Joseph Hobson

Joseph Hobson
Born	1834 Guelph Township
Died	1917 (aged 82–83)
Nationality	Canadian
Occupation	Land surveyor, civil engineer

Joseph Hobson (1834–1917) was a Canadian land surveyor, civil engineer, and railway design engineer. He was the resident engineer during the construction of the International Railway Bridge and designed the first St. Clair railway tunnel. This was the first underwater railway tunnel between Canada and the USA and, when it opened in 1891, the first undersea tunnel linking two distinct countries and the longest undersea tunnel then constructed.

Hobson was born in 1834 in Guelph Township in Wellington County, Ontario. He had a brother, John, who was born in 1835. Hobson's parents were Joseph and Margaret Hobson.

Hobson attended log schoolhouses in Guelph for his primary schooling. He then moved to Toronto and was there for seven years. He apprenticed with John Tully as a land surveyor. During this time he did layout plans for the Ontario towns of Kitchener and Guelph. Later he apprenticed under C. Schofield and he passed his final exam in 1855 for a provincial land surveyor.

Hobson in 1856 joined the firm of Gzowski and McPherson in Toronto. He returned to Kitchener in 1858 from Toronto to work for the county of Waterloo as their engineer on a part-time basis. Besides being the county engineer he also did private surveying. One of his contracts was the surveying of the township of Bidwell on Manitoulin Island.

Hobson was later an assistant engineer on the construction of the Grand Trunk Railway from St. Marys to Sarnia. He was also engaged in railway surveys in Nova Scotia and also in the United States. Hobson lived in Guelph from the mid 1860s to the mid 1870s. From the summer of 1869 to the spring of 1870 he was an engineer to George Lowe Reid, chief engineer of the Great Western Railway. He assisted in the building of the Wellington, Grey and Bruce Railway from Guelph to Southampton.

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