Village Squire, 1980-08, Page 16The Wizard
of
St. Joseph
This is the story of a man.
a village and a dream
BY ELAINE TOWNSHEND
Anyone who says Canadian history and the people involved in
it were boring haven't read about Narcisse Maxime Cantin,
whose vision of an Atlantic Ocean to Great Lakes Waterway was
fifty years ahead of its time. If not for a twist of fate, Cantin
would be officially recognized as father of the St. Lawrence
Seaway and the hamlet of St. Joseph, Ontario, would lie at the
head of one of the most important waterways in the world.
In the late 1830s, three French Canadian lumberjacks, roving
fellows who in earlier years would have been called
coureurs-de-bois. explored land along the shores of Lake Huron,
PG. 14 VILLAGE SQUIRE/ AUGUST 1980
and in the early 1840s, they returned with their families and
friends from north of Montreal.
The settlers travelled from Montreal to Hamilton by boat and
walked the rest of the way to the lake through bush and swamp.
Some stopped in Goderich, but most struggled further south past
Bayfield to hack out a new community that was known through
the years by various names including French Settlement,
Johnson's Mill, Lakeview and finally, St. Joseph. Credit must go
to the pioneers for the years of poverty and hardship they
endured while establishing their community and at the same
time preserving their French background and Roman Catholic
faith. At its peak, the population of the village reached 300.
Today many mailboxes along Highway 21 bear family names of
the original settlers.
In 1846, Antoine Cantin came to Goderich from Montreal to
establish a shipbuilding firm. He bought two farms at the French
Settlement: one for each of his sons. His son, Pierre, married
Mathilda Mass, daughter of an early arrival, and in 1870 their
son, Narcisse, was born.
Narcisse had only three years of formal education. As a boy,
he was often seen gazing across the lake, but it soon became
evident he was no idle dreamer. At the age of 17, he began his
career as an entrepreneur. He bought cattle from local farmers
and sent them by rail from Hensall, the nearest railroad town, to
Buffalo for sale. The business proved lucrative, and after his
marriage in 1889 to Josephine Denomme, daughter of a
neighbouring farmer, he and his wife moved to Buffalo for seven
prosperous years.
While in Buffalo, he patented an "Instant Crockery Mender"
and a liquid furniture polish. He eventually became represent-
ative for Gas Consumers Benefit Company for whom he
introduced the Jackson automatic pressure regulating gas
burner.
FASTER TRANSPORT NEEDED
His inventive mind didn't stop at domestic products. He
recognized the need for a faster transportation system, because
the deterioration of cattle from the time they left the pastures of
Huron County until they reached Buffalo was costly. Buffalo was
a major Great Lakes port and the western terminus of the Erie
Canal, and Cantin became familiar with Lakes' transportation
and contemporary canals.
By 1892, he had devised a scheme for a canal from St. Joseph
on Lake Huron to Port Talbot on Lake Erie to cut 300 nautical
miles and two -and -a -half days off shipments and to alleviate
congestion on the Detroit River, Lake St. Clair and St. Clair
River. Soon he expanded his plan and proposed a deep -water
canal system, entirely in Canada, from the head of the Great
Lakes to the Atlantic Ocean. In 1896, he returned to St. Joseph
withthe epurpose of developing anm� p rtant urban centre from
which he could promote his canals scheme.
A site had previously been surveyed for a village to be called
Lakeview, but Cantin extended the streets in every direction. A
devout Roman Catholic, he renamed the "city" St. Joseph in
honour of the patron saint.
By 1900, construction was booming with a sawmill and a brick
and tile yard in operation, as well as a $15,000 government -built
wharf. By 1913, the town had an organ factory, winery, butcher
shop, blacksmith shop, post office, doctor's office and a busy
Queens Hotel. Anyone who invested in the town had a street
named after them.
A FAMOUS HOTEL
Between 1889 and 1907, Cantin constructed an impressive
hotel modelled after the famous Balmoral Hotel in Montreal and
furnished with lavish stock bought in Montreal. Glass panels,
half an inch thick, depicted the original Balmoral Castle in
Scotland. Although Cantin advertised the "luxurious summer
resort" in newspapers throughout North America, vacationers
stayed away in droves and St. Joseph's Balmoral Hotel never