Special to The New York Times

OTTAWA, July 11 - Gen. A. G. L. McNaughton, often called the "father" of the Canadian Army died of a heart attack today at his summer home in nearby Montebello, Que. He was 79 years old

Considered to be Canada's foremost soldier, General McNaughton was also a scientist, an engineer and a diplomat. He was in the public service without interruption from 1909, when he joined the Canadian militia, until 1962, when he retired as chairman of the International (United States-Canada) Joint Commission.

In 1946, General McNaughton was named Canada's representative to the Atomic Energy Commission of the United Nations, and, two years later, its permanent representative with a seat on the Security Council.

Gen. Andrew George Latta McNaughton, known as Andy to his World War II troops, was once described by Senator Mike Mansfield of Montana as "one of the most determined men to come up against in negotiations. He is an extreme nationalist and I say this in the good sense."

The Senator's observation, made when General McNaughton was trying to wing concessions from the United States in the Columbia River Treaty is descriptive of the soldier-scientist who also served as Canada's Defense Minister.

He was called the "father" of Canada's Army because be insisted that the ground forces that he led in World War II should be considered as an army. In World War I, Canadian troops fought as part of the British Expeditionary Force.

General McNaughton was called the "father" of Canada's Army because he insisted that the ground forces that he led in World War should be considered as an army.

The general, who was wounded twice in World War I in France, took command of all Canadian forces overseas during World War II. He called the First Canadian Division, a group of volunteers that he took to Britain in 1939, a dagger pointed at the heart of Berlin.

When the First Division arrived in British waters, General McNaughton went out on a patrol boat to meet the incoming transport ships. He stood in the prow of his cutter waving to his men to the chorus of "We Want Andy!"

"I have never done anything else but talk of an offensive in Europe," he told President Roosevelt when the volunteers were in training in England. "We intend to give it to the Hun-right in the belly."

But before he could lead them into battle, however, General McNaughton was recalled to Canada in a dispute with Ottawa over their deployment. He vigorously opposed the Government's plan to split the forces by sending a corps to Italy. General McNaughton maintained that the forces should be held intact for the great assault on northwest Europe. He stepped down in late 1943 after the contingent was sent to Italy.

The combat units that had fought in Sicily and the Italian mainland rejoined the main Canadian force for the D-Day assault on Normandy in June 1944. "I still think I was right" General McNaughton said later. "It was a terrible mistake to break up the army."

His recall was a disappointment for the officer with the unruly crop of cIose-cut graying hair even though he had been promoted to lieutenant general.

As a brigadier at the age of 31, he had commanded Canada heavy artillery at the close of World War I. The boy who had once fashioned a cannon from a discarded boiler and fired potatoes at gophers was credited with inventing an artillery-firing system that was called "the box barrage" because it boxed in the enemy. General McNaughton, however, called the system "evolution, not invention."

After he returned from Britain in early 1944, General McNaughton fought several other losing battles on the home front.

He became Defense Minister in 1944 and tried without success to send casualty replacements on a volunteer basis. The Government again opposed him, sending conscripts and General McNaughton resigned after less than a year in the post. Just before he resigned, the general suffered two defeats at the polls when he tried for a seat in Commons.

A debate over control of nuclear weapons had been going on for several years in and out of the United Nations when the Soviet Union exploded an atomic bomb in 1949.

General McNaughton maintained at the United Nations that the principal duty of an international control authority should be to warn other nations rather than to punish violators. He said that he believed that a majority in the commission recognized that, in the event of a long war between powers having atomic facilities there could be no certainty of preventing the eventual use of atomic weapons.

The general also formulated a plan to demilitarize Kashmir, and thus pave the way for a plebiscite to settle the dispute over that state between India and Pakistan. Pakistan agreed to the proposal but India balked.

An earnest, intense man, General McNaughton was not without his moments of dry humor. At a dinner in 1948 at Lake Success, the general was talking with the guest of honor, Andrei Gromyko, the Soviet delegate, when the talk turned to apples. The late Henry A. Wallace had asked General McNaughton to suggest a couple of good Canadian varieties for Mr. Gromyko.

"Well," the general said, "we have McIntosh Reds and also the Northern Spy."

In 1950, General McNaughton became chairman for Canada of the International Joint Commission with the United States. The commission "was set up to negotiate common boundaries and water disputes. Among its most important achievements was the Columbia River Treaty, of which the general was a principal negotiator and later a severe critic.

The general said that Canada has been sold down the river by the treaty under which the United States would receive electric power from Canadian sources upstream. The treaty was signed in 1962 and ratified in 1964. When his retirement from the Commission was announced in 1962, General McNaughton said he had been arbitrarily removed from his job and denounced Prime Minister John Diefenbaker as a "dictator."

Last year, the general told the Canadian Engineering Institute that "Canada has no obligation whatsoever to export water that is contained entirely within her boundaries."

"And even if such export is made eventually" he added, "the water would be sold as a commodity with 100 percent of the price going to its owner, Canada."

After his retirement from the commission, General McNaughton took every opportunity to counter a proposal to divert water from the Canadian Rockies to the southwestern United States. His argument was that once water is sold it is a lost birthright never to be retrieved.

"We should reject with the greatest firmness any proposals for United States use of Canadian waters that relegate us to the role of 'hewers of wood and drawers of water," he said.

General McNaughton was born Feb. 25, 1887, in the tiny Saskatchewan village of Moosomin. His father ran a trading post. He attended the Bishop's College School in Quebec and McGill University in Montreal, there he received bachelor's and master's degrees in science. He became an instructor in electrical engineering and mathematics at McGill in 1912.

In 1926, General McNaughton, was the co-inventor of a Cathode-ray direction finder that was used by aviators to get bearings over mountainous areas.

General McNaughton became president of the National Research Council in 1935. He worked on the application of pure science to practical industrial problems and organized a. high-voltage laboratory. He left the council in 1939 to resume military command.

General McNaughton was promoted to major general and appointed Chief of the General Staff at Ottawa in 1929. He was promoted to general when he retired from the Army in 1944

The general was Companion of the Bath, Companion of the Order of St. Michael and St. George and the recipient of the Distinguished Service Order.

He held honorary degrees from six universities and was an honorary fellow of many engineering societies in Canada, the United States and in Britain.

General McNaughton is survived by his widow, the former Mabel C. S. Weir; two daughters, Miss Leslie Anita McNaughton and Mrs. T. B. McDougall of Ottawa; and two sons, Andrew R. L. McNaughton of Montreal and Col. Edward M. D. Leslie (who had his name legally changed). A third son, Squadron Leader Ian McNaughton, was killed in a 1942 bombing raid.

In announcing General Mc Naughton's death to Commons, today Prime Minister Lester B. Pearson said that "his value to his country was equaled only by his courage and usefulness. He was warm-hearted, whole-souled and high-minded. There was nothing mean about him and much that was brave and wise."

The flag atop the Peace Tower in Ottawa was lowered to half-staff. Flags of all units of the Canadian armed forces will be lowered Wednesday, the day that a funeral, with full military honors will be held at 2:30 P.M. at Christ Church Cathedral in Ottawa.