Portage du Fort
Portage du Fort is one of the oldest villages in the County of Pontiac. Located at the foot of rapids on the Ottawa River, it was originally a trading post. In 1847, Henry Osborne built a depot with a storehouse to supply the lumber industry further inland. Portage du Fort became the headquarters for the lumber industry.
St. James the Great Roman Catholic Church was built in 1850.
Portage du Fort became the county seat on September 19, 1855; Patrick Fox was the first mayor and warden. The council meetings were held at the stone school that had been build in 1840 and which was later used as the town jail.
Portage du Fort continued to flourish until 1914, when it was swept by fire, burning most of the wooden buildings. No one died in the fire and none of the three churches was destroyed, but after that, the village never regained its former glory. When the Canadian Northern Railway bypassed the village, this was another blow.
Elsie Gibbons was the first female warden, from 1959-1961.
Recently, the Dolomite Mine and paper products company Consolidated-Bathurst (now Smurfit-Stone) brought industry back to the struggling village. But the closing of the Dolomite Mine in October 2004 represents one more setback to a village that has struggled for most of the past century.
A Portage du Fort binder has been compiled, with clippings from The Equity and the Pontiac Journal, photographs, historical accounts, maps and interviews.