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• French-Canadian Settlement and the CPR in the Mattawa Area
  Francophone settlement rapidly increased in the Mattawa area with the arrival of the Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR) in 1881. During construction of the rail line, the local economy benefitted from the presence of thousands of French-Canadian workers, some of whom were accompanied by their families. Once the railway was operational, the local lumber industry expanded and Mattawa prospered as a community, a supply and transportation hub, and a lumber depot. Development was also stimulated in...

• Brent Crater, The
  First noted in aerial photographs in 1951, the Brent Crater is a circular depression approximately three kilometres in diameter that is thought to have been formed as the result of the high-speed impact of a giant meteorite some 450 million years ago.

• Grey Owl 1888-1938
  Archibald Belaney came to Canada from England in 1906 and lived as a trapper and guide in the Temagami and Biscotasing areas. After joining an Ojibwa band he adopted the name Grey Owl. Alarmed at the rapid despoliation of the wilderness, the trapper turned conservationist and spent the last 10 years of his life writing and lecturing on wildlife preservation.

• Canoe Route to the West, The
  Here, when the canoe was the principal means of travel, explorers, voyageurs, missionaries and others bound for the West, left the Ottawa River and followed the Mattawa River to Lake Nipissing, the French River and the upper Great Lakes. For over 200 years, the Mattawa River formed part of the route linking the St. Lawrence River settlements with the vast interior of the continent. Among the historic figures who passed here were: Samuel De Champlain...

• Mattawa House 1837
  Situated at the junction of major canoe routes, Mattawa House was established by the Hudson's Bay Company primarily to discourage lumbermen from encroaching on the company's fur-trading monopoly. The post profited more from the transshipment of supplies than from furs, however, and actually owed its continued existence to business with the lumber companies.

• Reverend Silas Huntington 1829-1905, The
  A zealous Methodist missionary, Huntington travelled extensively throughout northeastern Ontario visiting outlying communities and Canadian Pacific Railway workcamps as far west as Schreiber. He was a man of magnetic personality and great physical strength, and became the hero of many local legends.

• La Vase Portages
  The historic La Vase (Mud) Portages began at the head of the nearby pond. These three portages, connecting Trout Lake and the lower La Vase River, were linked by small navigable streams and ponds. They formed part of the great canoe route via the Ottawa and Mattawa Rivers, Lake Nipissing and the French River, leading to the upper Great Lakes and the West, which was followed by the early explorers, missionaries and fur traders. Among...

• Jean Nicolet
  Born in France, Nicolet (c.1598-1642) came to Canada in 1618. He lived for a number of years with the Nipissing First Nations, adopting their lifestyle and thereby helping to strengthen their alliance with the French. An intrepid explorer, Nicolet is generally credited with the discovery of Lake Michigan, which he partially explored in 1634.

• Temagami Post 1834
  Established to safeguard the Hudson's Bay Company's fur-trading territory from competitors, the small post on Lake Timagami (now Temagami) was an outpost of the company's major depot on Lake Timiskaming.

• Reverend Charles Alfred Marie Paradis 1848-1926, The
  An Oblate missionary from Quebec, Paradis was posted to Lake Timiskaming in 1881. During his years in the region, he did much to encourage agricultural settlement, particularly in the area around Verner, and took up farming himself. Paradis was an enterprising man of many talents: he prospected for gold, wrote meditative works, and painted in watercolour.

• Founding of Sturgeon Falls, The
  The development of Sturgeon Falls began in 1881 with the arrival of Canadian Pacific Railway construction crews. Lumbering and the establishment of pulp and paper industries accelerated the village's growth and attracted many French-Canadian settlers to the area.

• Louise de Kiriline Lawrence, 1894-1992
  Louise Flach was born in Sweden and grew up on the scenic Baltic coast where she developed an interest in nature. Flach became a Red Cross nurse, serving during the First World War in Denmark, and then with her first husband Greb de Kiriline who died in revolutionary Russia. She immigrated to Canada in 1927, settled near Bonfield, Ontario and was head nurse for the Dionne Quintuplets. In 1935, she retired from nursing to study...