Rugged Beauty: Along the Waters of Pointe du Bois and Slave Falls

May 15, 2024

Click on any of the images below to enlarge.

Special thanks to the Lac du Bonnet & District Historical Society, the Manitoba Electrical Museum & Education Centre, the Western Canada Pictorial Index, Library & Archives Canada and the US Library of Congress for the use their photographs.

A remote thirty-five mile stretch of the Winnipeg River near the Ontario border, along the Whiteshell Provincial Park’s northern boundary, contains some of southeastern Manitoba’s last true wilderness. Relatively untouched by the ravages of modern development, a journey along the river here is like travelling back in time.

For generations, Indigenous peoples moved through the area, following the seasons and wild game. Archaeological sites near Pointe du Bois and Slave Falls, belonging to the Laurel Culture that existed prior to the known tribes, were radiocarbon dated to 500 BCE, or 2,500 years ago. The Cree inhabited the region by the 1300s, and called the river Win-nipi, “murky water.”

At the time of La Verendrye’s discovery of the river in 1733, the vast Rupert’s Land territory had been under Hudson Bay Company (HBC) control for over sixty years. In early spring, Jean Baptise La Verendrye and his cousin, La Jemerais, left Lake of the Woods and travelled along the Winnipeg River until stopped by ice at La Barriere aux Esturgeons, a place where the Cree had barricaded a narrowing of the river to catch sturgeon. They stayed with the Cree a while before returning to Lake of the Woods.

The next year, other members of the La Verendrye expedition journeyed down the Winnipeg River to the south basin of Lake Winnipeg and the Red River. The Cree had been trading with the English and were willing to trade with the French, provided they had a steady supply of muskets, tobacco and pots. Fort Maurepas was built at the mouth of the Winnipeg River (and later moved to the Red River) to facilitate trading opportunities.

The canoe brigades of the North West Company (NWC), founded in 1779, frequently travelled the Winnipeg River. An intense rivalry existed between the HBC and the NWC. Competition between the French-Canadian voyageur, Highland Scot and Métis traders resulted in numerous skirmishes, especially when both companies built trading posts along the Winnipeg River, at Fort Alexander (Sagkeeng), Lac du Bonnet and thirteen miles east of Pointe du Bois at Eaglenest. By the 1780s, the Ojibwe had moved from the Great Lakes, displacing the Cree further north and west.

The journals of fur traders and explorers Alexander Mackenzie and Alexander Henry the Younger were among the first to document the Winnipeg River as they passed through the region in 1789 and 1799, respectively. Their descriptions are limited to navigational details, as their objectives were further inland.

In 1821, in an effort to resolve inland conflicts, the HBC and NWC merged, combining the HBC’s privileges with the proficiency of the Nor ’Westers.

It was clear to both companies that representatives would have to explain the new arrangements to the wintering partners at the posts at Fort William, along the Winnipeg River, and throughout the interior. Nicholas Garry, deputy governor of the HBC, left London, England in March 1821 accompanied by Angus Bethune, of the NWC. The party reached the Winnipeg River by August.

Nicholas Garry was the first to provide vivid depictions of the river’s scenery in his journal. The Winnipeg River was described as a chain of lakes, connected by narrow channels with rapids. In most sections, the riverbanks were low, often edged with flat rocks, and covered with varied underbrush. High rock ridges, upwards of 1,000 feet, were also common along this section of river.

As a result of the merger, the use of the Winnipeg River as a trade route sharply declined. Explorers on scientific expeditions became the primary users of the river as they passed through to various places. Even Sir John Franklin, on his second expedition to the Arctic, travelled the Winnipeg and Saskatchewan Rivers to connect with the Mackenzie River. Decades later, the painter, Paul Kane, found the mosquitoes and blackflies “annoying all night,” completely depriving him of sleep.

**

The Chute de Jacques (Lamprey Falls), named for a voyageur who perished while attempting to run the rapid, were considered one of the most dangerous on the river and travellers always approached with “great caution.” The river above the falls was shallow with a swift current. A semicircular rock ridge, one mile long, forced the river to turn south. A rock ledge created a violent, “foaming torrent” about twelve feet high, passing over three steps of about four feet each. Nicholas Garry called the falls “one of the grandest he had seen” and, for a moment, the view outweighed the danger.

In two hours, travellers arrived at Pointe du Bois, where two falls, the Grande and Petit, were “exceedingly beautiful” and produced large amounts of white foam that was carried some distance downstream. The Ojibwe name was Ka-mash-aw-aw-sing, meaning “the Two Carrying Places.” Geologist and naturalist, Henry Youle Hind, considered Pointe du Bois a “romantic break in the river.” While an American expedition thought the beauty was second only to Slave Falls. The expedition’s artist, Samuel Seymour, captured the picturesque scene, though he lamented that the rocky shoreline prevented a complete view of both falls.

The two portages, separated by a two minute paddle, passed through a “fertile oasis sustaining oak, ash” and birch. Hind remarked that the early morning air was filled with the “delicious fragrance” of “a great variety of sweet scented flowering plants,” including rosebushes and honeysuckle. Along these portages, in 1799, Alexander Henry’s NWC men overtook twenty-four canoes, all heading in opposite directions.

Rocher Brule (Eight Foot Falls), meaning “burnt rock,” was reached after five minutes. Voyageurs portaged over the rugged rock, carrying canoes and packs across their shoulders with apparent ease. Nicholas Garry thought that the small rapid “would be very fine” if it were “surrounded by less interesting neighbours.”

After half an hour, travellers reached Chute à l’Esclave (Slave Falls), considered the highest and prettiest of the entire Winnipeg River. The Ojibwe name, Awakane Pawetik (Slave Falls), recalls the story of a Sioux slave (in most versions, a woman) who fled her Ojibwe captors and went down the falls in a canoe, ending her enslavement. High rock ridges forced the river through a narrow slot, creating an upper cascade with rapids below. The longest portage on the Winnipeg River, at about 600 yards, passed through a forested point alongside the falls.

Bishop David Anderson, enroute to Islington Mission, viewed Slave Falls “from a nearer point, through a tangled wilderness of roses, wild peas, raspberries, and strawberries.” He also noted orange tiger lilies, columbine and other wildflowers along many portage paths.

Nicholas Garry’s party stopped to dine “at the foot of this magnificent fall.” He stated: “Our dinner table was a hard rock, no table cloth could be cleaner, and the surrounding plants and beautiful flowers sweeten” the meal. “Before us, the waterfall, wild, romantic, bold.” A view with “whirlpools, foam, loud noise and crystal whiteness, beautifully contrasted with the black pine” and “softened by the freshness and rich foliage of the ash, maple, elm, red willow” and occasional oak. A bald eagle hovered over the party, adding to the “wildness of the scene.”

**

In 1823, an American scientific expedition, undertaken with the approval of the War Department, was led by Major Stephen Long of the United States Topographical Engineers (a branch of the US Army) and was comprised of, among others, topographers (map makers), an astronomer, zoologist and botanist. William Keating, a geologist, complied the expedition’s journals into two large volumes with numerous scientific appendices.

The expedition left Philadelphia and travelled along the bottom of the Great Lakes to reach Pembina (North Dakota) to establish the location of the 49^th parallel. The party then journeyed up the Red River, to the Red River Settlement, where they procured supplies and guides. They left in mid-August with a party of twenty-nine, including an Ojibwe interpreter, a pilot, five French-Canadian and four Métis canoe men, and the Americans’ black slave, Andrew Allison, in three birch bark “canot du nord” (large voyageur canoes) bound for the Winnipeg River. They reached Slave Falls in seven days.

These scientists observed that the most common tree along the banks of the river was the aspen, “distinguished by the silvery white of its bark, and by its leaves lightly quivering at every breath of air.” A “dense and almost impenetrable undergrowth” was “interspersed with bushes loaded with plums,” chokecherries, bush cranberries and raspberries. Juniper, tamarack and birch became more abundant above Jacques Falls (Lamprey). The spruce here produced the best pitch for repairing canoes.

Upon reaching Lake of the Woods, the Americans made powerful observations about the Winnipeg River region. The fur trade had “left the land totally destitute.” On the entire river, the expedition saw minimal “signs of animals.” They heard from their guides that large game, either a “solitary moose, caribou or bear”, was found occasionally and that small animals, beaver, otter and other fur bearers, were “almost hunted out of the country.” The landscape of the upper half of the Winnipeg River was “exceedingly rugged and barren” with limited “means of subsistence.”

Fish were abundant, and were often “observed leaping out of the water.” Eagles and hawks fished near rapids. Wild rice also appeared to be an “inexhaustible” resource, though the Ojibwe were “frequently in great want.” The expedition had passed half-starved Ojibwe families fishing from canoes or at the base of rapids and harvesting wild rice.

Henry Hind observed “the poles of numerous wigwams” along the shores of “Grand Turn Lake” (a wide bend in the river just beyond Portage de L’Ilse (Boundary Falls)), and below Jacques Falls (Lamprey), near the “extensive rice grounds [that] cover many thousand acres and continue for miles on either bank.” Years before, these dwellings had been “visible at a great distance” when the bark coverings reflected the sun.

**

The last canoe brigade to travel the Winnipeg River was the Wolseley military expedition in 1870. The Hudson Bay Company had transferred its Rupert’s Land territory to the British Crown in November 1869, though Louis Riel’s resistance at Red River delayed further proceedings. In an attempt to appease Riel’s provisional government, Manitoba became Canada’s fifth province on May 12, 1870.  Colonel Garnet Wolseley was dispatched to Red River.

Canadian railways had only reached the eastern edge of the Great Lakes, and the use of American rail lines to North Dakota was denied. Under the command of Colonel Wolseley: 2,000 men, Iroquois guides, voyageurs, workmen, British soldiers and militiamen from Ontario and Quebec, travelled from Toronto to the Red River in three months, hauling all their supplies and weaponry. The transfer of Rupert’s Land to Canada was finalized midway through their journey.

Wolseley stated that “the journey down the Winnipeg River can never be forgotten once made,” and that “no length of time, nor any amount of future adventures, can erase from the writer’s mind his arrival at the Slave Falls.” For a brief moment as he approached the falls in a birch bark canoe, Wolseley feared the Iroquois guides were about to run the rapids, and that “everything was over for us in this world,” but the shore was reached without incident.

The expedition had reached Slave Falls in the evening. Captain Huyshe called it “one of the most beautiful bits on the river.” After portaging around a “jutting ledge of rock” above the falls, they camped for the night on a “level rocky plateau, almost overlooking the falls, and in the midst of such scenery,” impossible to describe.

**

The Canadian Pacific Railway reached Winnipeg in 1883, and with it came new people and an expanding provincial economy. Such progress was powered by electricity. The Winnipeg Electric Railway Company’s generating station on the Pinawa Channel, the first to be built in Manitoba, was operational in June 1906. At the same time, the City of Winnipeg council established the City Light and Power (City Hydro) public utility and moved ahead with plans to construct a city-owned generating station. Alderman (Councillor) John Cockburn had reserved the site of Pointe du Bois on the City’s behalf and, once a consensus was reached, relinquished the development rights to the City.

By February 1906, survey crews were travelling through the area, determining the best route between Lac du Bonnet and Pointe du Bois. Two months later, Cecil B. Smith, the City’s engineer, made an initial report to council and considered the two falls of Pointe du Bois, combined with Lamprey Falls, the best of “any falls examined” for power generation.

Between 1907 and 1908, a twenty-six mile tramway was built between Lac du Bonnet and Pointe. Portions were cleared by crews from Lac du Bonnet. The line passed through varied country of rock ridges, either built around or blasted, creeks and muskeg swamps. The Winnipeg River bridge, near Lac du Bonnet, was finished by May 1908, and a month later, the bridge over the Pinawa Channel (Lee River) was installed. The railway reached Pointe in late September. Engineers had already cleared the generating station site and construction materials were soon arriving from Lac du Bonnet.

Trees were cut down, and the soil was removed to expose solid granite. Steam drills and dynamite cleared a canal, 1,500 feet long, through the once-wooded point to divert water to the site of the generating station. A derrick (similar to a crane) moved the broken rocks to a steam-powered crusher. Some of the excavated rock was mixed in the concrete for the powerhouse.

Built on solid granite near the base of the second falls to utilize a natural twenty-six foot drop, the powerhouse was located partially in the water, and, in order to excavate an additional six feet for the turbines, divers had to custom fit lumber planks to the “irregular bottom” to ensure the coffer dam didn’t leak during construction.

A rock dam was built on either side of an island at the top of the first falls to block the original channel and raise water levels by fifteen feet. The high, rocky banks above Pointe limited the spread of the flood, though a seven square mile reservoir was formed. Lamprey Falls was drowned out, as were the thousands of acres of wild rice grounds.

In mid-1909, Winnipeg’s mayor, the Board of Control members, eight aldermen and several prominent citizens travelled to Pointe du Bois to inspect the construction site. Upon arrival at the train terminal, the group was greeted with “the roar” of simultaneous dynamite blasts. Once the noise faded away, all that could be heard was the “rolling of the rapids.”

A crew of 250 men and seventeen horse teams worked in shifts during the day and by lantern light at night. Near the worksite, the engineers’ offices were housed in the same log building as the store and post office. The engineers’ house, the only one built of sawn lumber, had an “upper verandah” and a telephone. Workers were accommodated in numerous log buildings, and those with families were provided separate lodgings. A small log school was built for the children.

Construction progressed for two years, stopping only once in July 1911 after a smallpox epidemic began at the worksite. Provincial health officers quarantined the workers at Pointe du Bois, in an attempt to stop the spread, and the CPR was ordered to suspend passenger service for the Lac du Bonnet area.

In September 1911, as the work drew to a close, the Winnipeg mayor came to inspect the site, accompanied by other officials and members of the British press. Powerhouse construction was finished. “One small ridge of rock” was all that kept water from entering the canal, and water, in excess of two feet, flowed over the spillway. Most equipment was gone. The majority of the log buildings had been dismantled, the logs either burned or “floated out into the river.” Any remaining trees around the powerhouse were also gone, victims of a recent “cyclonic storm” that left them in a bent and twisted mess. From the powerhouse roof, the visitors had a “most impressive view of the whole river.” Transmission line cables were strung directly below, awaiting power.

Within a month, the bunkhouse and store had been purchased by the City for storage facilities. The school had closed. The remaining log buildings were burned. Permanent buildings for operating staff were under construction, as was a garden. Plans were made for roadways and seeded lawns to “beautify” the area.

Pointe du Bois, the first generating station on the Winnipeg River and the first built by City Hydro, delivered its first power to Winnipeg on October 15, 1911. A seventy-seven mile transmission line carried the power past Lac du Bonnet, through Winnipeg’s East Kildonan neighbourhood, over the Red River to the Rover Avenue Electric Terminal in Point Douglas. By December, 4,000 Winnipeg homes had been connected to the City Hydro system. Crews were completing an average of 150 hydro hookups per day. Throughout the next fifteen years, more generators were added to increase Pointe’s power capacity.

**

Slave Falls was Winnipeg’s reserve site. Preliminary surveys had been completed in 1921 and by May 1923, Manitoba’s premier and Winnipeg’s mayor had toured their future investment.

They left Pointe in “a half dozen motorboats and canoes” to travel a “fine stretch of river” and “tramped” through an “extraordinarily beautiful” pine-scented forest to reach the future site of the generating station, about one mile downstream from the top of the falls. They left with a “feeling of great enthusiasm” and consideration was even given to moving the Pointe du Bois townsite to Slave Falls, as the area was “more favourable” for a community.

“The river is entering a new and mightier stage,” a Tribune reporter remarked. “The French and British explorers have gone, the river has not seen a soldier on active service for over fifty years. In their place have come the surveyor, the engineer, the financier, the industrialist [and] the water power expert.”

Work on the Slave Falls generating station progressed slowly. A rough line had been cut for a seven mile tramway extension from Pointe in 1925. Actual clearing began in late 1927. Frank Waters, of Lac du Bonnet, constructed the track bed, and local Pointe men completed the rock excavation, grading and ditching work.

Alterations were also made at Eight Foot Falls. Throughout 1927, dynamite was used to make a “rock cut” to “widen and deepen the channel” so water could flow faster. “Rock filled stop log cribs” were also installed. The work continued through 1928 and, in March 1930, high explosives were used to “clear away a small island in the center of the river.”

The tramway to Slave Falls was finished in late December 1928 and generating station construction began by mid-1929. Built on either side of a granite island, “most conveniently mid-stream,” the generating station was designed to utilize the natural river channels to generate power, rather than rely on reservoirs. The powerhouse was built downstream of the falls so a 30 foot head of water could be acquired. The natural Slave Falls and Eight Foot Falls were flooded over.

By mid-1930, the “roar of stone crushers”, “blast of dynamite” and “rattle of hammers” echoed through the “beautiful valley of the Winnipeg River.” 800 men worked seven days a week, by day and at night, beneath “powerful searchlights.” Rough lumber was brought in from Pointe. A planing mill and foundry were set up near the construction site. Additional rock for the concrete mix was excavated from high granite riverbanks just north of the natural falls.

Transmission lines were also cleared, and the timber was either used for corduroy roads or piled and burned. A six mile transmission line from Pointe enabled both generating stations to supply power to either line, reducing the chance of Winnipeg losing power.

By October 1930, a power shortage was looming. City Hydro and the Winnipeg Electric Railway Company urged people across the province to limit their electricity use.

By early 1931, construction of the Slave Falls generating station was reaching the finishing stages. At its peak, the site employed 2,000 men as general labourers, steel workers, lumbermen, bricklayers, etc. 1,000 men worked on the transmission line alone.

On September 1, 1931, Winnipeg’s mayor flipped the switch, sending the first power along a nearly 100 mile transmission line past Whitemouth and into Winnipeg’s St. Vital area. More generators were added throughout the next seventeen years.

**

Pointe du Bois, Manitoba’s oldest generating station, still in operation after 112 years, endures alongside a townsite being reclaimed by nature. Downstream, the 92 year old Slave Falls generating station stands alone amongst the wilderness. Today, in the quiet stillness of early morning, one can sit on the Pointe shoreline and look across the river to a wild, rugged beauty. Unchanged. A witness to the passage of time. In the gentle lap of water, listen for the whisper of the Indigenous canoes and voyageur paddles…

References:

Journals and Books

Anderson, David. The Net in the Bay or The Journal of a Visit to Moose and Albany (London, UK: Hatchards, Piccadilly, 1873), 15.
https://archive.org/details/cihm_01151/mode/2up

Combet, Denis, ed., In Search of the Western Sea: Selected Journals of La Verendrye (Winnipeg: Great Plains Publications, 2001), 41, 49, 65, 173, 175.

Coues, Elliott, ed., The manuscript journals of Alexander Henry, fur trader of the Northwest Company, and of David Thompson, official geographer and explorer of the same company 1799-1814. Volume I (New York, Francis P. Harper, 1897), 28-31. https://dx.doi.org/10.14288/1.0363301

Dawson, S.J. and Henry Youle Hind, Papers Relative to the Exploration of the Country between Lake Superior and the Red River Settlement (London, UK: G.E Eyre and W. Spottiswoode, 1859), 35.
https://www.canadiana.ca/view/oocihm.88996

Franklin, John. Narrative of a Second Expedition to the Shores of the Polar Sea in the years 1825, 1826 and 1827 (London, UK: John Murray, Albemarle Street, 1828), xx. https://archive.org/details/cihm_35179/page/n5/mode/2up

Garry, Nicholas. Diary of Nicholas Garry, Deputy-Governor of the Hudson’s Bay Company from 1822-1835: a detailed narrative of his travels in the Northwest Territories of British North America in 1821 (n.p., 1900?), 129-31.
https://www.canadiana.ca/view/oocihm.06955

Hind, Henry Youle. Narrative of the Canadian Red River Exploring Expedition of 1857 and of the Assiniboine and Saskatchewan Exploring Expedition of 1858 (London, UK: Longman, Green, Longman and Roberts, 1860), 115-116.
https://www.canadiana.ca/view/oocihm.35699

Huyshe, G.L. The Red River Expedition (London, UK: MacMillan and Co., 1871), 181-82.  https://www.canadiana.ca/view/oocihm.30287

Kane, Paul. Wanderings of an Artist among the Indians of North America (London, UK: Longman, Brown, Green, Longman and Roberts, 1859), 65-66. https://archive.org/details/wanderingsanart00kanegoog/mode/2up

Keating, William, Stephen H. Long, et al., Narrative of an expedition to the source of St. Peter’s River, Lake Winnepeck, Lake of the Woods, performed in the year1823. Volume II (Philadelphia, H. C. Carey & I. Lea, 1824), 76, 89, 95-102, 152-53, 160, 232-34. https://www.loc.gov/item/rc01001607/

Lacey, Peter. Tramway to the Point: The Winnipeg Hydro Tramway 1907-1996 (Altona, MB: Friesen Printing, 1996), 15-17, 19, 26, 33-34.

Mackenzie, Alexander. Voyages from Montreal through the Continent of North America to the Frozen and Pacific Oceans in 1789 and 1793 (New York: A.S. Barnes and Company, 1903), xcviii.
https://archive.org/details/voyagesfrommont03mackgoog/mode/2up

Morse, Eric W. Fur Trade Canoe Routes of Canada: Then and Now (Ottawa: Queen’s Printer, 1969), 90.  
http://parkscanadahistory.com/publications/fur-trade-canoe-routes.pdf

Oder, Aileen, ed., Logs and Lines from the Winnipeg River: A History of the Lac du Bonnet Area (Steinbach, MB: Derksen Printers, 1980), 252.

Steinbring, Jack. “The Prehistory.” In Trails to Rails to Highways, Bob Porth and Craig Mackenzie, eds., (Winnipeg, Manitoba: Total Printing and Reproduction Service, 1979), 33-34.

Wolseley, Garnet J. Narrative of the Red River Expedition (New York: White and Allen, 1871), 306-11.
https://www.canadiana.ca/view/oocihm.18308

Online Resources

Archives of Manitoba. Hudson’s Bay Company, Eagle Nest. (Records Listing) http://pam.minisisinc.com/scripts/mwimain.dll/144/PAM_AUTHORITY/AUTH_DESC_DET_REP/SISN%201273?sessionsearch

Beal, Bob. “Red River Expedition.” The Canadian Encyclopedia. Historica Canada. Article published February 7, 2006; Last Edited June 22, 2015. https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/red-river-expedition

Brown, Jennifer S.H. “North West Company.” The Canadian Encyclopedia. Historica Canada. Article published June 6, 2007; Last Edited March 4, 2015. https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/north-west-company

Foster, John E. and William John Eccles. “Fur Trade in Canada.” The Canadian Encyclopedia. Historica Canada. Article published July 23, 2013; Last Edited November 1, 2019. https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/fur-trade

Goldsborough, Gordon. “Historic Sites of Manitoba: Pointe du Bois Generating Station.” Manitoba Historical Society. Article revised September 4, 2022. http://www.mhs.mb.ca/docs/sites/pointeduboisturbine.shtml

_____. “Historic Sites of Manitoba: Slave Falls Generating Station.” Manitoba Historical Society. Article revised March 21, 2020. http://www.mhs.mb.ca/docs/sites/slavefallsgeneratingstation.shtml

Kramer, Nathan. “Historic Sites of Manitoba: Rover Avenue Electric Terminal.” Manitoba Historical Society. Article revised December 13, 2020. http://www.mhs.mb.ca/docs/sites/roverelectricterminal.shtml

Manitoba Hydro. “A History of Electric Power in Manitoba.” 9, 15. https://www.hydro.mb.ca/corporate/history/history_of_electric_power_book.pdf

­­_____. “A legend on the Winnipeg River: Slave Falls Generating Station.” https://www.manitobahydropower.com/news/legend-on-wpg-river-slave-falls-gs/

“Manitoba Hydro System Map.” Item Created May 5, 2021. https://www.arcgis.com/home/item.html?id=c1eb6739bc494b7da06af6a82084c70e

Marsh, James H. “Winnipeg River.” The Canadian Encyclopedia. Historica Canada. Article published October 1, 2009; Last Edited October 31, 2014. https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/winnipeg-river

McIntosh, Andrew and Shirlee Anne Smith. “Rupert’s Land.” The Canadian Encyclopedia. Historica Canada. Article published February 7, 2006; Last Edited August 18, 2022. https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/ruperts-land

Peers, Laura. “The Ojibwa, Red River and the Forks, 1770-1870.” Manitoba Historical Society. Article revised December 18, 2011.  http://www.mhs.mb.ca/docs/forkssevenoaks/ojibwa.shtml

Ray, Arthur J. “Hudson’s Bay Company.” The Canadian Encyclopedia. Historica Canada. Article published April 2, 2009; Last Edited June 10, 2022. www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/hudsons-bay-company

Rea, J.E. and Jeff Scott. “Manitoba Act.” The Canadian Encyclopedia. Historica Canada. Article published February 7, 2006; Last Edited January 7, 2021. https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/manitoba-act

Newspaper Articles

“Surveying the Power Sites.” Winnipeg Tribune, February 16, 1906.

“Municipal Water Power.” Winnipeg Tribune, April 12, 1906.

“Estimates Re Power Plant.” Winnipeg Tribune, May 4, 1906.

“To Excavate in September.” Winnipeg Tribune, August 18, 1908.

“Report of Progress on Power Plant.” Winnipeg Tribune, March 5, 1909.

“City Representatives Visit Power Site at Point du Bois.” Manitoba Free Press, June 19, 1909.

“Smallpox Epidemic East of Winnipeg.” Manitoba Free Press, July 8, 1911.

“Another Visit to Point du Bois.” Manitoba Free Press, September 4, 1911.

“Will Beautify the City Power Plant.” Manitoba Free Press, October 7, 1911.

“Big Demand for Civic Lighting.” Manitoba Free Press, December 1, 1911.

“Enormous Water Power of Winnipeg River…” Winnipeg Tribune, October 28, 1916.

“Slave Falls Site…Reserved by Federal Employees.” Manitoba Free Press, August 20, 1921.

“Develop Civic Power Site at Slave Falls.” Manitoba Free Press, October 18, 1921.

“Water Power Possibilities Not Realized.” Winnipeg Tribune, May 21, 1923.

“At the City Hall.” Winnipeg Tribune, July 25, 1925.

“Shoot Big Blast.” Manitoba Free Press, August 11, 1927.

“Big Dynamite Shot Set off at Falls.” Manitoba Free Press, October 14, 1927.

“Committee Approves Start of Slave Falls Development.” Manitoba Free Press, November 10, 1927.

“Wages for Linemen and Splicers Debated.” Manitoba Free Press, December 6, 1927.

“Business Men Inspect City Hydro Plant.” Manitoba Free Press, May 8, 1928.

“Glassco to Ask for Twenty More Men at Power Site.” Manitoba Free Press, February 18, 1929.

“Four Western Power Projects Advance Vigorously.” Manitoba Free Press, January 9, 1930.

“Good Progress Being Made at Slave Falls.” Manitoba Free Press, March 17, 1930.

“Carving a Road through Forest” Manitoba Free Press, March 31, 1930.

“Work at Slave Falls Making Good Progress.” Manitoba Free Press, June 9, 1930.

“What Hydro Power Means to Manitoba.” Manitoba Free Press, July 15, 1930.

“Power Shortage Threatens Winnipeg and Manitoba.” Manitoba Free Press, October 10, 1930.

“Power Plant Uses Many Materials.” Manitoba Free Press, September 1, 1931.

“Winnipeg’s $5,500,000 Hydro-Electric Plant.” Manitoba Free Press, September 2, 1931.

Photographs and Maps

Lac du Bonnet District Museum Archives. “W.D. Halliday foreman, on Pointe du Bois rail track construction: Credit Jack Halliday.” Photograph. 1907.

Manitoba Electrical Museum & Education Centre Collection. “Engineers Residence.” Photograph. 1909. Accession Number 24209.

____. “[Canal Excavations].” Photograph. 1909. Accession Number 27449.

____. “Students and Staff in front of local school.” Photograph. Circa 1910. Accession Number 24027.

____. “#6 Log Cabins.” Photograph. 1909. Accession Number 27516.

____. “Aerial view of Pointe du Bois power plant, sluice ways and Winnipeg River.” Photograph. Circa 1920s. Accession Number 27809. 

____. “West end of initial portion of Powerhouse, from Intake deck.” Photograph. September 4, 1911. Accession Number 24017.

____. “[Standing by Slave Falls].” Photograph. No date. Accession Number 26333.

____. “[Construction of Slave Falls Generating Station].” Photograph. No date. Accession Number 26351.

Manitoba Forest Service. “Nature’s Playground in Eastern Manitoba: Whiteshell Area.” Map. Circa 1958.

Napier, William Henry Edward, artist. “[Untitled: (Rapids with Indian Camp in the Foreground)].” Watercolour. From Library and Archives Canada: William Henry Edward Napier fonds, accession number 1948-115-1.
http://central.bac-lac.gc.ca/.redirect?app=fonandcol&id=2836227&lang=eng

Special Note: I compared this Untitled image with Napier’s watercolour titled “Slave Falls, August 29, 1857” and found the images to be identical in terms of location.
Library and Archives Canada: William Henry Edward Napier fonds, accession number 1948-110-1
http://central.bac-lac.gc.ca/.redirect?app=fonandcol&id=2877354&lang=eng

Seymour, Samuel, designer. J. Hill, engraver. “Upper Falls of Winnipeg River.” Book Plate. Philadelphia: H.C. Carey & I. Lea, 1824. From Library of Congress: General Collections and Rare Book and Special Collections Division.
https://www.loc.gov/item/rc01001607/

Western Canada Pictorial Index. “Tramway Terminal.” Photograph. From City of Winnipeg Hydro Collection, image number 7733, contact sheet A0242.

_____. “Store House in Pointe du Bois, MB.” Photograph. From City of Winnipeg Hydro Collection, image number 59176, contact sheet A1816.