Northern Algoma: A People's History

John D. Blackwell is co-ordinator of information services, Arthur A.
Wishart Library, Algoma University College, Sault Ste. Marie.

Douglas, a teacher and amateur historian living in Hornepayne, Ontario,
has written an engaging popular history of “Northern Algoma”—a
term he coined for this book and defines as “an area north of Lakes
Superior and Huron that stretches north from Wawa to Hornepayne and east
from White River to Missanabie.”

Although this brief history begins in 1600, the first three centuries
are summarized in fewer than five pages. The focus of the volume is the
period from the 1930s to the 1960s—the span of living memory. Inspired
by Paul Thompson’s classic The Voice of the Past: Oral History (1978),
Douglas set out to interview residents of Northern Algoma who played a
part in the early extraction of its natural resources. Their
recollections tell the story of living in company towns and coping with
the sometimes harsh idiosyncrasies of Northern Ontario. As one
interviewee observed, “the spine of the Earth is close here, you are
never far from bedrock.” Until the construction of highways in the
1960s, many communities in Northern Algoma were severely isolated.

Douglas relates much of the history in his subjects’ own words,
relying occasionally on secondary sources to provide context and
transition; his select bibliography includes only a dozen titles. Along
the way, one learns much about the history of fur, gold, iron ore,
logging, and railways. There are also glimpses of the area’s
pioneering industrialists, such as Francis Hector Clergue and Sir James
Dunn. One of the book’s greatest strengths is its more than 60 period
photographs; they powerfully evoke the tenor of life in Northern Algoma
during the middle third of the 20th century. The two maps are also
highly informative.

Most of what appears in this small volume—the memories of
working-class people—is not recorded elsewhere. For that reason alone,
Northern Algoma deserves to be read and valued.