Patrick and Annie Downey reflected pioneer spirit raising family plus involvement with church and community

Settling in Chapleau just before the beginning of the 20th century, Patrick 'Paddy' and his wife Annie Downey reflected the pioneer spirit of those times as they became involved with the church and community as well as raising their family.

Born in Sheenboro, Quebec, Mr. Downey started working for the Canadian Pacific Railway in its early years returning home from Chapleau in 1897 to marry Annie Catherine Mears. For the first few months in Chapleau, they lived with Tom and Catherine Downey, a cousin.

They first lived in a house near Sacred Heart Roman Catholic Church where five of their eight children were born, but then bought large house on Lorne located  across from the YMCA, where the liquor store is today.

In an article about the Downey family written for the centennial of Sacred Heart Church, the writer who is one of the family but not identified noted that "Both Annie and Paddy were hard working energetic people who were happy to be living in a country where freedom and opportunity were available to all."

To supplement Mr. Downey's income from the CPR and to pay for their new house, they rented four bedrooms, usually to teachers. Apparently teachere were "sent" to Mrs. Downey. Renting rooms with board was a pretty common practice even the 1940s-50s when I was growing up in Chapleau. 

The artice writer noted, "Imagine the washing that entailed with no electricity and water heated by a tank near the cook stove adding that it was a "horrendous" job with family and boarders ---"scrubbing, cooking, sewing, patching..."

Much of the work fell to many wives of many railroaders who would be out on the road for long periods of time in those days.

However, the boys would go with their father to get the wood supply sometimes putting it in a boom to float down river, haul it home, saw it, pile it outside to dry, throw it in the basement, pile again...

No gym was needed, the article notes.

Despite challenges they were always secure and well cared for.

"Both parents had the pioneer spirit and became very involved with church and comunity,"

At first all children attended the public school but in due course there was a need for a separate school and Mrs. Downey and other women met with Bishop Scollard to pursue it. By 1910 it had been provided.  

Mrs. Downey was also active in the Catholic Women's League and was very involved in the selection of plays and casts for the very popular St. Patrick's Day celebrations. Mr, Downey was also active in the church.

After Chapleau High School opened in 1922, Mr. Downey served several terms as a board member, and was very active in its early years.

During the Great Depression, Mr. Downey served on the municipal council which was a great challenge with many out of work.

Another great Chapleau pioneer family. My email is mj.morris@live.ca

---

Ambitious mission to explore and preserve the land in Chapleau region from Lake Huron to James Bay undertaken in early 20th century by Canadian Camp Club

James Bay Lake Huron Canoe Routes Ian Macdonald 2016

Note: Ian Macdonald and Michael McMullen take a look at the ambitious mission of the Canadian Camp Club, a New York City-based group of wealthy outdoorsmen at turn of 20th Century. An interesting read. Thanks Ian and Michael.

Ian Macdonald and Michael McMullen

At the turn of the 20th Century, there were attempts by private sector groups to preserve the environment in various parts of the United States and Canada. One of the more interesting, but less known chapters of the history of the Chapleau region, involves a New York City-based group of wealthy outdoorsmen called the Canadian Camp Club, which was created in 1905. Indeed, President Theodore Roosevelt of the United States was a member.

The ambitious mission of this club included the acquisition of large tracts of land along the 450-mile network of rivers and lakes stretching from Lake Huron to James Bay. The plan was that this land, including native settlements, would be preserved in a natural state with a series of modest camp facilities built along the route for the private use of club members. This well intended task ultimately proved far beyond the practical means of the group to achieve. The only facility that was actually ever built was a large camp on what is now called Basswood Lake near Thessalon, Ontario adjacent to the Mississagi River.

Canadian Camp Club at Basswood Lake ON eary 1930s

The Canadian Camp Club through promoting this part of Northern Ontario amongst their membership inadvertently led to creation of an invaluable photographic record of the region in 1905 including traditional native culture that was rapidly disappearing. A number of canoe trips were well documented and published in detail by major outdoors magazines of the day, including Shields Magazine and Forest and Stream. Additional records were provided by private individuals like Dr. Howard Kelly of Baltimore, Maryland, who along with his family, made trips in 1905 and 1906 travelling from the CPR siding at Winnebago near present day Sultan, south up the Wakami River, portaging over the height of land and down the Wenebegon and Mississagi Rivers to Blind River on Lake Huron. Dr. Kelly kept a meticulous record of these trips describing and photographing Ojibwe encampments and artifacts showing many different aspects of traditional Ojibwe culture.

Kelly Canoe trip party at Winnebago siding 1905 Dr Howard Kelly

Dr. J. Seymour Emans had also travelled from the same departure point at Winnebago two months earlier than the Kelly group in 1905 and his journey was documented in detail in Shields Magazine. Dr. Emans took a slightly different route than Dr. Kelly, photographing the remains of the old Hudson’s Bay Company (HBC) post at Green Lake, native life and early logging activity along the way.  The trip from Winnebago to Thessalon on Lake Huron began on August 8, 1905 and took fifteen days.

HBC Post at Green Lake ON 1905. Dr J Seymour Emans in Shield Magazine

Robert T. Morris in 1905 embarked on a canoe journey also originating at Winnebago, but travelled north down the Wakami River. The first leg of the trip was to the HBC post at Flying Post on Groundhog Lake and then on the Groundhog, Mattagami and Moose Rivers to Moose Factory on James Bay. The entire canoe journey from Winnebago to Moose Factory and return took two and a half months. The journey was documented in detail in the June 9, 1906 and June 16, 1906 issues of Forest and Stream. These two descriptive and insightful articles describing the varying landscape of the Hudson Bay watershed, native life, early surveying activity and the way of life at the HBC posts at Flying Post and Moose Factory.

The most familiar examples of private sector engagement with conservation and preservation today would be groups like Ducks Unlimited. In 1937, Publisher Joseph Knapp, Robert Winthrop, and a small group of conservation philanthropists decided to focus on the decreasing waterfowl populations and the habitat necessary to sustain them in Canada, and formed Ducks Unlimited Inc. As of January 1, 2018, the organization indicated that its habitat conservation programs have conserved 14.1 million acres in North America of which 6.4 million acres are in Canada, and influenced another 152.4 million acres in Canada through agreements.

The debate associated with the work of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada has served to raise the level of public awareness of the value of traditional Indigenous culture and their involvement with the land. The University of Manitoba, for instance, which presently houses the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation at their Fort Garry campus in Winnipeg, recently developed a set of principles and guidelines derived from traditional native culture that shape policy decisions for that institution’s future strategic planning and development of University lands. Significant amongst these recommendations is a commitment to the natural environment and sustainability including conservation, preservation and restoration of local species and ecosystems wherever possible. ]

Additional guidelines require striking a balance between public access to natural areas and maintaining their qualities as natural habitat. The guidelines also make reference to an indigenous way of being that looks seven generations forward and seven generations back while being rooted in our present generation. This approach encourages planning to become more holistic in nature encouraging longer term planning recognizing that planning objectives may not be realized in our lifetimes, but will have effects on future generations.

The Photograph taken by Dr. Howard Kelly in this article is the property of the Kelly family. Dr. Kelly’s original journal has been donated to, and is located , the Chesney Medical Archives of John Hopkins University.

Conservation, Preservation and the Environment all challenges in early years of Chapleau region and Canada

Anishinabe Chief Louis Espagnol At Biscotasing Ontario (1905) Archives of Ontario

Note: In this article Ian Macdonald and Michael McMullen give an insightful look into the challenges of conservation, preservation and the environment. Thank you Ian and Michael. MJM. 

Ian Macdonald and Michael McMullen

The construction of the Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR) in Northern Ontario in the 1880s along the height of land, such as in the Chapleau region, sparked the development of the business and social infrastructure of the resulting new towns and villages. This created employment and enabled a new beginning and social fabric for many. As well, opportunities arose for timber development, mining development and hydro-electric projects.

As we look back at that time, we can reflect that conservation and preservation of the environment was likely considered, if at all, by only a few. There was an abundance of land, water, trees, game and fish. There was plenty for everyone. The priority was economic activity that began with the building of the CPR line. Any pollution of the environment was accepted as part of economic development. This was not limited to Northern Ontario, ththe country as a whole did not fully consider conservation or preservation as policy issues.

Also overlooked at the time was the impact on the First Nations people who had lived and survived on this land for centuries and coexisted with the Hudson’s Bay Company (HBC) for well over 200 years. Their way of life was now being significantly altered.

Conservation played a role in the fiercely competitive and ruthless fur trade of the early 19th century. HBC policies encouraging wildlife extermination were actually implemented in the southern regions of HBC territory in an attempt to exterminate the fur bearing species in the region thus discouraging the incursion of rival traders. HBC, paradoxically, implemented conservation policies in 1822 in the more secure and lucrative northern regions abolishing the use of steel traps and ordered the post factors to discourage the indigenous trappers from trapping cub beaver.

During the next decade the company sent out instructions on fur conservation and nursing encouraging trapping of smaller animals and in all but the frontier district only winter beaver pelts were accepted. This policy was difficult to enforce as beavers were trapped as much for the meat as for the fur and the company’s London headquarters implemented new policies including provision of summer employment of trappers so that they would not be forced to kill beaver for food. At New Brunswick House, indigenous trappers were hired to fish the nearby lakes, hunt geese in the autumn, and to work on the boats between Moose Factory and Michipicoten. The policy proved so successful that it was reported in 1843 that the Southern Department would not require any labourers or tradesmen from England that year.

In the United States in the early 20th century, conservation and preservation were being confronted directly by President Theodore Roosevelt who would go on and, during his two term tenure as President from 1901 to 1909 to establish the United States Forest Service, sign into law the creation of five National Parks, establish the first 51 bird reserves, four game preserves, and 150 National Forests. Conservation and preservation were therefore very much in the forefront of public consciousness and particularly the captains and kings of our southern neighbour at the turn of the century.

Issues specific to the Chapleau region during that same period included the incursion of white trappers on traditional native hunting and trapping grounds along with indiscriminate mining and lumbering on a grand scale. Anishinabe Chief and former manager of the HBC post at Lake Pogoomasing, Louis Espagnol, was one of the most highly visible voices for indigenous concerns and had forcefully spoken to this issue during the Treaty Nine negotiations of 1905-1906.

Twenty years later in 1925, under the stewardship of Chapleau merchant and fur trader, William McLeod, the Chapleau Crown Game Preserve would be created to prevent the fur bearing animals in the Chapleau region from being totally annihilated. The Chapleau Game Preserve at 7000 sq. kilometers reflected the scale of solution necessary to deal with the conservation challenge which in most cases was only possible through government intervention. Conservation was a big challenge requiring big solutions and big thinking.

Chapleau Crown Game Preserve (2015) Ian Macdonald

Development of a regulatory framework focusing on conserving and preserving the Canadian natural environment progressed at a more measured pace than in the United States. Although the first national park in Canada at Banff, Ottawa was created in 1885, it would not be until 1930 when a national system of parks was entrenched in legislation with the passing of the National Parks Act. It would take until the 1979 revisions to the Act to give more specificity and emphasis on conserving the natural areas in an unimpaired state through ecological integrity and restoration, moving away from development based heavily on profit.

Roger Mizuguchi and Ian Macdonald Nemegosenda River (1962) Ian Macdonald

Canada’s first provincial park was in was in Ontario with the establishment of Algonquin Park in 1893. Nevertheless, some 60 years later, in 1953, there were only seven provincial parks in Ontario. However, in the 65 years since, the number has grown to 340 by 2018. In the Chapleau region, Ivanhoe Lake Provincial Park was established in 1957 and Chapleau Nemogosenda River Provincal Park in 1973.