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Georgian Bay: A "Famous" Attraction |
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Present-day visitors to beautiful Georgian Bay may not realize that they are following in the footsteps of some very famous people who visited the bay in the early part of this century. In 1916, the great aviator, Orville Wright, came to Cognashene. Orville and his brother Wilbur had logged the world's first official flight in 1903. The brothers were adventurers who were very close and when Wilbur died of typhoid fever in 1912, Orville became very depressed.
At the suggestion of a friend, Orville decided to travel to Georgian Bay where he hoped to find peace and quiet that might lessen his mourning for Wilbur and act as a tonic for the poor health he was experiencing at that time.
Orville stayed at a cottage on Waubec Island but, while touring around with a neighbour, he noticed Lambert Island and became very attracted to it. The buildings were in poor shape and two years later, Orville made extensive renovations. The main cottage was located on a cliff and by adding a second story, Orville had an unobstructed view of the sky where he could indulge his love of astronomy. This room also afforded a magnificent view of Minnicognashene, Giant's Tomb and Hope Island.
Orville Wright was a cottager until 1941 when he was recalled to the U.S.A. where he was needed to consult on aeronautical matters as the country entered WWII. After several years of failing health, Orville died in 1948, and we can imagine, with regret, that he was never again able to visit his beloved island.
Orville Wright was a scientist but it is not surprising that other famous visitors to Georgian Bay were artists. Back in 1838, Winter Studies and Summer Rambles was published by Anna Brownell Jameson, a famous literary figure of her day and wife to the Vice Chancellor of Upper Canada. One wonders if the Group of Seven artists had the opportunity to read Mrs. Jameson's book, in which she describes, in great detail, the beauty and colour nuances of sunsets on the islands during her canoe trip down the bay to Penetanguishene.
A. Y. Jackson of the Group of Seven was very enthusiastic about the natural beauty to be found here, at all seasons of the year. In 1920, he travelled to Penetanguishene where he was weather-bound for a couple of days but when the weather cleared, he donned his snowshoes and walked over the frozen bay to Franceville, some 15 miles! In his notes he wrote that he went "in all directions and found so much material to paint that I used up all my panels and had to paint on the back of them." Probably the most dramatic painting of that trip is March Storm, Georgian Bay, 1920.
The Group of Seven has left us a rich and vibrant pictorial legacy of our bay and its 30,000 islands. |
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The Wrecks of Georgian Bay |
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Schooners, barges, tugs and freighters regularly plied the waters of the Great Lakes carrying cargo and passengers between ports. Many of these vessels met tragic endings on the rocks and shoals as they made their way to and from the bustling ports of Penetanguishene and Midland.
The Thomas Cranage sits in 10 to 25 feet of crystal clear water on Watcher's Reef, northeast of Giant's Tomb Island. The 305-foot freighter, thought to be the longest wooden vessel lost on Georgian Bay, went aground in 1911.
Nearby, off Hope Island, sit at least three notable wrecks, the work of the famous fall gales that took many ships to their watery graves. The Marquette, a 139-foot schooner, was beached there during a November blizzard in 1867, enroute to Penetanguishene. The Michigan, a 297-foot steel barge was driven ashore during a similar storm in 1943. The Lottie Wolf, a three-masted schooner bound for Midland with a cargo of corn, hit a rock off the northeast shore of Hope Island and was beached by her captain.
Off Christian Island lies the largest wreck on the bay. The 350-foot steel lake freighter, Mapledawn, was wrecked in 1924 on the northwest corner of the island. Its remains lie scattered about 100 yards offshore in depths of 20 to 30 feet.
These wrecks and many others jealously guard part of Georgian Bay's past, from the days before highways, trains or airplanes moved people and freight with modern-day speed and efficiency. Divers can discover their stories in the underwater world surrounding Midland and Penetanguishene. |
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In 1921, the town fathers decided to celebrate, at the insistence of Father Athol Murray, the tercentenary of the landing Samuel de Champlain on the shores of Penetanguishene at Toanche.
In 1920, Gerald Lahey was a young man aged 20, who had just decided to enter the Jesuit order. His father D. A. Lahey, one of the town's wealthiest merchants, had offered his only child anything he wanted, but the boy could not accept since he had taken a vow of poverty when he joined the Society of Jesuits.
After speaking with Father Athol Murray, the idea of a gift to the town to commemorate the "bonne entente" or friendship between the two founding peoples of Penetanguishene and Canada - the French and the English - was born. It also helped that Gerald's mother, a Fitzgerald, was English and his father was French.
And so, two bronze angels, one marked "Ontario", the other "Quebec" were dedicated in a formal ceremony during the "Old Home Week" celebration in 1921.
Since then these angels have had several facelifts. They received new bases and were rededicated with their old friend Father "Pere" Murray returning in 1971 and 1975, to revisit them and his old town.
In 1988, a successful fundraising drive by the Heritage Penetanguishene Committee enabled the two angels to be recast and upgraded to their former glory. Today, they herald a triumphant bilingual welcome to friends and visitors alike just as they did back in 1921.
Replicas of the original bronze angels are positioned at the entrance to the Town of Penetanguishene, while the original angels can be viewed at Penetanguishene's Centennial Museum. |
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(Penetanguishene writer David Dupuis, author of the internationally acclaimed best selling hockey biography "Sawchuk", and renowned Midland artist, Del Taylor, have combined their talents to co-author a lengthened and beautifully illustrated book titled "Kitche'uwa'ne - A Legend". The following common version is an excerpt used with their permission.)
As Aenons, the Chief of Toanche, approached the assembled villagers, all grew quiet. In the distance a wolf howled as he began to speak.
"Listen now to the howl of the wolf, who calls out to the great Huron Giant, Kitchikewana to wake from his sleep. My children, as many moons ago as there are stars in the night sky, a party of Hunters from Toanche found a baby the size of a man on Manitoulin Island and brought him back here to Penetanguishene, the place of the white rolling sands. They named him Kitchikewana and as time went by, the child grew and soon the great white pine trees came up to his knees and there could be no doubt that this indeed was the son of the great spirit Manitou. Despite his great size, he played with the other young braves, and at the winter games at Ossossane, he could not be beat at fishing, chopping wood and snowshoeing. Every Huron from all five clans knew and respected him and with his presence, the savage Iroquois from the south dared not venture into our lands. It was a time of prosperity. With one finger he could break winter ice for all to fish and he could see and shoot a deer as far away as Ossossane."
"The great Giant could easily find any lost child and once, when a wolf had attacked one, Kitchikewana asked the wolf why he had done such a thing. When the wolf answered that the boy was easy prey, the giant threw the wolf and his brothers to the north in one hand, and to this day their howl recalls this. Finally, when he was a full grown warrior, and he had lost control of his temper three times in one winter, the elders felt that a wife was needed to calm the great one. At the next Ossossane winter gathering, Kitchikewana was invited to pick from amongst the most beautiful Huron women. He picked a girl named Wanakita, daughter of the north Chief Musquakie, but she refused to marry him as her heart belonged to a warrior from her own tribe. Still, she and her father were forced to move to Toanche, on the shores of Penetanguishene Bay."
"For eighteen moons, Kitchikewana tried to win Wanakita's heart and a wedding date was set many times, but each time she cancelled. It was said her heart was ripped from the north and one final time she declared her heart belonged to another, in front of all the Huron tribes. The giant was furious, shamed before all his people. Afraid of his wrath, she and her father fled to the north in a canoe. Seeing this final betrayal, Kitchikewana reached down and threw handfuls of earth at them, capsizing their canoe. Seeing them drowning in the falling debris, the giant plucked Wanakita and Musquakie from below the water's surface, gave them each a kiss of life, put them back in their canoe and pushed them away to their northern home."
"Broken hearted the giant sat out in the waters all summer, refusing all food, drink and visitors. His absence teased the Iroquois into venturing into Huron territory once again. The elders met and sent word for Wanakita, who had since married her own warrior, to come and ask the giant's forgiveness and blessing. Maybe then he would be persuaded to marry one who would have him. But on the night of her arrival here in Penetanguishene, a great storm raged while the giant called out to his father. In the morning, a great pine-filled island was left in place of the giant. Asking for the great one's forgiveness as she kneeled on the beach of the island, a breeze blew and a rainbow broke. She cried and knew she was forgiven. Through the ensuing years she told her children and they theirs, of the great giant and his island that will be forever known on the great bay as "The Giant's Tomb"- the isle of legends."
Aenons crossed his arms and looked down. The great story was finished. |
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In 1641, Father Jean de Brebeuf, a Jesuit priest, was working as a missionary among the Huron people at Sainte-Marie among the Hurons, near what is now Midland, Ontario. He wanted to tell the familiar Christmas story in a way the Hurons could understand, so he composed a Christmas Carol in the Huron language, setting the words to the tune of an earlier French carol.
Father Brebeuf was later killed by an Iroquois war party, but the Hurons who escaped remembered the song and continued to sing it. Almost 100 years later, another Jesuit priest heard the carol and wrote it down. It was translated into French under the title "Jesus est ne." In 1926, poet J.E. Middleton wrote an English interpretation that is widely known today.
Twas in the moon of winter time
When all the birds had fled
That mighty Gitchi Manitou
Sent angel choirs instead
Before their light the stars grew dim
And wondering hunters heard the hymn:
"Jesus your King is born
Jesus is born: In excelsis gloria!"
Within a lodge of broken bark
The tender babe was found
A ragged robe of rabbit skin
Enwrapped his beauty 'round
And as the hunter braves drew nigh
The angel song rang loud and high:
"Jesus your King is born
Jesus is born: In excelsis gloria!"
The earliest moon of winter time
Is not so round and fair
As was the ring of glory on
The helpless infant there
The chiefs from far before him knelt
With gifts of fox and beaver pelt
"Jesus your King is born
Jesus is born: In excelsis gloria!"
O children of the forest free
O sons of Manitou
The holy child of earth and heaven
Is born today for you
Come kneel before the radiant boy
Who brings you beauty, peace, and joy
"Jesus your King is born
Jesus is born: In excelsis!"
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