HUDSON BAY

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 1, Issue 85, 1 December 1931, Page 2

HUDSON BAY

A VAST LAND \ REGULAR SHIPMENTS OF \ * WHEAT NOW BjSING MADE. OLD DREAM COME TRUE. YANCOUl^R. When two vess.els, one from Liverpool, the other from Montreal, loaded the first wheat to go to England tbro.ugh Hudson Bay, a dream of over 300 years was realised with regular shipments in and out of Hudson Bay. Strange as it may sound, in the first .century of its existence there was more shipping coming and going by this route than in tbe last. And over that century hangs the aura of romance and glajnour that is associated with the early history of Canada. William Hudson the English explorer, sailed into the bay called after him in l709. His crew abandoned him to his fate. Ten y.ears later Jens Munk, a Danish navigator, went to rescne him. Munck had two ships, 'manned by 65 men. He wintered at York Factory, now Churchill, the Government port of Hudson Bay. All his men but two died of scurvy. Munck and the two suryivors worked one , vessel back to Copenhagen after scuttling the other. The Indians called ' the place "The River of Strangers." The Hudson's Bay Company erected the fort in 1715. It is still standing as evidence of the construction ab'ility of Joseph Robinson, who built it to the order that it must he the strongest fort in North America. Its walls are 30ft thick. Its oue military adventure was an ignominious surrender by the Governor, Samuel Hearne, to the French Admiral Le Perouse, without the firing of a shot, as Hearne was cut off from his ammunition supply, which was on the other side of the lake. Great Mineral Belt. > Hearne was an appointee of the earlier Governor, Moses Norton, who had dispatched him to the Far North to test the truth of statements made by Indians about the rich minerals of that territory. Hearne travelled .over the Barren Lands to the Coppermine River, and was the first white man to stand on the shores of the Arctic Ocean. Thus was discovered the PreCambrian Shield, the world's great- , cst mineral belt, which is only now being opened up by aerial survey. Norton hanged a man named Kelly for stealing a goose. One of the many artists of the day, whose rock carvings are still plainly visible, depicted Kelly on the gallows, his mouth gaping horribly. Iron ring bolts in the rocky shore carry inscriptions that they moored the vessels Furnace and Discovery, navigated by Captain William Moore and Captain Middleton, who wintered there is 1741 while searehing for the North- west Pas- j sage. | The first seed for the Canadian f! Prairie came in by Hudson Bay, and |i the first settlers for the Prairie ar- jj rived at Red River (Winnipeg) by ] the Bay route. In a century, 750 ] vessels cleared in and out of Hudson jj Bay with but two accidents — a reeord [■ that would do credit to the St. Law- i rence during the present year. I Never before did railroad builders \ have to contend with the conditions 1 that faced the construction gangs at | the northern end of Hudson Bay line. i They fought Arctic blizzards in win- ' ter, mosquitos and flies in summer, jj They waded in swamp and mud up to their knees day after day, and dug | three miles of drainage ditches for \ overy mile of track. They had to j iay fifty miles of wooden duckwalks ; wer the muskeg to enable the engi- j aeers to transport their outfits. A 1 stretch of 150 miles was built to i vhieh there was no access for material j and machinery except over the road tself. Poles were laid herringbone xashion over the muskeg. A Peep Ahead. i For sheer desolation, the. country \ served by this last stretch of line has \ no equal. The crossing of the Barren | Lands by Hearne in 1770 was not re- | peated until the Tyrrel expedition of jj 1893. Interminable swamps, torn up, | covered with moss and mud, dotted | with water holes, a few deal sticks ! of timber. For long stretches there ( would be a hard foundation under | the spongy layer of moss on the sur- ? face, solid blue ice insulated by the I surfaee moss, melting only to a depth 1 of seven to ten inches in a warm f summer. This condition speaks well jj for the future road-bed of the rail- ^ way. If a ten-ineh layer of moss i will insulate the ground to such an- - ^ extent, a three-foot layer of gravel | dumped on top serves to insulate it | entirely ahd ensure a road-bed of 1 solid ice. i -jg Over this new Canadian empire | thousands of prospectors are criss- f crossing hy dog team and eanoe, pack- | sack and aeroplane. One mine already I working at Flin Flou has 6,000,000 | tons of ore blocked out. The rail- 2 road will send the trapper further ' | afieldi intp the harrens. The muskrat, ' | the beaver, and the mink will flee | ahead of them. The Indian and Es- 1 kimo, further endangered by ciyjli- , | sation, will lean more on a patrenal f Government. But the story of de- | elopment must proceed as Hudson , I Bay is ppened up to navigation. |