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Édouard-Gaston Deville
1849–1924

Hydrographer, Inventor, Surveyor General of Canada (1885–1924), Director General, Bureau of Surveys (1922–24)

For many years, Édouard-Gaston Deville skillfully directed Canadian surveying activities by using innovative techniques to deal with the challenges of surveying in Canada, including his own ingenious method of mapping mountainous regions.

Édouard-Gaston was born on February 21, 1849, in Charité-sur-Loire, France. After attending naval school, he served in the French navy, conducting hydrographic surveys in the South Pacific. He retired as a captain in 1874 and immigrated to Canada.

In 1875, Édouard-Gaston began working as a surveyor and astronomer in Quebec and very quickly rose to the position of Inspector of Surveys, the province's top surveyor. He passed exams in high-level survey theory, earning the rare designation of Dominion Topographic Surveyor. In 1880, he joined the Department of the Interior in Ottawa to survey homesteads in the Prairies.

He was appointed inspector for Dominion Land Surveys in 1881, and four years later became Surveyor General of Canada.

Surveying in the Rocky Mountains posed tremendous logistical and technical obstacles. To meet these challenges, Édouard-Gaston experimented with mapping methods developed by French army engineer Aimé Laussedat. Édouard-Gaston used Laussedat's principle of elevated photography, and refined a technique of creating large-scale maps from these photographs.

He designed a rugged, lightweight field camera that could be carried long distances. In 1886, his camera was used for the first time in the Rockies. Surveyors would place the camera on a mountain peak, train the lens at the horizon and take panoramic shots of the surrounding peaks, measuring each view in relation to the survey station. Surveyors could take photos in the short summer season and use them to complete their calculations and mapping in their offices during the winter. This allowed larger areas to be surveyed more accurately, in less time, and at one-third the cost of conventional surveying.

Édouard-Gaston introduced his innovative mapping technique at the Chicago World Fair in 1893, later promoting it through pamphlets and a comprehensive textbook. Édouard-Gaston's method of making maps based on photographs became known as phototopography or photogrammetry.

Édouard-Gaston was honoured with numerous awards recognizing his contribution to science. He received an honourary Doctor of Laws from the University of Toronto in 1905, and became a Companion of the Imperial Service Order in 1916.

In 1922, he represented Canada at a geophysics conference in Rome, and his expertise on mountain surveys became sought after internationally. A copy of his camera was even used to map the north slope of Mount Everest. At home, his technology was adopted by agencies such as the Geological Survey of Canada and the International Boundary Commission.

With the arrival of fixed-wing aircraft, surveyors could use Édouard-Gaston's camera to create aerial photographs for surveying flat and remote parts of the country, as well as regions with high elevations. The two systems complemented each other for at least 30 years.

Édouard-Gaston died on September 21, 1924, in Ottawa. During his lifetime, Canadian surveyors had used his phototopography to map 83,678 square kilometres, roughly the size of the United Kingdom.

Mount Deville in British Columbia is named in his honour.

• 1875 — Quebec surveyor
• 1881 — Inspector of Surveys for Quebec
• 1882 — Founding Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada
• 1885 — Surveyor General of Canada
• 1889 — Published Photographic Surveying
• 1905 — Honourary Doctor of Laws degree from the University of Toronto
• 1916 — Companion of the Imperial Service Order
• 1922 — Honourary member of Engineering Institute of Canada

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