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Northern Ontario History

Top Ten Mining Events in Northern Ontario History – by Stan Sudol (March 22, 2014)

This column was also published on the Huffington Post – the “New York Times” of the web: http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/stan-sudol/ontario-mining_b_4885841.html

Klondike Versus Northern Ontario

For crying out loud, I continue to be astonished with our collective Canadian obsession over the Klondike Gold Rush while northern Ontario’s rich and vibrant mining history is completely ignored by the Toronto media establishment, especially the CBC.

Discovery Channel’s recent six-hour mini-series on the Klondike – vaguely based on Charlotte Gray’s book, “Gold Diggers: Striking It Rich in the Klondike – once again highlighted this glaring snub.

Unfairly, the Klondike did have the benefit of terrific public relations due to famous writers like Jack London, Robert W. Service and Pierre Berton, but I still don’t understand how this brief mining boom continues to dominate the “historical oxygen” in our national psyche.

At its peak, the Klondike only lasted a few years – 1896-1899 – and produced about 12.5 million ounces of gold. And unlike the California gold rush that created one of the largest and richest states in the union, the entire Yukon Territory’s population today is about 36,000. Contrast that with booming Timmins with 45,000 hardy souls who have dug out of the ground about 68 million ounces and counting of the precious metal, since the Porcupine Gold rush of 1909.

It’s enough to make to make Benny Hollinger, Jack Wilson and Sandy MacIntyre – the founders of this extraordinary deposit – spin in their collective graves!

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NEWS RELEASE: Outlining Cobalt’s Colourful Mining History

Click here for the prospector’s colouring book: https://docs.google.com/viewer?url=http://campersbest.com/PresidentsSuites/images/site/documents/Livre+a+colorier+Web.pdf

TORONTO, ONTARIO–(Marketwired – March 2, 2014) – In honour of the Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada 2014 conference, The Prospectors’ House in Haileybury, Ontario is launching its Colouring Book, a Prospectors’ Game, and a Head Frame Memory Game.

The colouring book and games are being launched in recognition of the many prospectors who responded to the discovery of silver in Cobalt in 1903. Thirty well-known prospectors, influenced by Cobalt’s the silver rush are featured. Their work, and the wealth they generated from the Cobalt Mining Camp, led to the development of the mining industry across the North, and furthered mining across Canada and around the world.

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PoV: Why we need a statue of Stompin’ Tom [in Sudbury] – by Brian MacLeod (Sudbury Star – February 15, 2014)

The Sudbury Star is the City of Greater Sudbury’s daily newspaper.

When a group of Sudburians first announced they wanted to raise $50,000 to place a bronze statue of Stompin’ Tom Connors downtown, it seemed a bit out of place. Connors was not a Sudburian, yet he is inexorably part of our heritage for his iconic song, Sudbury Saturday Night. He is not necessarily associated with an individual place, rather he was relentlessly Canadian. Why a bronze statue in Sudbury?

Because he was able to write a simple, irresistibly catchy song that captured who we were at the time. In 1965, when he wrote the song, we were a city of hard partying labourors drinking away the sweat of the mines. It does not represent what Sudbury is today, but Connors was able to make a nation think about a city that many at the time knew only as a place “up North.”

Sudbury Saturday Night — best captured in his performance at the Horseshoe Tavern — might make us cringe a bit now. “The girls are out to bingo and the boys are gettin’ stinko and we’ll think no more of Inco on a Sudbury Saturday Night.”

Inco is now Brazil-based Vale, and bingo has faded. And drinking heavily is not so much to be memorialized these days. “We’ll drink the loot we borrowed and recuperate tomorrow, cause everything is wonderful and we had a good fight.”

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‘Unlikely Radicals’ exposes the toxic Adams Mine Dump War – by Meg Borthwick (Rabble.ca – February 6, 2014)

http://rabble.ca/

Everyone loves a good David vs. Goliath story and Unlikely Radicals: The Story of the Adams Mine Dump War by Charlie Angus is as good as it gets. Centred on the campaign to keep Toronto’s garbage from being dumped in a decommissioned Northern Ontario mine, Unlikely Radicals isn’t just a story about the rural north vs. the urban south, it’s a story about the politicization of ordinary people — including Angus himself.

In the late 1990s Charlie Angus, NDP Member of Parliament for Timmins-James Bay (and current Official Opposition Critic for Ethics), “believed that organized politics was the domain of stuffy old men.” The former Toronto activist and punk rock musician was living in Cobalt, a town of fewer than 1,500 people in the heart of Northern Ontario’s historic Mining District. It was also part of the Timiskaming District, “ground zero” for the Adams Mine dump war, the fight to keep Toronto’s garbage from being dumped in the environmentally sensitive region.

Backgrounder: How Toronto reached critical load

In 1989 Dofasco, a steel company based in Hamilton, announced the closure of the 8000 acre Adams Mine site. For the mining-dependant local population, the closure spelled economic disaster and as a community facing massive job loss they were tremendously vulnerable.

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[Northern Ontario] Aviation pioneer – Thunder Bay Chronicle-Journal Editorial (February 4, 2014)

Thunder Bay Chronicle-Journal is the daily newspaper of Northwestern Ontario.

NORTHERN Ontario’s aviation pioneers are a special breed. From lone bush pilots to small fleet owners they hop-scotched into a growing number of remote communities as airstrips were hewn out of the boreal forest. Gradually, scheduled air services were established. Names like Wieben, DeLuce and Kelner are among a long list of adventurous fliers who took on the challenge of opening up such a vast region as this.

The list is short a key member this week with the sudden death of Harvey Friesen. Together with his brother, Cliff, they grew Bearskin Airlines from a two-floatplane operation to a large, scheduled airline with 50 years of service — a remarkable achievement in an industry where longevity is rare.

The company was created in 1963 by a bush pilot named John Hegland from a base in Big Trout Lake, flying charter service to Sioux Lookout. (Hegland named the operation after Bearskin Lake where he owned a store.) A second hop to Thunder Bay was a logical step.

New owners turned Bearskin into an air taxi service with Harvey Friesen one of its pilots. In 1972, at age 24, he bought half the company and purchased most of the rest of it five years later. Brother Cliff bought in shortly after and a family business was born and grew with the addition of a base in Thunder Bay to augment the one in Sioux Lookout.

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Timmins History: Dance night a treat for early prospectors – by Karen Bachmann (Timmins Daily Press – February 1, 2014)

The Daily Press is the city of Timmins broadsheet newspaper.

TIMMINS – A few years ago, the Auer family donated, to the museum, a selection of the journals of Charles and Mae Auer. The Auers were local pioneers, responsible for the Nighthawk Mine and the development that would become known as Mattagami Heights (today, home to our local Ford Dealership).

The diaries are an exceptional view of what life would have been like for the very early prospectors coming to the area. Today, I offer to you an excerpt that caught my attention because it sounds like something right out of a movie!

To set the stage, Charles Auer and his partner Black Jack Cole (what a name!) started to head for the Nighthawk River system in January 1908. Along with their dog team lead by Nell and Jack, they mushed their way on existing trails, breaking new ones when needed.

The temperatures plunged to -40 F and the snow was about three feet thick. The going was pretty rough. Eventually, they hit smoother ground and stopped for the night at Campbell’s Halfway House, outside of McDougall Chutes. They took care of the dogs and enjoyed a good hot meal.

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50 years ago: Discovery of Kidd Mine – by Len Gillis (Sudbury Star – November 10, 2013)

The Sudbury Star is the City of Greater Sudbury’s daily newspaper.

It was the most important thing to happen in Timmins since the discovery of gold. And it happened 50 years ago, on Nov. 7, 1963.

It was Thursday November 7th, 1963. Texas Gulf exploration geologist Ken Darke directed a diamond drill crew where to set up for drilling on the mineral anomaly known as Kidd 55. The very first drill hole was K-55-1. The drilling crew was set up in the northeast section of Kidd Township, roughly 24 kilometres from Timmins Town Hall.

Aside from a handful of drillers and geologists, no one would witness the incredible event that would happen the next few days in that drill shack, as core samples from hole no. K-55-1 were being pulled out of the ground and placed in core boxes.

As the story goes, one of the samples displayed a length of solid copper nearly a foot long. Ken Darke knew immediately he was standing on a major discovery. It would become the world-class Kidd Creek orebody; so huge and so rich it was a geological freak of nature. It was a good Friday in Timmins, although no one in Timmins knew it yet.

It would be another six months before Texas Gulf formally announced the discovery on April 16, 1964, causing whoops of joy, kicking off a major staking rush as well as a rush on buying shares in any company anywhere near the Kidd Township discovery.

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From Big Bang to No Wimper: A historical book review – by Dieter K. Buse (Sudbury Star – September 30, 2013)

The Sudbury Star is the City of Greater Sudbury’s daily newspaper.

To order a copy of “From Meteorite Impact to Constellation City”, please click here:  http://www.wlupress.wlu.ca/Catalog/saarinen-meteorite.shtml

In 1980, a disgruntled person who had moved from Sudbury to Edmonton, Alta., published a long piece in the Edmonton Journal proclaiming the demise of the city he had left and ranting at length about its problems.

Yet, 30 years later, despite a mess at city hall — though not matched by the Ford brothers show in Toronto or rotation of mayors in Montreal — and crumbling infrastructure as everywhere, Sudbury seems to be more than surviving. With every passing year it becomes a more attractive place to live due to its physical setting among lakes, its increasingly diversified economy (research institutes, medical school) and the limited stresses of a mid-sized regional service centre.

The lengthy book under review, Oiva W. Saarinen’s From Meteorite Impact to Constellation City: A Historical Geography of Greater Sudbury, is the most comprehensive account of Sudbury’s past published to date and helps to explain its survival despite the many odds aligned against it. The author underscores the importance of space and place to understanding the city’s long-term development and its continued difficulties.

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The hole in Canadian history – by Dieter K. Buse (Toronto Star – August 11, 2013)

The Toronto Star has the largest circulation in Canada. The paper has an enormous impact on federal and Ontario politics as well as shaping public opinion.

Northeastern Ontario has just two National Historic interpretative centres.

Congratulations to Parks Canada for having obtained another World Heritage Site designation. Canada’s 17th such site acknowledges the importance of Red Bay, the 17th century Basque whaling station in Labrador. Perhaps the publicity will inspire more people to experience such sites and to learn more about our diverse heritage. The sites recognize special geographic, geological, biological but especially cultural and historic places. Hence in Canada they include Gros Morne, the Klondike, the Rocky Mountain parks and the core of Quebec City.

However, this achievement needs to be seen in a larger context, and some bones picked with Parks Canada. If one looks at the location of Canada’s sites — easily done on the Parks Canada website map — one finds that many are located in remote and isolated areas. Perhaps that merely reflects the nature of our vast, lightly settled country.

Yet, it does pose the question why no significant place has been identified between the Rideau Canal system near Ottawa and Dinosaur Park in Saskatchewan? Do not some important, special landscapes, such as those made iconic by the Group of Seven, exist between those points? Have no important historical events occurred in such a large area?

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The Shield – Riches Beyond Our Rocks (Sudbury History Video) – by Ontario Visual Heritage Project


For part one, go to the TV Ontario website: http://ww3.tvo.org/video/162962/shield-riches-beyond-our-rocks-part-1

For part two, go to the TV Ontario website: http://ww3.tvo.org/video/162677/shield-riches-beyond-our-rocks-part-2

The Ontario Visual Heritage Project presents films that teach, preserve and promote the history of Ontario. http://www.visualheritage.ca./index.html

News Release: Feature Length Documentary on Greater Sudbury History Available NOW!

SUDBURY, Ontario – Dec. 18, 2008 – After the launch of the City of Greater Sudbury installment of the Ontario Visual Heritage Project in July, the DVD of the production is now available through local museums and libraries. Entitled, ‘Riches Beyond Our Rocks; Stories
from Greater Sudbury,’ the DVD features a two-hour documentary film, which explores the intriguing history of the City of Greater Sudbury and its people through interviews with local historians, archival films and photographs, and re-enactments of historical events. The DVD is packed with additional interviews and stories.

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Hail to the New Province of ‘Noront’ [Northern Ontario separation] – by Joe Lascelles (Highgrader – Summer 2013)

http://www.highgradermagazine.com/

HighGrader Magazine is committed to serve the interests of northerners by bringing the issues, concerns and culture of the north to the world through the writings and art of award-winning journalists as well as talented freelance artists, writers and photographers.

Having been raped, robbed, screwed over from the beginning of Confederation, the Northern region of Ontario has had enough and we will not take it anymore. We will no longer let those feudal lords (Southern Ontario politicians) dictate how much they will leave Northerners to eat as they carry away our resources, all to fatten the coffers and the members of Government, to be spent almost exclusively in Southern Ontario.

For years, decisions for Northern Ontario have been made in Toronto by Southern politicians who, it might be said, have not bothered to even come to see how we live, see what we do for entertainment and how deep and numerous our potholes are. Southern Ontarians take as truth the Stompin’ Tom Connors ditty that Sudbury women play Bingo and the men all get stinko on a Sudbury Saturday night.

For all they think of us, most Northerners now have oil stoves to heat up our igloos. We can now cook up our seal blubber before eating it. Timmins? That’s really the North Pole isn’t it? Cochrane? Oh yes, they know something of Cochrane because they have polar bears roaming around the Esquimo village.

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Documentary examines Del Villano [1956-59] bear hunt – by Kyle Gennings (Timmins Daily Press – April 22, 2013)

The Daily Press is the city of Timmins broadsheet newspaper.

TIMMINS – Timmins is a community that is built upon stories of heroism, bravery, ingenuity and downright strangeness.

From Sandy McIntyre to Maggie Buffalo, the snippets of Timmins past are wide spread and deeply rooted. But none of the stories transcended the borders of the community and the country quite like the tale of one mayor and his determination to see the Queen’s guard look their best marching in front of Buckingham Palace.

Leo Del Villano served as Mayor of Timmins for many years. Between 1956 and 1959 he gained international fame for having organized the largest bear hunt in Ontario’s history.

“I am looking at an overall perspective on Black Bear hunting and management in Ontario and as I had been going through a number of newspaper articles, I stumbled across Leo Del Villano’s story,” said Michael Commito, a PhD candidate from the Department of History at McMaster University.

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NEWS RELEASE: Mayor Matichuk leads Greater Sudbury in mourning Canadian icon Stompin’ Tom Connors

 

For Immediate Release

Thursday, March 7, 2013

Mayor Marianne Matichuk was saddened to learn of the passing of Canadian music legend Stompin’ Tom Connors on Wednesday.

“Stompin’ Tom endeared himself to Canadians because he devoted himself and his music to life in Canada,” Mayor Matichuk said.

“He wrote and sang about the things Canadians hold dear, such as hockey. He cared most about being a Canadian … and he will never be forgotten for that.”

One of his most famous songs, Sudbury Saturday Night, written and first recorded in Canada’s Centennial year of 1967, remains recognizable to all Canadians. Though Greater Sudbury has evolved considerably from the company town immortalized in that song, Connors captured compellingly the spirit of our community 45 years ago.

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Spirit of Schumacher still lingers – by Benjamin Aubé (Timmins Daily Press March 2, 2013)

The Daily Press is the city of Timmins broadsheet newspaper.

TIMMINS – The landscape of Schumacher may have changed over the years, but the community’s vibrant spirit and heritage is being kept alive and well.

Like those of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s Dr. TJ Eckleburg in The Great Gatsby, legendary philanthropist Frederick Schumacher’s eyes still watch over the town that bears his name.

A party honouring 101 years of the community’s existence and heritage was held at the McIntyre Arena, the building where Schumacher’s portrait is mounted on the exterior. Friday, Mar. 1 was Mr. Schumacher Day, and the Schumacher Arts, Culture and Heritage Association (SACHA) celebrated in style.

“It’s a committee that’s been together for a year now,” said Rob Knox, a member of the SACHA committee. “Our focus has been the preservation of Schumacher arts, culture and architecture, and celebrating the citizenry of Schumacher and the diverse and wonderful history of this small mining community.

“We’ve undertaken a few various community events in an efforts to elevate the notion of Schumacher as a community and its history and its overall contribution to the city of Timmins and the Porcupine Mining Camp.”

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Excerpt from “Haywire My Life in the Mines” – by Doug Hall

This autobiographical book describes the Doug Hall’s family through war and depression, and goes on to relate his experiences underground in the late 1960′s and early 1970′s. It is written from the point of view of the average Joe who went underground when he was eighteen and didn’t know what he was getting into. The author considers himself lucky to have survived those years.

Click here to order an e-book of “Haywire My Life in the Mines”: http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/269905

Working on the Grizzly

So anyway there I was one day working in a gang of guys with Old Abel when the Shift Boss or Captain or some such dignitary came up to us and said, “I need a man with a safety belt to work on the grizzly”. Now probably at that point I should have been a bit brighter and taken note of how all the other men in the crew were suddenly looking at the ground or the side of the drift or just about anyplace else except at this chap who needed a man for the grizzly. And to compound things I looked directly at this chap and said, “I’ve got a safety belt”. I noticed then how some of the other men in the crew seemed to relax and some of them even looked the visiting dignitary right in the face as if to say, “Gee I was going to volunteer but that other guy beat me to it”. And so that was how I became a grizzly man.

For the uninitiated perhaps I should explain what a grizzly is. It’s basically a steel grating with various sized holes placed over the top of an ore-pass. Usually a scooptram driver but sometimes trammers on the railroad tracks would put rocks of varying sizes (i.e. muck) on top of the grizzly and then the grizzly men would have to put the rocks through the grizzly so that the rocks would be small enough to go through the chutes in the loading pocket down below. The grizzly men would do this using a scaling bar, a sledge hammer or by drilling and blasting the rocks, sometimes after dragging them to the back of the grizzly using a tugger hoist.

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