Special History:
The Environment and the Fur Trade Experience in
Voyageurs National Park, 1730-1870

Chapter Three
Material Culture (continued)

Transportation

Traders usually described the landscape of the Rainy Lake Region in terms of expeditiously traveling through it. They wanted to avoid getting lost in its maze of waterways, and they sought the least arduous routes, which generally meant the routes with the fewest and shortest portages. The Rainy Lake Region contained an uncommon amount of vertical relief, producing some exciting rapids and a sense of accomplishment after traversing it. On the westward journey, the traveler often experienced a remarkable acceleration of daily progress when he reached the big waters in present-day Voyageurs National Park, passing the length of Namakan and Rainy lakes in a day or two when it had taken him ten times that long to cover the distance from Lake Superior. At the west end of Rainy Lake the traveler usually enjoyed a short layover at one of the trading posts, followed by a more relaxing paddle down the broad, even current of the Rainy River to Lake of the Woods. These traveling experiences shaped how fur traders responded to the landscape. The traders noted fewer landmarks and named fewer places in the present-day national park than they did east of the park where the route posed more difficulties. Yet Rainy Lake itself was one of the most famous landmarks of the Canadian Northwest, and the Rainy River acquired a reputation as a river of uncommon beauty and tranquility.

The French named these features Lac La Pluie and Rivière Du Pluie for the mist spreading from the falls that were located a short distance below the outlet of the lake. La Vérendrye referred to Rainy Lake by an Indian name, Tecamamioüen, in a letter of 1730, but called it by the French name in 1748. Joseph La France gave an explanation of the French name in his account of 1740 (published by Arthur Dobbs in 1764), and while some argued that the lake was named for the weather, or was a corruption of René, its supposed French discoverer, most accepted the derivation given by La France. English-speaking fur traders usually referred to the lake by its familiar French name, or even by its initials, L.L.P., until about the 1830s (Figure 5).

Figure 5. Geographic Names of the Fur Trade Era.
(click on map for enlargement in a new window)

Many travel accounts describe the well-known lake. Jonathan Carver, a "pedler" and early visitor to the region, was one of the first to describe the outlines of Rainy Lake. He referred to a "Great Rainy Lake" and a "Little Rainy Lake" separated by an isthmus. He noted that the eastern arm of the lake was generally shallow, and he greatly overestimated its length at 300 miles. John J. Bigsby, a doctor and member of the Boundary Commission that traversed the Rainy Lake Region in 1823, referred to the "northeast horn" and "northwest horn" of Rainy Lake. The northeast horn, he wrote, was "remarkable for the pure, smooth, porcelain whiteness of its granite hills, which are often very high, and gleam through their scanty clothing of pine in a beautiful and singular manner, while the dark forests of cypress at their feet greatly heighten the general effect." Bigsby's account is unusually appreciative of wild nature; it reflects the Romanticism that affected literary circles in his times. A more typical response was that of the Hudson's Bay Company's Nicholas Garry, who wrote in his diary in 1821: "Rainy Lake is very uninteresting, low Banks and stunted Fir Trees. Indeed, all the Lakes we have passed since we left Fort William present little to gratify the Eye."

The falls below the outlet of Rainy Lake were perhaps the most renowned landmark in the region during the fur trade era. In characteristically prosaic fashion, Alexander Henry the Younger gave the name of the portage around the falls as "Chaudiere portage," (French for waterfall) and stated that it was about 200 paces. Bigsby noted the falls were in two stages separated by a "boisterous interval of 50 yards." He gave the height of the two stages as 10 feet and 20 feet. Adding to the fame of the falls, the Hudson's Bay Company fort stood on the north bank of the river only a few hundred yards downstream.

Its fame notwithstanding, naming of this landmark was inconsistent–just as it was for other landmarks in the Rainy Lake Region during the fur trade era. Some called it Kettle Falls, while others reserved that name for present-day Kettle Falls at the other end of Rainy Lake. Similarly, some called it by the French name Chaudiere Falls, while others applied that name to present-day Kettle Falls. Perhaps since naming was inconsistent, the waterfall was most often identified by its location rather than by name.

Present-day Kettle Falls was another landmark of the fur trade era. Roderick McKenzie described the falls as an important fishing place for Indians and European traders in 1819. John D. Cameron referred to Kettle Falls as a meeting place with the Ojibwe headman, Two Hearts, in 1825. The Reverend Peter Jacobs, passing through in 1852, noted that the Indians gathered at Kettle Falls during the whole summer, where they caught fish "in great numbers by scooping them up from the eddies and whirlpools in the rapids."

Various members of the Boundary Commission of 1823 used the name Kettle Falls for this landmark and described its distinctive appearance. Joseph Delafield, for example, stated that the falls was named for a hole worn in the rock at the side of the falls in the shape of a kettle. According to tradition, the excavation was the work of Indians, but Delafield noted that it was "plainly the work of a boulder set in motion by the rapids when they overflowed the spot." Stephen H. Long commented that they were viewing the falls in high water conditions. Many years later, a soldier of the Red River Expedition described the appearance of the falls in low water conditions:

Kettle Falls is scarcely entitled to the name when the water is so low as at present, though it no doubt deserves it in the spring, for a huge semi-circle in the rock on each side of the rapid presents a kettle-like appearance, in which the water doubtless boils as in a cauldron. In searching for a reason for the name of these falls, I discovered a hole in the rocks very like the inside of a kettle, perfectly smooth, and which would probably hold about five or six gallons.

Stephen H. Long described alternate routes taken by the voyageurs around this obstacle. In high water (the condition in which Long observed it), the voyageurs took the direct route between Rainy Lake and Namakan Lake (Bear River and New Portage). In low water, this route required a tedious portage so the voyageurs took the "Kettle Portage" around the falls. Although the latter followed the circuitous course of the main river (through Kettle Channel and Squirrel Narrows) it required only the one portage all the way to Namakan Lake and thus saved time and effort.

New Portage was the most important portage of the fur trade era in the vicinity of Voyageurs National Park. (It is located just outside the park in Ontario.) Today most of New Portage is submerged and appears on maps as a bay called Bear River. Sir Alexander Mackenzie may have been the first to describe it. In Voyages from Montreal, he detailed all the portages between Lake Superior and Rainy Lake, describing New Portage thus:

The discharge of the lake [Namakan] is from a bay on the left, and the portage one hundred and eighty paces, to which proceeds a very small river, from whence there is but a short distance to the next Nouvelle Portage, three hundred and twenty paces long. It is then necessary to embark on a swamp, or overflowed country, where wild rice grows in great abundance. There is a channel or small river in the centre of this swamp, which is kept with difficulty, and runs South and North one mile and a half, with deepening water. The course continues North-North-West one mile to the Chaudiere Portage, which is caused by the discharge of the waters running on the left of the road from Lake Naymaycan, which used to be the common route, but that which I have described is the fastest as well as shortest.

Descriptions of New Portage vary, owing to differences in water conditions from time to time. Most accounts refer to two portages separated by a swampy stretch. Lord Selkirk made the portage in June 1816 at a time of low water and reported having to walk through grass and rushes for about a mile, "dragging the canoes thro' soft mud." Nicholas Garry crossed New Portage in wetter conditions in 1821, and found this middle section not only navigable but rather pleasant, with "beautiful white water lilies, high grass, underwood and wild rice growing in the water." He recorded the first portage going westward as 400 paces and the second as about 300 paces. After both portages, his party still had to negotiate about two miles of swamp where the "mosquitoes were dreadful." Stephen H. Long, going eastward, entered a "small stream called New Portage River which proved very crooked." He described the intermediate swamp as about 700 yards long and abounding with wild rice. Similarly, S. J. Dawson described "a circuitous narrow river, without perceptible current, passing through a reedy expanse fringed with low willow for about 3 miles." Peter Jacobs, crossing the portage in the highest water he had ever seen, estimated the two portages were each a half-mile long and a half-mile apart. By 1870, the name New Portage was no longer in common use for this long-standing route; instead, the two portages were known as Turtle Portage and Bare (or Bear) Portage.

Additional portages became popular in later years as use of smaller canoes grew more common. Grassy Bay Portage provided a short cut between Sand Point and Namakan lakes. Lost Bay Portage extended from Saginaw Bay across the base of Soldier Point to Lost Bay. Gold Portage provided a route between Kabetogama Lake and Black Bay on Rainy Lake. Its name presumably derives from its use during the Rainy Lake gold rush in the late nineteenth century. No references to any of these routes were found in the fur traders' journals.

Namakan Lake was another landmark to the fur traders. Historian Elliott Coues, who researched many geographical place names for his edited volume, New Light on the Early History of the Greater Northwest (1897), gave this account of the lake's name: "Thompson calls this Lac le Mecan, as if it were French; McKenzie maps 'L. Micane'; but it is an Indian name, now rendered Namakan, Namekan, Namaukan, or Nameukan, referring to a place at a fall where the natives speared sturgeon."

Sand Point Lake was less well known than Namakan Lake. Considerably smaller, it was thought by some to form an arm of Namakan Lake and by others to form a single body of water with Crane Lake and Vermilion Lake. Moreover, if one took the northern route from Lake Superior that came down the Namakan River, then Sand Point Lake was bypassed. Still, the sandy point for which it was named became a recognizable landmark. Charles Whittlesey, a geologist who explored the country in 1848, commented on this feature in his journal. "In this region of bare rocks & boulders a sand beach is so seldom seen as to be a remarkable object & I suppose the lake just passed received its name from a Sandy Point on its eastern shore."

The fur traders left few permanent place names on all the islands, bays, and narrows across the whole expanse of Rainy Lake. When they identified specific landforms, such as an island chosen for a campsite, it was usually by reference to how many hours they had traveled since their last degrade. Even Brule Narrows, the place where Rainy Lake pinches to a width of a few hundred yards, creating strong currents, was known to the fur traders by the generic French name, Petit Detroit, or Little Narrows. Sometimes it was called simply the Detroit. Alexander Henry the Younger mentioned Petit Detroit in his journal of 1800. Hugh Faries passed another party going the opposite direction "at Detroit in LLP" in 1804. Joseph Delafield, surveying the international boundary in 1823, reported making camp on a rocky island at "a place called the Detroit."

More than a century after Delafield made his journey, members of another international boundary commission described an island in the middle of Brule Narrows as having "a lone tree used as a range mark by steamboat pilots." They identified this landmark as "Lone Tree Island," although the name does not appear on modern maps. It was a custom of the voyageurs to honor an important passenger by modifying such a conspicuous tree as this into a "lob stick." The men would lop off all of the tree's lower branches to create a tuft at the top, and would then carve the name of the passenger in the trunk. It is tempting to imagine that this lone tree was a "lob stick," but no solid evidence has been found that this tree was so modified by the voyageurs. There is a Lobstick Island in the Canadian waters of Rainy Lake, presumably named for such a tree. Local residents say that until the 1970s there was a lob stick in King Williams Narrows, which appeared on postcards.

The fur traders often referred to the eastern end of Rainy Lake by another generic French term, the Grand Traverse, or big crossing. Broader and with fewer islands than other parts of the lake, it presented voyageurs with the all too familiar choice of making a B-line across big water or taking a longer and safer route close to shore. In doubtful weather the decision could be a difficult one. Stephen H. Long estimated that the Grand Traverse was about 12 miles and "destitute of islands" for its whole length.

The fur traders' preference for plain, descriptive place names may have reached a peak with Portage des Morts, or Portage of the Dead. Located several miles east of Voyageurs National Park, it was so named for the number of men who had drowned trying to run the rapids rather than portage around them. Traveling through the area in 1821, Nicholas Garry recorded in his diary that he saw "numerous crosses or burial places."

Fur traders were prosaic and parsimonious in their use of place names probably because they traveled over such a huge expanse of terrain. Names such as New Portage and Little Narrows had the practical purpose of alerting travelers to shortcuts and hazards. Hardly unique to the Rainy Lake Region, these names were used over and over across the continent. By contrast, soldiers of the Red River Expedition, coming from a different work culture, were quick to bestow names on memorable geographic features as they moved through the region in 1870. Soldier Point on the south shore of Rainy Lake may come from this experience, although no evidence was found for it. Other place names appear not to have lasted. Sergeant John Emslie's unit camped one night on an island "in the center" of Namakan Lake and "christened it Canvas Island." It is not clear whether "in the center" referred to half the distance that the men traveled to New Portage, half the distance across Namakan Lake, or even half the distance across Namakan and Kabetogama lakes combined, since Kabetogama Lake was often considered part of Namakan Lake. In any case, the name did not survive. Another unit named a place on Namakan Lake "Sandy Beach."

The Hudson's Bay Company post journals for Rainy Lake House carry many references to geographic names, but most of the place names in circulation in the Rainy Lake Region during the fur trade were for points outside the national park: Lake of the Woods, Manitou Rapids (on the Rainy River), the River Seine (which flows into Rainy Lake from the north), Dry Berry Lake, White Fish Lake, Vermilion Lake, Lake La Croix, Basswood Lake, Portage de Jourdin (near Dog Lake), and Point des Meurons (nine miles west of Fort William), among others.

The fur traders sought to ease their way through this country by taking the paths of least resistance and giving names to such features as lakes, rivers, and portages so that they could remember the lay of the land. For the most part they used existing watercourses without making physical modifications of the landscape. Occasionally, however, they made improvements. They marked trees to show the way, cut vegetation out of the way, and set logs in the ground to help them get across boggy areas. Any recognized route could be called a "road" whether or not it was improved, but by the nineteenth century the term applied more often to something that the company maintained. Sometimes the term "made road" appeared.

Lord Selkirk took a keen interest in establishing such "roads." In 1817, when the Hudson's Bay Company was fighting the Nor'Westers for possession of the fort at Rainy Lake, Selkirk ordered trader Donald McPherson to "cut" a road from Rainy Lake to Grand Portage. The route, Selkirk indicated, should keep to the north of Lake La Croix and Lake Saganaga and "the old canoe track." He suggested that McPherson employ Indians, noting that Indians had already begun the job from Grand Portage to Lake Saganaga but that they were unfamiliar with the country past that point. Selkirk's specifications for the road are of interest. It was to consist of more than blazes on trees (or plaques as the voyageurs called them); it was to be a cleared path through the forest and undergrowth wide enough "to make an easy Snow Shoe tract."

The North West Company made its own road between Fort William and Rainy Lake. When Garry traversed it in 1821, he found recent repairs to several sections, including a point at Middle Portage where three logs were placed together, and another point at Savanne Portage where the road went through a swamp. At another place called French Portage, Garry found the road in a "ruinous rotten State."

Roderic McKenzie describes the origins of the Kaministiquia route After a long absence in the Indian territories, I paid this year a visit to Canada. Returning the following Spring, on my first trip from Grand Portage to Lac La Pluie, I met a family of Indians at the height of land from whom I accidentally learned the existence of a water communication a little way behind and parallel to this, extending from Lake Superior to Lake La Pluie, which is navigable for large canoes and, if adopted, would avoid the Grand Portage. This was excellent information; of course I immediately engaged one of the Indians to meet me at a certain point in Lac La Croix, to show me this new route but on my arrival, as appointed, the Indian was not there. However, being acquainted with the entrance of the route, I proceeded without him and reached post of the Company where I procured a guide who accompanied me to Caministiquia on Lake Superior, from whence I soon reached Grand Portage, being the first who reached there from Lac La Pluie direct by water communication. This apparently new route, being at the door of Grand Portage, and formerly used by the French, it is most astonishing that the North-West Company were not acquainted with it sooner. It may be right to observe here that, after the peace of 1783, the Commissioners appointed by the British and American Governments for settling the boundaries, decided that the Grand Portage was within the limits of American territories. In 1784, at the establishment of the North-West Company, the Directors, in consequence of the decision of the Commissioners, despatched an expedition to survey a water communication said to exist between Pays Plat, in Lake Superior through Nipigon to Portage de l'Isle in River Winipic, which after two months of hard labour, was reported impracticable, so that the North-West Company were left awkwardly situated, without one opening for their trade, until the present discovery. In the History of Canada, repeated mention is made of the establishment of Caministiquia, and it appears by vestiges and report that the French establishments were destroyed by fire. In the river of Caministiquia, at a short distance above the fort, there is a fall which, in my opinion, is little inferior in splendor to the Falls of Niagara. In consequence of this discovery, measures were adopted for the removal of the establishment of Grand Portage to Caministiquia, and in 1801, the necessary preparations having been made, Caministiquia became the head of the North-West Company for ever after. —Roderic McKenzie, "Reminiscences," in L. R. Masson, ed., Les Bourgeois de la Compagnie du Nord-Ouest, pp. 46-47

Hudson's Bay Company men seem to have made repairs to this road as a matter of course. In 1850, an officer named James Anderson led a brigade of six canoes from Fort William to Rainy Lake and back two times during the summer. On his second trip, Anderson noted in his journal that his men cut all the trees in the portages between French Portage and Fort William, including "immense pines" that lay across the portages. It is unclear whether they were cutting saplings and deadfall that had accumulated over a period of years or during an ordinary winter, or indeed, whether the "immense pines" had fallen recently in an unusual storm.

Dawson's road, surveyed in 1859 and finally completed in 1871, was somewhat more elaborate. When the military used it in 1870, they carried larger boats over the route than had ever been used in the fur trade. Henry Youle Hind, a geologist with the first Red River Expedition, noted that the old road of the North West Company needed to be "cleared, and tramways laid down, over which loaded boats may be hauled by appropriate tackle." Apparently the idea was to lay wooden rails end to end so that boats could be skidded along them. Much of the actual work of road construction was carried out in 1870 by the military force under General Wolseley. G. L. Huyshe, a member of the latter expedition, reported just such an arrangement at New Portage between Namakan and Rainy lakes. His detachment cut a path and laid "skids" across this section.

Park officials are aware of one case of historical graffiti, probably from the fur trade era. The inscription "HUGH" appears on the rock on the north side of Soldier Point. It is visible only during extreme low water conditions. Local residents have attributed the inscription to fur trader Hugh Faries.

Table of Contents | Introduction | Rainy Lake Region | Fur Trade Experience | Material Culture | Natural Environment | Bibliography