As a youngster, his family lived in many small western Canadian towns, as his father was a grain elevator operator and trainer.

They returned to Asquith, where his father ran a hardware store and later a Dodge car dealership in North Battleford.

Crops were drying out, prices for grain were low, farmers were being forced off the land, businesses were failing and there were next to no jobs.

This also applied to service stations, which made it very difficult to construct a building big enough to repair trucks and tractors or car dealerships.

He developed and patented an automatic rewinding mechanism for gasoline pumps (CA 454365) and a pipe-wrapping machine for coating pipelines with tar paper in the field.

[6] In 1955, Bruce's invention of the double sprocket made it possible to drive wide tracks and also keep them in place while using a single row of wheels.

However, the oil industry need a larger capacity in order to transport the geophysical "seismic" drilling rigs.

Imperial Oil, responding to this breakthrough in muskeg vehicles, bought 30 powered tracked trailers and 30 Scout Cars.

Even though the Model 110 was now proving to be a more successful operating unit, the Canadian marketplace was reluctant to purchase many Nodwell vehicles due to memories of past failures.

This crew operated successfully in severe muskeg conditions, spreading the reputation of the Model 110 throughout the geophysical industry both in Canada and Alaska.

Foremost, over the years expanded the product lines to encompass both tracked and large-tired vehicles with load capacities from 5 to 70 tonnes.

The company pursued international markets throughout the world, with its major success being in the USSR and Russia where over 700 vehicles with load capacities of 30 tonnes were delivered.

During the early days of geophysical exploration in the north, the Nodwell vehicles were often sent out onto lakes once the ice was believed to be strong enough.