View topic - Understanding the Lands of the Spanish River

Places where we travel usually reveal little of their detailed history. For the Spanish river area, we've had a bit of its story already: Grey Owl's books, and then details collected by Grey Owl's biographers. We are thankful for that, and in my case, this knowledge made me want to explore the area further.

Now, there's a book that describes people, events and history of this specific area. It's written by Andy Thomson, a member of the family that had logged the area in the 1930s and '40s, built a saw mill beside the river and created much of the village at the place that is now the Sheahan railway stop. They still have a large camp there and are still call the area their summer home.

The book is focused on Pogamasing, the large lake that parallels the Spanish River in its mid-section.
Andy spent his summers at that lake, as a youngster he was a canoe guide and later became a high school teacher. His academic curiosity shows in the thorough research done for this book: it's a treasure trove of stories, maps, photos and archival records, all painting a vivid and detailed history of the area.

I was spellbound to find
* how the area experienced the First Nations contact with the Europeans,
* the documented efforts of the fur traders plying their business in that area, including the details of the various HBC posts from the Lake Huron North SHore to the height of land (such as the post at LaCloche, Green Lake on the Missisagi and of course the post on Lake Pogamasing),
* the pushing of the trans-Canada railway straight through largely uncharted bush, and the iron snake's effect on people and land,
* the effort of then surveying endless miles of forests and lakes so the government could sell the rights to mine and log
* the various efforts to log the area and use the river to float the logs to the mills - and first-hand descriptions of how a logging operation was run in the days of horses and sleighs
* the building of the Wye village and successfully running the business in spite of the depression of the 30's
* the arrival of tourism after WWII

It's a fascinating book. I never knew the area had that much history! Details at Andy's website at http://pogamasing.com/


Also, there'll be a book launch in Sudbury and also one in Toronto this week - if you want to attend, I'll post details in the Event Forum.
Toronto: http://www.myccr.com/phpbbforum/viewtop ... 74#p361574
Sudbury: http://www.myccr.com/phpbbforum/viewtop ... 40&t=39019

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“What is the good of having a nice house without a decent planet to put it on?” - Thoreau

Here's a sampler, from one of the chapters:

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“What is the good of having a nice house without a decent planet to put it on?” - Thoreau

Thank you Erhard for this post. I will definitely be putting that book on my "Wishlist".I love the Spanish River Area. We paddled the Spanish River from Duke Lake to Agnew Lake in 2006.Although we have given up ww canoeing,I would love to visit it again.That being said, there are some areas that portaging would be difficult .None the less,the beauty of the Spanish remains with me and thank goodness for the digital photos I recorded on our trip.

Thanks for bringing this book to the attention of the paddling community. I just listed the book at
http://myccr.com/phpbbforum/viewtopic.php?f=107&t=31543
under Spanish River area. Information.

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A literal mind is a little mind. If it's not worth doing to excess, it's not worth doing at all. Good enough isn't.  None are so blind as those who choose not to see. (AJ)

Even though I had seen early sections of the book, I am discovering new pages. I am surprised to find references to stuff that is dear to us CCR folks:

Describing the Budd Car service that the residents of Pog Lake use, the book alludes to CCR's Deep Freeze events:
"In winter, there are trappers or occasionally you will meet a group of intrepid enthusiasts who like to winter camp not far from the track. They bring their toboggans, snowshoes, tents and their musical instruments, and enjoy themselves, perhaps in a way a little like Samuel de Champlain did when he created the "Ordre de Bon Temps", to help overcome the dread of winter. Singer-songwriter Dave Hadfield is one of these winter adventurers. I met him several years ago on his way to one of his winter expeditions. He wrote a song that strikes a chord with those who use the train to get to Pog and beyond, about the shared experience of waiting for the Budd Car.
"
A few pages earlier, the book describes the original train service of three times a day, and it gradual cutbacks to three times a week, and goes into detail what can hold up the Budd Car, to the chagrin of the Pog folks and everyone else. Yes, the VIA scheduler in Calgary is mentioned...

By the way, the complete words and chords to Dave's song are at http://www.myccr.com/phpbbforum/viewtop ... w=previous

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“What is the good of having a nice house without a decent planet to put it on?” - Thoreau

The author of the book, Andy Thomson, had an interview with the CBC a while ago and it's up at their website:
http://www.cbc.ca/morningnorth/past-epi ... gamasing/#
The part where Andy explains why this area represents a microcosm of Canada's history: relating to the times of the Native cultures to the arrival of the Europeans with their fur trading commerce, the wars between the foreign powers, the building of the railway through the area - Bud car users still ride it today - the surveying of the land as preparation to logging and settling. That topic begins at 2:15 minutes into the recoding.

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“What is the good of having a nice house without a decent planet to put it on?” - Thoreau

I just got the spring issue of The WCA's magazine and found a review of the book. Tony Harting, Nastawgan's editor, was pretty impressed and ends his article with these words:

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“What is the good of having a nice house without a decent planet to put it on?” - Thoreau