Kanu Links

The Missinaibi Trip

November 6, 2000: The trip notes have been removed. I apologize to cause you this disappointment....

Notes: For a MissTrainCar_small.jpg (1577 bytes)picture of travelling up there, read the report at Hans Boldt family's website which describes a visit to Moosonee taken by train  (click the picture of the train car with the Cree writing on it);
for a trip done on the Mattagami River (that is the big river that joins the Missinaibi to form the Moose River), click here! ; and to see how a group of Chapleau Cree paddled it about 70 years ago; click right there!

 

From the Canadian Encyclopedia Plus Copyright © 1996 by McClelland & Stewart Inc.:

Moose Factory

Moose Factory, Ont, IR, located on an island in the Moose R, 24 km from JAMES BAY and opposite MOOSONEE. Founded (1672-73) by Charles Bayly, it was the HBC's second post and the first English settlement in what is now Ontario. Originally called Moose Fort, it was captured (1686) by the French in a daring overland attack led by de TROYES. It was returned to the HBC 1713 and trading activities resumed 1730. Among the restored buildings at this historic site is the blacksmith's shop (1740), likely the oldest wooden building in Ontario. The altar cloth and liturgical vestments at St Thomas's Anglican Church (1864) are of moosehide. The island is home to a CREE band.

Author: JAMES MARSH
Moosonee

Moosonee, Ont, TP, pop 1319 (1991c), 1213 (1986c), located on the Moose R, 25 km from JAMES BAY. The old fur-trade post, MOOSE FACTORY, lies on an island nearby. The site was chosen in 1931 as the northern terminus of the Ontario Northland Ry, which follows an old native canoe route along the Abitibi and Moose rivers; the railway was built in 1932. The name was derived from the CREE name for Moose River Factory, and was used in this spelling for an Anglican diocese founded 1872. Moosonee is Ontario's only saltwater port, but high hopes for its prosperity were never realized. Many of the local native population are employed as guides for the tourists and hunters who ride the “Polar Bear Express” from COCHRANE.

Author: JAMES MARSH
Moose River

Moose River, 80 km long, is formed by the confluence of the Mattagami and the Missinaibi rivers. About 55 km downstream, it is joined by the Abitibi R, then by the N French R, and flows NE to discharge into the bottom of JAMES BAY in northern Ontario. With its tributaries it drains most of the northeastern part of the province. Once well travelled by fur traders, the river valley today is the site of mining, pulp and paper, and hydroelectric developments. MOOSE FACTORY, Ontario's oldest trading post (est 1672-73), is located on an island in the river's mouth, opposite the mainland village of MOOSONEE, Ontario's only saltwater port. The Ontario Northland Railway links these settlements to the South.

Author: DANIEL FRANCIS

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