For Capital and Honest Enterprise – Second of 4-part series

July 28, 2022

Part One: The Timber Frontier

This article was done in partnership with the Whitemouth Municipal Museum and the Lac du Bonnet & District Historical Society. It appeared in the June 30, 2022 edition of the Lac du Bonnet Clipper.

At the turn of the century, the boundless natural resources of southeastern Manitoba appealed to the civilized world. Some came in search of solitude, though most desired the timber, minerals and potential for water power. An April 1899 Manitoba Free Press article remarked that “capital and honest enterprise will exhume its buried treasure and establish a prosperous population” along the Winnipeg River. The Lac du Bonnet Mining, Developing and Manufacturing Co. was established for this singular purpose.

During the winter of 1900-01, forty families from Fort Alexander and a “large force of men” worked in bush camps to cut and haul timber to a small sawmill at Lac du Bonnet. When the railway reached Lac du Bonnet in 1901, one of the contractors, J.D. McArthur, purchased the LdBMDMCo., acquiring their two townships of timber. McArthur had a small sawmill at Milner Ridge to cut railway ties and expanded operations at Lac du Bonnet. A bush crew, under R.N. Campbell, was sent up river, towards Whitemouth, to cut railway ties.

The J.D. McArthur Co. was quickly becoming the “leading lumber firm” in Manitoba. His Lac du Bonnet sawmill, with a capacity of 75,000 board feet per day, and Milner Ridge at 20,000 bd. ft. daily, kept McArthur’s Winnipeg yards well stocked with lumber, flooring, window sashes and doors. His numerous bush camps, towards the Pinawa Channel and Great Falls, brought logs out using horses and mules. Cordwood permits allowed McArthur to cut fuel wood, used to heat Winnipeg warehouses, buildings and houses, that was shipped daily by the trainload from Lac du Bonnet.

Twenty miles to the south, in Whitemouth, David Ross utilized a logging road between Seven Sisters to the north and south forty-eight miles to Whitemouth Lake, near Sprague, to access more timber. He retired from the lumber business in May 1902, though his sons, Hales and Joseph, continued to operate the sawmill under the name Ross Bros. & Co. By 1905, the brothers sold their stock and transported their entire operation, including the sawmill, to British Columbia to start the Ross-Saskatoon Lumber Co. A small sawmill established by River Hills homesteaders Fred Zink, Sr. and Karl Huettemann, filled the void left by Ross’ departure. Any house or barn built between Seven Sisters and Whitemouth at this time used Zink & Co. lumber. Another sawmill was established north of Whitemouth in fall 1915 by Tom Little. Neither mill could match McArthur’s Lac du Bonnet enterprise. As a community, Whitemouth slowly moved from lumbering to agriculture.

Demand for railway ties was diminishing, though the need switched to lumber. Winters in the Lac du Bonnet, Whitemouth Valley and Whiteshell regions were for hauling timber. Men and women drove horse or ox teams to the nearest sawmill, where the lumber and cordwood was loaded onto boxcars and shipped to Winnipeg. Large logs, some requiring two oxen to pull just one, were piled alongside the Winnipeg River and in spring were floated to Lac du Bonnet.

In October 1914, disaster struck at Lac du Bonnet. A fire started in McArthur’s warehouse, containing oats, hay and sixty sleighs. Bucket brigades battled the flames, but in the strong winds, the fire spread to other buildings in the vicinity, two CPR boxcars and the lumber piles, destroying approximately five million bd. ft. The sawmill caught fire several times, though company manager, R.N. Campbell, and the employees, put it out each time.

McArthur absorbed the loss and turned his attention to new interests. In 1916, McArthur formed the Manitoba Pulpwood Company, Ltd., which would begin his decade long quest to establish Manitoba’s first pulp mill.

Part Three: Pine Falls Pulp & Paper
Part Four: The Last Forty Years

References:

Jim Mochoruk, Formidable Heritage Manitoba’s North and the Cost of Development 1870 to 1930 (Winnipeg, MB: University of Manitoba Press, 2004), 168,436.

Bob Porth and Craig Mackenzie, eds., Trails to Rails to Highways (Winnipeg, Manitoba: Total Printing and Reproduction Service, 1979), 9-10, 12, 17, 117, 129, 149, 157.

Aileen Oder, ed., Logs and Lines from the Winnipeg River: A History of the Lac du Bonnet Area (Steinbach, MB: Derksen Printers, 1980), 1, 3-4, 16, 41, 166, 196.

Karen Nicholson, The Lumber Industry in Manitoba (Winnipeg, MB: Historic Resources Branch, 2000), 32-33.

Pioneer History Book Committee, eds., Pioneer history of Glenn, East Braintree and McMunn (Keewatin, ON: Lakewood Graphics Ltd., 1989), 34.

My articles: Land of Rich & Plenty, The End of the Line

“A New Manitoba Eldorado.” Manitoba Free Press (Winnipeg, MB), April 15, 1899.

“Lumber Business Change.” Winnipeg Tribune, March 12, 1902.

“To Whom It May Concern.” Manitoba Free Press, May 28, 1902.

“Crop at Whitemouth.” Manitoba Free Press, May 25, 1903.

“C.P.R. Survey Party Have Finished Work.” Manitoba Free Press, February 20, 1905.

“$125,000 Loss to McArthur Plant.” Winnipeg Tribune, October 2, 1914.

“Millions of Feet of Lumber Destroyed.” Brandon Daily Sun (Brandon, MB), October 8, 1914.