The dawn of the new century marked the beginning of the Edwardian Era, and a number of technological and economic changes. Electric lighting, telephone lines and factory assembly lines defined the transition to a new century. Waves of immigrants from Europe and Asia arrived in Canada during the years leading to World War I, including Chinese families who located to Napanee.
Canadians, for the most part, were engrossed in the rapid growth of their country, unaware that a major world conflict was about to disrupt their lives. The First World War began on July 28, 1914, and Britain's Declaration of War against Germany and Austria-Hungary instantly brought Canada into the war. In Lennox & Addington, men were mobilized for the 146th Battalion. C Company of the 80th Battalion was stationed at the Napanee Armouries built in 1915. At the end of the conflict, 156 men from Lennox and Addington were among the war dead. A Cenotaph, built in front of the County Court House in 1920, paid tribute to their supreme sacrifice.
