DC Everest

Pictured is Dwight Clarke Everest, the Wisconsin man credited with building a wood products company, and in real definition the founder of TWNBMB. He passed away 53 years ago. This legacy escapes. The people who took the torch failed miserably.

After I bought a car, sometimes I would wander down to the rotting ruins of Jackfish. Jackfish at one time was one of the most important ports on the Great Lakes. Its harbour accepted coal for the railways, fish from Lake Superior to southern Ontario markets. It had lumber streaming to its docks. Passenger ships made it a regular stop. It had one of the most famous hotel saloons on the CPR railroad. Important people traveling on the rail system made it a point of stopping over for one or two shots. It had diversity. According to its residents it had potential.

Within a decade, economic surprises killed the goose. The railways loved the diesel locomotive for every economic reason. Oil replaced coal for home heating. The Trans-Canada highway opened allowing wood products to be trucked out to major cities for sawing and planing. According to the US Army Engineers, lampreys invaded the unprepared lakes almost causing Lake Trout to become extinct and the fishery was killed.

Jackfish faded into forgotten history. Towns boom from nothing in Northern Ontario at the apathetic whims of business and government. Residents in these communities leave at the site of impending economic disaster.

I used to sit on the upper edges of the rockcuts that overlooked Jackfish Bay. The thoughts circled around one vision that may come true. What would it be like to have a hometown which is a ghost town. I am afraid that this may happen. I was born in a town that will no longer exist.

Beyond Everest, there is a graveyard on the right hand side of Peninsula Road on the way out of TWNBMB. In it lay the bodies of many people, friends, that I know. One can go down to Port Coldwell to see what a forgotten cemetary is like. Coldwell another ghost town also had the hotel that housed many of the Group of Seven artists during their creative work period. It is a forgotten cove.