Richard Collins joined HSO in 2018, when he moved to Ottawa. Although his heritage walking tour business has sent him back to the GTA, he remains part of HSO, as the newsletter editor.

Richard recounts how canals have evolved, in Ottawa and elsewhere.

If Shakespeare had been around to write an article for HSO’s 2026 Bytown200 Bicentennial Storytelling Challenge (stiff competition for the rest of our contributors), two characters would have played a prominent role.

Ottawa, 1910

The scheme devised by the two antagonists was there in plain text, on the front page of the Ottawa Citizen, complete with portraits of the perpetrators displayed prominently. The two had come to Ottawa, from CPR’s home base in Montreal, not to praise the Rideau Canal, but to bury it.

Thomas Shuaghnessy was president of Canadian Pacific, and his general manager (and brainchild of the plan) was David McNicoll. (The town of Port McNicoll, on Georgian Bay, is named in his honour, although in Port McNicoll’s case, he was a proponent of marine transportation; not an opponent of it, as we was with the Rideau Canal.)

The part played by the Ottawa Citizen was to help it’s readers understand the logistics, for better or worse, behind Canadian Pacific’s logic to drain the Rideau Canal, pave the basin and lay railway tracks along the razed waterway to a new station that Grand Trunk had recently proposed to build beside the east bank of the canal, on the south side of Rideau Street.

Welland, 1972

I was eleven when I heard of similar news about the canal in my hometown. The province’s Department of Highways had put forward a plan to drain the soon-to-be abandoned section of the Welland Canal through its namesake city and build in the channel a new high-speed highway to whisk people efficiently from the QEW to the frantic urban centre of metropolitan Port Colborne – a city that, even today, hardly warrants a 400-series highway. (No disrespect to the people of Port Colborne – I have two cousins there – but the town has only 20,000 people.)

At Queen’s Park, opponents of the Ministry of Transportation’s plans were skeptical. The residents in Welland were furious. As a kid, I was just confused. Like the Rideau Canal in Ottawa, Welland’s man-made waterway was the historical and spiritual heart of a city that owes its very existence to the canal. Why would anyone want to take that away?

Ottawa, 2018

While leading a walking tour of the locks at the base of Parliament Hill a few years ago, I was asked by a man from Thorold about which of the two canals is the older; the one we were touring or the one in his backyard. The answer is a bit convoluted. William Hamilton Merritt completed the Welland Canal in 1829; three years before the Rideau Canal opened. But that canal was almost entirely destroyed through the 1850s when the Province of Canada Board of Works (the predecessor of the same department that contemplated the Rideau’s fate, in 1910) gradually replaced that first canal with a wider one, with bigger locks; naturally using the path of the existing canal. (Part of historic Lock 5 is still there, but you have to blaze a trail through bush to get to it. The ruins sit underneath Highway 406.) Yet, against the odds (and, as we’ll see, the wishes of Canadian Pacific), the Rideau Canal remains today, and still in use, as it was nearly 200 years ago. The size of the locks is the same now as the day Colonel John By approved the paperwork for their construction. This makes the Rideau the oldest surviving canal in Ontario.

The current Welland Canal is its fourth, and largest, iteration. The Welland locks make the Rideau’s locks look like teacups. (The three continuous locks at Thorold – Locks 4, 5 and 6) are three times the length of all eight adjacent locks in Ottawa.) It’s fascinating to watch ocean-going ships climb what is essentially the engineered equivalent of Niagara Falls (11 km to the east) but still, the Welland Canal lacks the charm and the heritage of the Rideau Canal.

Mississauga, 2025

(I hope my relatives in Welland don’t read this.)

Ottawa, 1910

When he took over as CPR’s general manager in 1903, McNicoll went on a mission to correct the mistakes he felt Ottawa’s earliest railway had made when building their line into Ottawa; something that his 1910 plan intended to correct.

The earliest of these – the Ottawa & Prescott Railway (by 1910, it was CPR’s Sussex line) – chose a terminal near the mill complexes at New Edinburgh. This alignment secured a lucrative source of freight tonnage, but left passengers bound for central Ottawa well east of their destination; with a long horsecar connection back into town. Fifteen years later a second line into Ottawa – the Canada Central (CPR’s Ellwood line, in 1910) – established a terminal at LeBreton Flats. It was also a good source of freight traffic, but this time passengers were trapped well west of the city centre, and a horsecar ride into town.

Meanwhile, CPR’s competition – Grand Trunk – had already chosen a route into Ottawa, along the east side of the Rideau Canal, that brought its trains right into the heart of city; just a few blocks away from Parliament Hill. McNicoll could have considered the option of sharing GTR’s line, but that meant writing monthly rent cheques to the competition. The better plan, in McNicoll’s view, was to pay one flat fee to buy the Rideau Canal from the Dominion government and use its right-of-way into the city centre. Misleading tales of summertime cholera outbreaks from stagnant canal water, or ice jam-induced spring floods, or military obsolescence, or declining traffic were all part of McNicoll’s pitch to diss the canal and motivate the seller.

The canal path was necessary to get passengers into central Ottawa from a line CPR had built on its own, in 1898 (the M&O Line), to be the shortest, fastest way between Ottawa and Montreal. The proposed Rideau Canal connection would also be the fast way west, to Toronto, too. To link the nation’s capital to its two biggest cities (something GTR had already done), McNicoll needed the canal’s right-of-way, come hell or stagnant water.

Rochester, 1908

McNicoll’s plan to drain the Rideau Canal and encase it in a concrete straitjacket was monumental, but not unprecedented. CPR’s plan for Ottawa had an an eerie (if you’ll allow the bad pun) similarity to events taking place in Rochester, New York.

Construction began two years earlier on a project to direct the Erie Canal south of the city. In the meantime, even while the old canal through the city was still in use, Rochester’s city fathers were drafting plans to drain the soon-to-be disused section and convert it to a subway (sort of) to give the city’s streetcars – inbound from the suburbs – a car-free path downtown. (The original Erie Canal is older, although only by a few years, than either the Welland or Rideau.) Looking through editions of the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle from that period, there seems to have been little opposition to removal of the historic canal. I guess it wasn’t really all that historic at the time. Heritage preservation wasn’t as strong an initiative in 1910 as it is today. Lift bridges, seemingly more often up than down (something I remember from my youth) delayed traffic, but residence, and D&C’s editor, seemed to welcome the canal’s end.

But Ottawa’s a different story.

Ottawa 1910

Opposition was strong here. That is to say that there was unity in Ottawa between residents, businesses and local politicians, to save the Rideau Canal. The position itself was weak.

The only case the community had, to stop CPR from moving ahead with its plan, was the cultural heritage defense. Long before Queen Victoria selected Ottawa as the capital of Canada, the Rideau Canal planted the seed that geminated into a city. It was seminal, it was scenic, it was serene. But by 1910, the Rideau Canal had become nearly useless.

CPR’s defense for its railway plan was that the Rideau Canal had outlived its purpose. McNicoll declared that public opposition to the closing of the Rideau Canal was “a matter of sentiment, not business.”

Frustratingly, McNicoll was right. Traffic had been on the decline on the Rideau Canal for over a decade. The Ottawa Journal (an opponent of CPR’s plan) commented on a report by the Department of Railways and Canals which seemed to state that there had been a “substantial increase” in marine traffic on the canal, and that passages in 1909 had been the highest in 15 years.

But that statement was a bit misleading, whether by choice or by ignorance. It’s true that traffic had been up on the “Ottawa District” of the the Department’s network, but that geographic district also included the tonnage stats for the Carillon Canal and Grenville Canal (the chain of locks and channels along the Ottawa River, eastward to Montreal) since all tonnage passing through these two canals, as well as the Rideau, north of Smith’s Falls, was reported to the Ottawa office of the Department of Customs and Excise. More than two-thirds of the district’s registered tonnage traveled through the Ottawa River canals; not the Rideau Canal.

Passenger traffic through Ottawa (Locks 1 to 8), Hartwells (Locks 9 and 10) and Hog’s Bank (Locks 11 and 12) in 1909 was down to 19,498 passages from a 1905 peak of 24,394.

It’s easy to play with the numbers, and McNicoll did. Annual traffic flow on the Rideau Canal typically, unpredictably, rose and fell frenetically over the years, like mercury in an Ottawa thermometer in springtime. Good harvests or bad on Ottawa Valley farms – alone of all other commodities shipped on the canal – could adjust the number of freight passages by integers, year by year. A busy year of road construction could send aggregates tonnage up that year, followed by a season with no tonnage at all, once the new roads projects were completed. Even in recent memory, a global pandemic slashed traffic on the recreational canal. And just when recovery seemed in sight, traffic flow was stalled by rising gas prices, which sent boaters looking for a cheaper pastime, in the meantime. Using Covid-era lingo, business on the Rideau Canal has always been ‘hardwired’ to the unpredictable economy around it. The numbers favoured CPR in 1910, but what of the future?

If the data was open to interpretation, and sudden change, McNicoll had stronger defenses. He claimed that the Rideau Canal no longer served any strategic need. This statement is true, but like the commercial traffic, McNicoll’s military claim is also a bit on the misleading side.

Bytown, 1826

McNicoll hesitated to note that the naval traffic that was supposedly down had, in fact, never been “up”. The Rideau Canal was not a vital link in Canada’s military defense strategy. Of course, one reason for that is the fact that the canal opened 18 years after Canada’s last war with the US. And if war were to flare up again, the possible quick capture of Kingston (the southern entrance into the canal) by the Americans would quickly turn the canal from a strategic defense for Canadians into an effective invasion route for Americans, with the canal’s other end being the primary target the invaders’ advance; Canada’s seat of government.

It wasn’t Britain’s might that Canada was looking for in building the Rideau Canal. They needed the army’s experience. The well-established chain of command of the British Army was essential to progress and completion of such a demanding project. The men of the Corps of Royal Engineers and the Royal Sappers & Miners had the skills to build a canal. Blasting through granite required expertise with explosives; which made the Royal Regiment of Artillery the right appointment for the task of building dams. And with nearly 250 years of empire on its CV, the project overseer – the British Ordnance Department – could shame amazon.com when it came to logistics. If the canal were to be built today, contractors with a wide array of logistical skills would make a bid for the project but the army got the Rideau Canal contract because there were no private contractors in Upper Canada in 1826. (A recent project to naturalize the former Cuyahoga Canal in Cleveland was undertaken by the United States Army Corps of Engineers because the army outbid the private competitors.)

Ottawa, 1910

Not that any of this history mattered to McNicoll. He hadn’t come to Ottawa to convince the locals. He needed to convince the politicians that destroying the Rideau Canal was good for the home field. The city would certainly feel the effects hardest, whichever way Parliament chose, but either way, the feds had the final decision. A wrong decision could make it the governing party’s Waterloo.

Waterloo, 1815

Wellington is a name associated with victory, but that same name proved to be McNicoll’s downfall.

Ottawa, 1910

If sending the last drops of Rideau Canal water down “The Wash” (today, the alignment of King Edward Avenue) and over the Rideau Falls wasn’t enough to raise concern, then digging a tunnel under Wellington Street from the Sappers’ Bridge to CPR’s existing station in Lebreton Flats raised a few eyebrows. This was the expensive chapter in McNicoll’s plan, and it seemed so unnecessary. If only McNicoll could let go of his contempt for Grand Trunk and share the station it was building across from (and along with) the Chateau Laurier, then the cost of the Wellington tunnel could have been avoided, and CPR’s passenger wouldn’t still be stuck in the outer reaches of civilization (Lebreton Flats) waiting for a streetcar connection to the Chateau Laurier.

If McNicoll had let go of the weak part of his plan, the rest of it might have come to pass. (McNicoll died six years later. His successor, Edward Beatty arranged to share GTR’s tracks east of the canal, and its central station in 1920.)

Utrecht, 1969

What would Ottawa be like today if CPR had had its way, and the Rideau Canal was no longer the cultural artery in a city with many historic veins? Utrechtites (or whatever you call people from Utrecht) asked that same question 50 years ago. Canals had been coursing the flat terrain of the Netherland centuries before the first one was built in Canada, but a canal in Utrecht was drained in 1969 to build an eight-lane highway through the centre of the city. After a generation of regret (and declining population in the once trendy Binnenstad district) the people of Utrecht decided they wanted their canal back.

It was a double-whammy defense for canal restoration in Utrecht. The Dutch love their heritage and they’ve grown to hate their highways. Voters demanded a new master plan for the city which (in addition to more cycling paths instead of roads) placed a focus on restoring the Catharijnesingel (the Dutch also love long words) and installing recreational amenities alongside the restored waterway. Conversion started in 2015 and was completed in 2020.

The Catharijnesingel canal started out 800 years earlier as a defensive moat at the perimeter of the old city, but was widened in small stages through the 1810s an ’20s. Like the Erie diversion around Rochester, the Catharijnesingel supplanted the Oudegracht (“old moat”) to the east, which ran through the centre of old Utrecht, but which had become too hemmed-in to be widened to meet the requirements of larger boats; like the original canal through Rochester. So, while Americans were building the first large canal on this continent, ancient Utrecht got a new canal and kept its old one as a scenic feature of the old downtown. Now that’s civic devotion to canals.

Ottawa, 2026?

If McNicoll had gotten his way in 1910, would support in Ottawa to restore the Rideau Canal be as strong today as it was in Utrecht, 20 years ago? I’m inclined to believe that Ottawa folk love the canal they have . . . because they have it. But experience tells me that they’d miss the railway (and mostly roadway) access that would have to go to bring the Rideau Canal back to life, so long after its 1910 demise. (Or, let's say “1920 demise”, given the amount of time it takes the government to decide anything . . . which was, incidentally, McNicoll’s biggest concern in 1910.) In my past walking tours, every time I mentioned the possibility of closing Colonel By Drive, parallel to the canal, to put back the railway tracks that were there up to 1966 (so that trains could reach the “re-repurposed” Grand Trunk station – currently the home of the Senate), the response from those on my tours usually ranged from cautious consideration to rabid rejection.

Unlike Shakespeare, who left you no doubt when his play was coming to an end by killing off all the characters, I’ll leave the conclusion of this story on the near-death of the Rideau Canal to you by asking you what I asked the people on my tours. Would you be willing to sacrifice Colonel By Drive to bring trains back into the city centre. And . . . if Canadian Pacific had succeeded in 1910, would you be willing to sacrifice the roads and rails that were put in its place to get back a long-forgotten canal?

Membership and Donations

Membership

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The goal of French Life in the Capital is to tell Canadians an untold Ottawa story about the participation of Francophones in building the nation's capital. An outcome of Chantier Ottawa, an initiative coordinated since 2011 by the Centre de recherche en civilisation canadienne-française (CRCCF) with the participation of over fifteen French Canadian specialists, the exhibition presents archival documents of diverse origins about Ottawa’s Francophone population, its institutions, its achievements, and its ambitions at various times in its history.

Join us in exploring the role of the Francophones in early Bytown, with these excerpts from the University of Ottawa’s excellent “Vie française dans la capitale” website:

Bytown and its First French Canadians

https://www.viefrancaisecapitale.ca/espace/bytown_and_its_first_french_canadians-eng

Lowertown’s First Resident

https://www.viefrancaisecapitale.ca/espace/lowertowns_first_resident-eng

From Loggers to Merchants

https://www.viefrancaisecapitale.ca/espace/loggers_merchants-eng

First Families

https://www.viefrancaisecapitale.ca/espace/first_families-eng

Religious Beginnings in Bytown

https://www.viefrancaisecapitale.ca/espace/first_families-eng

A Political Space is Born

https://www.viefrancaisecapitale.ca/pouvoir/political_space_born-eng

Peter Di Gangi, based in Ottawa, is an established expert on Indigenous historical, legal and cultural research, working with Indigenous communities for over 40 years.  

Peter points out that the traditional territory of the Algonquin people has always included the Ottawa Valley and adjacent lands, straddling the border between what is now Quebec and Ontario, but unlike most of Ontario and the Prairies, Algonquin territory has never been dealt with by a land-sharing Treaty and Algonquin title continues to exist.

This article was published in Canada’s History: www.canadashistory.ca/explore/politics-law/algonquin-territory

Lynn Gehl, PhD, author, activist and member of the Algonquins of Pikwàkanagàn First Nation, makes the case, in this 2018 article, that historic and current development has betrayed the "Asinabka" vision of the late Chief William Commanda and desecrates what should alternatively be preserved and honoured as our nation's potential "heart of reconciliation":

The Chaudière Falls (Akikodjiwan) and surrounding landscape have long been a sacred place for Algonquin and other First Nations. How has this been impacted over the past two centuries, since the arrival of Europeans in the Ottawa area?

Has the historic and ongoing development of the Chaudière district (Chaudière Falls and Chaudiére, Albert, and Victoria Islands) been emblematic of our nation's disregard for Indigenous rights and jurisdiction?

Akikodjiwan - The Destruction of Canada’s Heart of Reconciliation

Prior to colonization, the Algonquin Anishinaabeg relied on the land and waterways now known as the provinces of Ontario and Quebec and the Ottawa River. Through the gifts they provided, the Algonquin achieved mino-pimadiziwin (the good life).

It was through Nanaboozo’s hardship of living without a father, his process of seeking revenge and learning forgiveness, that human beings understand reconciliation. The Spirit of the West Wind gave the First Sacred Pipe to his son Nanaboozo, instructing him about the rituals of reconciliation that include ceremony and prayer as the practices of reunion between father and son, peoples, and nations.

“During the historic treaty process British officials ignored the Algonquin because our very territory was becoming the heart of Canada.”

While many people think this Nanaboozo story is a romantic belief that lacks rationality, it is much more. Sacred beliefs that value the natural world are far more sustainable and intelligent than the destruction that manifests through the current economic paradigm, resulting in the polluting of our land and waterways with such things as plastic, sewage, chemicals, and radioactive particles.

During the historic treaty process British officials ignored the Algonquin because our very territory was becoming the heart of Canada. Through subjugating the Algonquin, the colonizers were able to appropriate Algonquin territory and centralize their Parliament base.

Many people today think Canada is in a better place with Indigenous nations. This is not so. Through the power gained from pilfering Indigenous land and water rights, Canada continues to divide the Algonquin through practices such as obfuscating and spinning what Canada’s treaty responsibilities are.

“In a world of economic power that lacks an understanding of the importance of preserving what is sacred, Algonquin jurisdiction and human rights continue to be pushed aside.”

Akikodjiwan and Akikpautik (Pipe Bowl Falls), located in the Ottawa River just upstream from Canada’s Parliament, are the very land and waterscapes where Creator placed the First Sacred Pipe. Through colonization Akikpautik was eventually dammed, and the islands that make up the larger Akikodjiwan landscape are now called Chaudière, Albert, and Victoria Islands. It was Grandfather William Commanda’s vision to have this sacred place restored. His Asinabka plan was endorsed and promised by many.

Unfortunately, despite Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s rhetoric of respecting a “nation-to-nation” relationship and calling for “reconciliation,” the current Liberal government is permitting the further desecration of this sacred place. I offer here a timeline of the continued destruction of the ultimate place of reconciliation inscribed by Creator.

1613: Samuel de Champlain records the Anishinaabeg offering tobacco to Akikpautik (Pipe Bowl Falls), also called Asticou meaning “the boiler.” Champlain translates this as “Chaudière.”

1806: Philemon Wright’s lumber industry begins within Algonquin traditional territory in the Ottawa River Valley.

1854: The Government of the Province of Canada approves an Order-in-Council reserving the Chaudière Islands and adjacent area of the Ontario shoreline for public purposes.

1856: Leases are issued so the lumber industry can harness the water’s energy for their sawmills. These lots are on Chaudière, Albert, and Victoria Islands.

1880: J.R. Booth now holds most of the lease interests on the Islands.

1908: A large ring dam is constructed extending from Chaudière Island over the entire span of the falls. Eventually E.B. Eddy takes over its operation for pulp and paper manufacturing purposes.

1913: William Commanda is born and becomes a respected knowledge holder and Grandfather. Eventually he has a vision about re-naturalizing Chaudière Falls and the Islands. He wants the sacredness of Akikpautik returned to its natural form and the islands housed with a park, an Indigenous centre, and a peace-building meeting site for all peoples. He calls his plan “Asinabka.”

1936: Prime Minister Mackenzie King commissions Jacques Gréber to create a master plan that will govern the development of the National Capital Region.6 It was completed in 1950. Gréber concludes the most effective improvement will be the central park at the Chaudière Falls.

1958: The National Capital Commission (NCC) is established to implement Gréber’s Master Plan.

1969: The NCC purchases 40 per cent of E.B. Eddy’s operations. As a condition the NCC gains first call on E.B. Eddy’s remaining property.

1990: Plans are announced regarding an Indigenous Centre on Victoria Island.

1998: Grandfather Commanda consults with the NCC, Douglas Cardinal, Algonquin communities in the provinces of Ontario and Quebec, and Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples regarding his Asinabka Plan.

Domtar purchases E.B. Eddy’s operations. This does not mean Domtar purchased the land and waterscape.

2003: Grandfather Commanda asks the NCC and Domtar to produce the deeds to the Islands; nothing materializes.

2004: The Ministry of Canadian Heritage grants Grandfather Commanda $50,000 to further conceptualize his Asinabka Plan.

2006: The NCC endorses Asinabka and allocates $35 million toward it.

Grandfather Commanda prophesizes, “It is a vision for the revitalization of this Sacred Site, Asinabka, at the circular Chaudière Rapids, Akikpautik: The Pipe Bowl Falls.”

Stephen Harper is elected as prime minister and opens the doors for corporate development in respect to the Islands.

2007: Domtar closes their paper mill operation.

2010: The City of Ottawa endorses Grandfather Commanda’s Asinabka Plan.

2011: With great sadness, Grandfather Commanda passes into the spirit world.

2012: Domtar places their interests up for sale. The NCC applies for funds but the treasury board refuses.

Canada permits the transfer of the Ring Dam to Energy Ottawa, a municipally owned power company.

2013: Windmill Development Group publicly announces interest in the Islands, discussing the need for re-zoning for their condominium and commercial development project.

2014: The Circle of All Nations reports that the Service Ontario Land Registry indicates Chaudière Island is not owned by Domtar.

Ottawa City council votes in favour of Windmill’s application to re-zone the islands from “parks and open space” to “downtown mixed use.”

Kitigan Zibi First Nation releases a statement: “Our traditional territory has always been and continues to be, Unceded. We hereby put Canada, Québec and Ontario on notice that [the] status quo, in which our Aboriginal title lands are taken up by governments and industry, is not acceptable.”

Douglas Cardinal, Romola V. Thumbadoo-Trebilcock, Richard Jackman, Larry McDermott, and Lindsay Lambert file an appeal to the Ontario Municipal Board (OMB) regarding the re-zoning.

2015: Windmill re-names their project as “Zibi.”21 Chief Gilbert Whiteduck argues the use of the Algonquin word is cultural appropriation.

May 2015: The City of Ottawa files a motion requesting the OMB dismiss the five appeals regarding the re-zoning due to a lack of planning grounds. This would result in the denial of a full hearing.

June 2015: The OMB pre-hearing begins with member Richard Makuch presiding.

August 2015: The Ottawa Citizen reports that Domtar sells their operations to Windmill. This involves land that Domtar has never proven they own.23 The Service Ontario Land Registry identifies Windmill as leasing the land from Domtar.

The OMB pre-hearing resumes. The appellants argue consultation is required, and that the re-zoning was a departure from the Gréber and Asinabka Plans.

The City and Windmill argue the appellants lack planning grounds, Chaudière Island is no longer an Indigenous cultural site of significance because of the industrial era, and all the land is in private hands. Wolf Lake, Timiskaming, Eagle Village, and Barriere Lake First Nations call for the protection of Akikodjiwan.

November 2015: Makuch dismisses the five appeals on the grounds that the re-zoning conforms to the City’s plan, the appellants failed to raise legitimate planning grounds. He also argues there was adequate consultation with Pikwàkanagàn First Nation and the organization known as the Algonquins of Ontario. In this way he imposes colonial provincial borders on the process of justice thus denying the rights of the larger Algonquin Nation that spans the Ottawa River and includes the Algonquin located in Quebec, both status and non-status Algonquin.

Justin Trudeau is sworn in as prime minister claiming to respect the “nation-to-nation relationship” and genuine “reconciliation.”

The Assembly of the First Nations of Québec and Labrador pass a resolution to protect Akikodjiwan.

Despite Algonquin and settler opposition, Energy Ottawa begins drilling a water channel deep into the bedrock of Chaudière Island27 for additional hydroelectric generation.

March 2016: The appellants appear in the Ontario Divisional Court (ODC) seeking leave to appeal the OMB decision. Justice Charles T. Hackland dismisses them on the grounds the OMB made no errors of law.

June 2016: In protest, more than five hundred people, both settler and Indigenous, walk from Victoria Island to Parliament Hill.

October 2016: Appellants appeal again to the ODC regarding Hackland’s dismissal. A panel of three judges denies the appellants.

December 2017: Although it is said the Tsilhoqot’in decision ushered in a new paradigm regarding Indigenous rights of consent versus consultations, on December 15, 2017, the Government of Canada approved a series of land transfers between the National Capital Commission, Public Services and Procurement Canada, the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry, and Windmill Dream Zibi for lands on islands in the Ottawa River. This happened without the consent of the larger Algonquin Nation, which includes the status and the non-status in both Quebec and Ontario.

February 2018: As of February 5th, 2018 the Service Ontario Land Registry assigns Windmill Dream Zibi Ontario Inc. parcels of land on Chaudière Island and Albert Island.

Contrary to what the City of Ottawa, Windmill Development, and the Ontario Municipal Board argued, the appellants rested their arguments on legitimate planning grounds: Jacques Gréber’s Master Plan and Grandfather William Commanda’s Asinabka Plan.

Both plans long pre-dated Windmill’s project, yet in a world of economic power that lacks an understanding of the importance of preserving what is sacred, Algonquin jurisdiction and human rights continue to be pushed aside. Clearly the Liberal government’s rhetoric of respecting a nation-to-nation relationship and seeking genuine reconciliation is a bold-faced lie.

Author Lynn Gehl © 2018, Lynn Gehl Ph.D. All rights reserved.
(Published in the Watershed Sentinel)
Reprinted with permission of the author.
 
Lynn Gehl, PhD., is a member of Pikwàkanagàn First Nation. She is the author of two books: 2014’s The Truth That Wampum Tells: My Debwewin on the Algonquin Land Claims Process with Fernwood Publishing; and 2017’s Claiming Anishinaabe: Decolonizing the Human Spirit with the University of Regina Press.

Here is a link to the full article: https://watershedsentinel.ca/articles/akikodjiwan/

Follow this link to view more of Lynn Gehl's work: www.lynngehl.com 

Listen to the February 2026 HSO presentation with Lynn Gehl: Algonquin Anishinaabeg of the Ottawa River Valley: Yesterday Today Tomorrow   

Dr. Gehl recommends these resources as further reading:

Matchewan, J-M. (1992, February 4). Algonquin Nation as Represented by Barriere Lake, Kipawa, Timiskaming and Wolf Lake. Retreived from https://publications.gc.ca/collections/collection_2018/aanc-inac/R5-648-1992-eng.pdf

Di Gangi, P. (2018, April 30). Algonquin Territory: Indigenous title to land in the Ottawa Valley is an issue that is yet to be resolved. Canada’s History. Retrieved from https://www.canadashistory.ca/explore/politics-law/algonquin-territory

Dumont, A. (South Wind). (2013, December 28). The Kettle of Boiling Waters: Chaudière Falls, Algonquin Territory. Albert Dumont.Retrieved from http://albertdumont.com/the-kettle-of-boiling-waters-chaudiere-falls-algonquin-territory/

Gehl, L. (2016, November 15). Deeply flawed process around Algonquin land claim agreement. Policy Options.Retrieved from https://policyoptions.irpp.org/magazines/november-2016/deeply-flawed-process-around-algonquin-land-claim-agreement/

Gehl, L. (2018b, March 8). Akikodjiwan: The Destruction of Canada’s Heart of Reconciliation. Watershed Sentinel. Retrieved from https://watershedsentinel.ca/articles/akikodjiwan/

Huitema, M.E. (2000). “Land of Which the Savages Stood in no Particular Need”: Dispossessing the Algonquins of South-Eastern Ontario of Their Lands, 1760-1930 . Master of Arts thesis, Queen’s University, Kingston, ON. Retrieved from https://iportal.usask.ca/record/6234

Jury, E.M. (1966). Tessouat (Besouat); Tessouat (Le Borgne de l’Île); Tessouat (Tesswehas, Le Borgne de l’Île) Paul. Dictionary of Canadian Biography (Vol. 1) (pp. 638-641). Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Here they are online.

• https://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/tessouat_1603_13_1E.html
• https://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/tessouat_1636_1E.html
• https://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/tessouat_1654_1E.html

Matchewan, N. (2008). Blockades: Algonquins of Barriere Lake Defend the Forest, 1989-2008. In First Nations Strategic Bulletin. Volume 6, Issue 1, September – October 2008. (pp. 28-29). Retrieved from https://epe.lac-bac.gc.ca/100/201/300/first_nations_strategic_bulletin/2008/v06n02.pdf

Pasternak, S. (2009, October 26). They’re Clear Cutting Our Way of Life: Algonquins Defend the Forest. Upping the Anti. Retrieved from https://uppingtheanti.org/journal/article/08-theyre-clear-cutting-our-way-of-life/

Pugliese, K. (2005). ‘So, where are you from?’ Glimpsing the history of Ottawa-Gatineau’s Urban Indian Communities. Master’s thesis, Carleton University, Ottawa, ON. Retrieved from https://repository.library.carleton.ca/concern/etds/0v838113m

Sarazin, G (1992). 220 Years of Broken Promises. In B. Richardson (Ed.), Drumbeat: anger and renewal in Indian country (pp. 167-200). Toronto: Summerhill Press. (original work published 1989)

Whiteduck, K. (2009). Our Majestic Forests: An Aboriginal View of Algonquin Park. In D. Euler & M. Wilton (Eds.), Algonquin Park: The Human Impact (pp. 36-54). Espanola, ON: OJ Graphix Inc.

http://muskratmagazine.com/celebrating-canadas-150th-featuring-the-desecration-of-an-indigenous-sacred-place/

http://www.asinabka.com/geninfo.htm

https://qshare.queensu.ca/Users01/gordond/planningcanadascapital/greber1950/

https://ricochet.media/en/101/ottawa-city-council-approves-rezoning-sacred-algonquin-site

http://rabble.ca/news/2016/06/condominium-development-threatens-protection-algonquin-sacred-site

James Powell is the author of the blog Today in Ottawa's History giving  a day-by-day account of local history.

The Anishinabek
For thousands of years before the Rideau Canal and Bytown, the Ottawa Valley was home to the Anishinaabe Algonquin people and remains their unceded land. James Powell explores the story of the Algonquin people and the devastating impact that European settlement had on their lives and livelihoods: The Anishinabek, Time Immemorial, 7 October 1783

James Powell, Allison Margot Smith and Lynn Gehl will be our guest speakers as we mark the 200th anniversary of the start of the Rideau Canal and Bytown – and also explore the impact both had on the Algonquin people, for whom the Ottawa Valley has been home for millennia.

Wednesday, February 11, 2026 @ 7 p.m.
Algonquin Anishinaabeg of the Ottawa River Valley: Yesterday, Today & Tomorrow
Guest Speaker: Dr. Lynn Gehl
(Via Zoom)

Saturday, March 28, 2026 @ 1:30 p.m.
The Rideau Canal
Guest Speaker: Allison Margot Smith
Ottawa Public Library Main Branch Auditorium

Saturday, April 25, 2026 @ 1:30 p.m
The Era of Bytown
Guest Speaker: James Powell
Ottawa Public Library Main Branch Auditorium

 The HSO Bytown200 initiative has been made possible, in part, thanks to the generous legacy bequeathed to the Historical Society of Ottawa by the late Ms. Vivian Lawrence.

At the 2026 Ottawa Regional Heritage Fair – to mark this year's bicentennial – the Historical Society of Ottawa, founder and patron of the ORHF, will present the “HSO Bytown200 Award” to the top student project specifically pertaining to Bytown, the Rideau Canal, or the impacts of Bytown and/or the Rideau Canal on the Indigenous people for whom the Ottawa area has been their traditional home.

Each year we also present the “HSO Indigenous Sacred Chaudiere Falls Award” for a student project that reflects and celebrates Indigenous history, culture and traditions in the Ottawa region, or that looks at the impact of settler colonial policies on Indigenous peoples of the Ottawa region.

Both awards consist of a certificate and $300. The ORHF will take place on Tuesday, April 28, 2026 at the Canadian Museum of History.

Educators interested in enhancing their students knowledge of local Ottawa area history should explore the opportunities of our HSO Resource List for Schools as well as our Student Corner HSO Blog.

Check out the stories we've gathered about Bytown and the Rideau Canal to help celebrate the Bytown Bicentennial.

These transcriptions of Dr. Christie’s travel writings (1830-1833) along the Ottawa River and Rideau Canal provide a unique perspective into that early era.

From the HSO Bytown Pamphlet series:

107. Ottawa River Settlements in 1833 as described by Dr. Alexander J. Christie

Travel writings from 1833 by Dr. Alexander Christie. Reflecting on current events, Dr. Christie describes the settlements, land quality for agriculture, and lumbering and mineral resources of townships adjacent to the Ottawa River between Pointe-Fortune in the lower Ottawa River Valley and the McNab and Clarendon/Bristol settlements upriver. Transcriptions by George A. and Iris M. Neville.

072. Rideau Canal & Bytown Memoranda by Dr. A.J. Christie, Physician to the Rideau Canal Works

Memoranda of a journey from Kingston to Bytown made along the Route of the Rideau Canal, in February 1830. Written by Dr. A.J.Christie. Transcribed by George A. Neville & Iris M. Neville.

(Historical Language Advisory:  Certain parts of the HSO pamphlet series may contain historical language and content that some may consider offensive, for example, language used to refer to racial, ethnic, and cultural groups. These items, their content and descriptions, reflect the time period in which they were created and the viewpoint of their author. The items are presented with their original text to ensure that attitudes and viewpoints are not erased from the record.)