In 1865, the first gentlemen anglers came to the Nipigon River to fish. Red Rock House, at the mouth of the Nipigon River, was an important outfitting station between 1870 and 1880. In 1916 Dr. J.W. Cook of Fort William caught the world record brook trout (14.5 lbs.) at Rabbit Rapids on the Nipigon River. The legendary appeal of the area also led to visits by Royalty. However, by the early 1900’s fish sizes and numbers had begun to decline.

Railway Affects the Nipigon

In the spring of 1871, Sanford Fleming, Chief Engineer of government surveys for the proposed Pacific Railway, sent a party of surveyors to the Nipigon region. Their mission was to locate a practical route for a railway running east to west from a point about 32 kilometers north of Lake Nipigon (Todd 1977). At that time, running a rail line along the rocky northern shores of Lake Superior was not considered feasible (OMNR 2001).

The Canadian Pacific Railway was built through the Nipigon region from 1883-1885. Nipigon town site and the river were important links in the supply route from Lake Superior to the railway location. This section of the Canadian Pacific was among the most difficult and expensive to complete due to the rocky and rugged topography (OMNR 2001).

A second transcontinental line was deemed necessary to deal with the increasing occupation and economic activity in western Canada. This line was to run north of the Canadian Pacific from Quebec to Vancouver (Todd 1977). Government survey crews selected a route north of Lake Nipigon. Transporting equipment and supplies into this remote northern location proved to be a difficult task. Horse and dog teams were used to haul supplies to various construction sites. In the summer, the Nipigon water route was used. The problem of portaging supplies around the Nipigon River was resolved in 1908 by building an eighteen mile long 3-foot gauge tramway along the Nipigon River called the Nipigon Tramway (Todd 1977).

Logging

The construction of the Canadian Pacific Railway through the Nipigon area between 1883 and 1885 required extensive use of forest resources. Thousands of axe-made ties were taken from within and adjacent to the right-of-way. A similar demand for ties occurred with the construction of the National Transcontinental Railway in 1908- 1910 and the Canadian Northern Railway in 1913-1915.

The first attempt to drive logs down any part of the Nipigon River was made by James Whalen in 1900. At this time, prior to the dam construction, the river was very rough and proved to be a challenge. Karas (1997) describes the river of the past.

“It was composed of a large river that varied in width from 50 to 200 yards, with a voluminous flow of water; 5500 cu. feet per second. In its 32-mile southerly course from Lake Nipigon, it once descended 313 feet over 15 well-accelerated rapids and seven waterfalls, losing its identity only temporarily when it flowed through four lakes. It has been described as having three ecologies: 10 miles of lakes, 10 miles of river, and 10 miles of rapids.”

Log jams often occurred on sections of the river between Alexander Falls and Jessie Lake. Whalen established camps along the Nipigon River. Pine logs were cut along the river and driven down to Nipigon. Whalen’s operation continued until 1907. Full log drive started again on the Nipigon River in 1923 after the construction of the Cameron Falls dam and continued until 1973.

All the log boom towing on the Nipigon River was done by Abitibi Power and Paper Company. Abitibi held the rights to the river drive and their employees carried out the drives. Companies paid Abitibi an annual toll that was based on the amount of wood they expected to move and on Abitibi’s estimate of expenses. There were 2-6 different companies operating log drives from ice out to late September. Wood was towed in booms of up to 7,000 cords each to Virgin Falls. The annual volume was between 200,000 and 400,000 cords.

The release of the boom into the river was controlled by opening the boom with a winch (Mutch 1991). Once the logs were

Commercial Fishing

Commercial fishing on Lake Nipigon began in 1917 as a result of food shortages brought on by World War I. Icehouses were established at Macdiarmid, near the C.N.R. rail line and the newly built railway transported the fish to markets. Large-scale, mechanized commercial fishing did not occur in the Lake Nipigon Basin until the early 1900’s. Mechanization led quickly to over-fishing, with a harvest of 2.3 million pounds in 1919. Since that time, stock harvests have depended on factors such as market price, weather, fishing effort and stock abundance. Lake Nipigon’s fish community has remained relatively unchanged since the early 1900’s with the exception of the introduction of smelt in 1976.

Construction of the Bridge over the Nipigon River

This tramway ran 3 miles west of the river from Alexander Landing to South Bay on Lake Nipigon. At Lake Nipigon, the supplies were transported north by steamer.

No sooner had construction on the National Transcontinental begun than the intention to build a Pacific and eastern extension to the railway, creating a third Trans-Canada railway was announced. After running along the Nipigon River, the line crossed and turned northeast along the shore of Orient Bay.

The construction of this railway was completed in 1914 and transcontinental service for passengers began to move along this line in 1915.

“spilled”, river crews kept them moving down the river to Lake Superior. A single drive took a month from the time wood was spilled above Virgin Falls until it cleared Lake Helen. Company records show that the number of drives ranged from a high of 10 in 1942 to two in 1971 with an average of five drives a year (Mutch 1991).

Approximately 100 workers were required to handle the logs. These workers were predominantly French Canadians and First Nations with a few Finnish and Swedish workers (Mutch 1991).

The main drive camp was located above MacDonald’s Rapids. There were four other camps located further downstream to house the men who worked the lower stretches of the Nipigon River. These camps were located at strategic points along the Nipigon River including Virgin Falls, Pine Portage, Cameron Falls, and Lake Helen. They were all linked by short-wave radio, by which the Drive Supervisor got reports and gave orders (Mutch 1991).

The river was divided into sections, with the wood from any one drive (i.e. the wood of one particular company) being confined to one section at a time. Once it was in a given section of the river, that area would be closed at both ends with booms, so that some other company’s wood could be released into the section above. Logs were stored in Lake Hannah above White Chutes, above the dams at Pine Portage and Cameron Falls (at the south end of the Lake Jessie) and to a limited extent above Alexander Falls. Pine Portage and Alexander Falls dams had control booms and lug chutes; Cameron Falls had no chutes; the movement of wood was controlled by stop logs (Mutch 1991).

Once the drive moved through each section of the river, the boom was closed and the river was “reared” up to release any wood that was held within that section. If water levels had been lowered while the logs were being driven down a section, Hydro would restore it to its original level to facilitate the rearing effort. This might mean high water levels were restored for two or three days at a time, then returned to the lower levels before the next phase of the drive was begun (Mutch 1991).

The following information comes from the Lake Nipigon Signature Site document.

Chapter 4, pg 166-167

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Settlement in the 1900's changed the Nipigon with Railway construction Logging and Commercial fishing.

Railways and Logging