Friday, January 13, 2012
Tim Horton’s Camp Voyageur leader Myriam Lacerte invited Venetia Crawford and Barbara Haughton to tell the camp councillors about the ghost town, Pontiac Village which was originally located by the camp site. Pontiac Village developed at the foot of Chats Falls on the Ottawa River during the logging days. Log slides were built over the falls, steamships landed at the foot of the falls, a horse railway was built around the falls and there was an attempt to open a canal to bypass the falls.  That was called the Georgian Bay Canal – intended to open a passage for boats from Montreal to Georgian Bay on the Great Lakes ( a shorter route by about 300 miles than by St Lawrence). After hearing the stories, we explored the abandoned buildings and looked at the enormous rock cut, the beginning of the canal. We concluded by reading a play about the area The Pontiac Highway.
Brenda Everson has videoed this story on You Tube — Historian 1938 Chat Falls trailer -  47 seconds. Check it out.  She intends to do a longer video next summer.
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