The Pigeon River Road
This abandoned roadway was used to deliver the mail for a decade until the Canadian Pacific Railway was completed in 1882.
Location:
On Highway 61 — which replaced the old road as the route to the border, 6 km west of the Kaministiquia River Bridge
Themes:
Transportation systems and communications
Plaque text:
This road was constructed to facilitate the transportation of mail between Thunder Bay and Duluth during the winter months when navigation was closed on Lake Superior. Demands for a reliable year-round mail service arose with the development of the Silver Islet Mine in 1870. A temporary mail trail was opened in 1872 before a 38-mile winter road was constructed from Fort William to the Pigeon River by John Carroll in 1873-74. The poorly built road was used by mail couriers until the completion of the C.P.R. to Thunder Bay in 1882. As the area traversed by the road remained sparsely settled, it was little used and much of it was abandoned when the Internationa1, or "Scott", Highway (later No. 61) was constructed in 1913-17.
