no bodies were ever found. All of the life-preservers were later discovered among the wreckage, but no bodies. Why were the passengers not wearing life-preservers? What happened to the passengers? A mystery!
The tug Mittie Grew was sent out to search for the missing Waubuno. At the gap in the islands south of Copper Head, the tug saw evidence of a shipwreck. Wreckage lay scattered for miles, including a paddlewheel box and a lifeboat bearing the name of the Waubuno, but no bodies and no passengers. They had simply disappeared.
A short time later, several lawsuits were brought against the Beatty business. A special panel of experts in the courts presented such conflicting testimony that the court was unable to reach a decision on the case. It was concluded that the wreck was a great mystery, which would only be solved “when the sea gives up its dead.”
The town of Parry Sound survived the blow. Passenger and freight steamers became numerous. These ships were admirably well-fitted and furnished for their service. In the South Channel between Parry Sound and Penetang, the sidewheeler City of Toronto ran daily trips. The City of Parry Sound, the Northern Belle, and the Atlantic called in to Parry Sound on their semi-weekly trips. Steam yachts and tugs of the Parry Sound Yachting Fleet, as well as those of Galna & Danter, were present in force.
Parry Sound, 1901: the Belvedere Hotel. Many grand hotels like this one were eventually lost to fire.
Archives of Ontario
In 1888 the Districts of Muskoka and Parry Sound were formed into a United Provisional Judicial District and Parry Sound was named the District Town.
On January 21, 1926, the Georgian Bay Creamery Limited purchased River Street property and commenced operations in March of that year. The creamery closed down a few years ago, but the building had a few incarnations and is now Orr’s.
At one time, Parry Sound hosted numerous tourist hotels. There was the Montgomery House owned by Joseph Calverly in 1881; this hotel served lumbermen and miners. The Canada Atlantic Hotel, operated by C.A. Phillips, had a beautifully appointed dining room. The Mansion House, on the corner of James and Mary Streets, was situated where the Brunswick Motor Hotel stands today. The Victoria House was on James Street, and just outside the town limits was Rose Point Hotel, owned by W.R. Thomson. There, guests enjoyed cruises on the Thomsons’ steam yacht, the Carlton. And there was the Hotel Belvedere situated on the hill looking out over magnificent sunsets on Georgian Bay. It was a three-storey structure with double verandas. Fire took this glorious hotel down in the 1950s, and today it is the Belvedere Heights Home for the Aged.
Gone are all the grand hotels, the ships and the yachts. Some beautiful old homes remain. Industry has been kept at arm’s length and the cultural life has found a niche of its own. There is The Festival of Sound (no pun intended) and Art in the Park. The surrounding townships have artists tucked away in every corner — inspired by this rugged land. The waterfront is beginning to develop, with two fine restaurants and an airplane service. The main street has potential but remains, as yet, undeveloped. The new four lanes of highway 400, north from Barrie, are begging for a new vision for this town. William Beatty had a dream and saw it come forth. What will the new dream be?
Pickering
In 1669 a French trader by the name of Pierre arrived at the Seneca village of Ganatsekwyagon, just east of the Rouge River in Scarborough. From there he set off across country to Lake Huron. In October of that year, Francois de Salignac de Fenelon, the first missionary to arrive in what is now Pickering Township, landed at Ganatsekwyagon.
Francois settled near the shore of Frenchman’s Bay and opened a mission school. His first winter there was one of the worst winters on record. The frost penetrated so deeply that the ground remained frozen until June. As a result, Fenelon ministered to starving Natives at Frenchman’s Bay. Food was so scarce, he was reduced to gnawing on the fungi that grew at the base of pine trees. Poor diet and rudimentary conditions led to the death of many women during childbirth. His main concern, at the time, was to prevent the Iroquois from placing live babies in the graves with their dead mothers. His attempts often failed, since few of the remaining women in the village were able or willing to care for the tiny orphans. The missionaries themselves attempted to care for the helpless infants, but were not often successful.
In 1791, surveyor Augustus Jones was authorized to survey the land between the Trent and Etobicoke Rivers and divide it into a series of townships. When Jones arrived to survey Pickering Township, he named Duffin’s Creek, a stream of water flowing into Lake Ontario, after a trader by the same name. Although he seems to be somewhat of a myth, Duffin is said to have lived there. His cabin, it is said, was always open to travellers, one of whom found the door ajar, signs of a struggle, and blood on the floor. Duffin was gone and never seen again.
William Deak, another fur trader, settled at the mouth of Duffin’s Creek in 1799. Between 1801 and 1807, a small group of houses formed a settlement at Duffin’s Creek. In July 1807 David W. Smith, surveyor-general of Upper Canada (1792–1804), sold an 850-acre block around the creek to Timothy Rogers, a prominent Yonge Street Quaker. He began to build a sawmill and a gristmill near his house, southeast of the Kingston Road bridge, but four years later he was forced to sell his property and enterprises to settle his debts. He considered Pickering Township to be the centre of Quaker settlement in Upper Canada. Roger’s grandchildren settled in both Pickering and Newmarket and pioneered the Imperial Oil Company development in Canada, as well as the Elias Rogers Coal Company. Although the Quaker population had increased the size of the settlement, it still only consisted of a few homes. By 1825 the population had reached 675.
During the early 1830s, Charles Fothergill, the noted naturalist, author, and politician, conceived an elaborate plan for a new community to be called Monodelphia. Churches, a tavern, a printing office, some mills, and a distillery were all part of his plan. Fothergill’s plan failed, but his scheme brought further construction of homes and he himself lived there from 1831 to 1837.
In 1846 the population of Duffin’s Creek was 130. There were now four churches, a grist-mill, a brewery, a tannery, several taverns, shoemakers, tailors, a blacksmith, and a wagon maker in the village. The excellent harbours, at both the mouth of the Rouge and at Frenchmen’s Bay, were used for shipping, and Duffin’s Creek was navigable for small boats as far up as the Kingston Road.
In 1856 the Grand Trunk Railway opened a line between Oshawa and Toronto. The railway benefitted the milling operations of the district. Each mill was served by a spur line of the Grand Trunk. By this time more than 50 percent of the township had been cleared of trees.
The U.S. Civil War in the 1860s hastened industrialization. War orders from the northern United States kept mills humming and encouraged farmers to put more land into wheat. Despite this, by the 1870s Pickering began to decline. Even at that time, many people could not afford to purchase Ontario farms and had headed west to homestead. The best pine and hardwood had already been exhausted and the remaining woodlots were cut again and again to pick up a little more ready cash. Many local flour mills ceased operation and were torn down or destroyed by fire.
Frenchman’s Bay Harbour Company received a $70,000 grant in 1875 to improve the harbour. It was put to good use in the construction of a lighthouse, a wharf, and a 50,000-bushel grain elevator at the bay. The formation of a tiny village, with two hotels and numerous houses, evolved. Wagons often lined up on Liverpool Road to unload barley for breweries in the United States. Later, the imposition of duty on the barley closed off the market, and the harbour activity began to fade.
In 1881 the Pickering News described the village as a growing community and drew particular
