince Edward Island opened around
1858.
In 1871 there were only two canneries on the whole Island. They
packed mainly salmon and other finned fish and were a very minor
aspect of the provincial economy. But ten years later, thanks to
the lobster fishery, the number of canneries had exploded to over
100. In 1881 the lobster fishery accounted for over 25% of
the province's income. Although their impact declined over the
following years, the canneries had become an important part of
the Island economy.
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