My hometown.
Coniston, Coniston Facebook page --->
Province of Ontario,
Canada
A sort of Canadian "Johnny Cash"...
I was born and raised in a small Northern Ontario mining community - Sudbury - and specifically the small (2,000 population) town of Coniston a few miles away. Consiton was settled at the beginning of the 20th Century when rich deposits of copper and nickel were discovered while laying tracks for the trans-Canada railroad.
The town I lived in was very much a blue collar "company town", and had settlers from all over the world. Small Polish, Ukrainian, French, Northern Italian and English communities flourished in ethnic neighborhoods. I was exposed to many langages, cultures and foods. Like a mini New York City!I lived in the Polish/Ukrainian section of the town - probably because my mother wanted to be near her Polish mother.
The economy of the town was always robust, and through the years ammenities and new housing developments spread. With virtually full employment, crime was astonishingly small and most people never locked their doors - even when they were not at home. Everyone knew everyone, and kept an eye out for each other. The telephone exchange required dialing of only five numbers - usually beginning with "44". My home number was 44907. IN the late 60's, a prefix of 69 was added to everyone in the town making our number 694-4907.
One unique feature of the town's landscape was the fact that the area was almost deviod of natural tree coverage - due to early logging and exposure to sulphur dioxide gas as a byproduct of the smelting process. We had to endure this occasional industrial gas exposure in the 1950's and 60's as part of the price of progress and employment. As a result of chronic sulphuric acid exposure, the landscape was baren and rocky, and NASA astronauts actually trained in the Sudbury area prior to the 1969 Apollo 11 moon landing. Today, environmental regulations are much stricter and the nearby terrain has miraculously recovered and is once again heavily forrested.
The town of Coniston, named after an English town famous for boat racing, was a great place for kids to grow up. Surrounded by countless hills and small lakes, most kids spent extensive time playing outdoors - rock climbing, swimming in nearby lakes, skiing in the winter and generally exploring the wilderness. This undoubtedly fostered a deep desire for exploration in me.
This is the modest family home, which my father built in 1963. This recent photo was taken in 2013. Small by today's standards - 3 bedrooms, one bathroom, and 1,200 square feet. My bedroom was at the back of the house on the left side. It certainly looks like it's in great condition for a 50 year old house. Man, did they build things solid back then. It looks just like when I lived there. More trees of course.
I almost expect to see my mother and father emerge from the front door to greet me...
1969
2014
Believe it or not, this old building constructed in the 1920s was my elementry school for 8 years. I walked a mile to school in the morning, a mile back home for lunch, a mile back to school after lunch, and a mile back after classes were over for the day. Many times in driving snow. I brought my lunch in a lunchbox on the really cold days when the thermometer dipped below -20 degrees farenheight.
I clearly remember standing in the schoolyard during an afternoon recess and watching a convoy of military vehicles hauling hundreds of ground to air missiles over the nearby trans-Canada highway during the height of the Cuban missile crisis.
I assume they were being deployed at the nearby NORAD radar base, and we were certainly close enough to the NORAD base (six miles) to be a a likely nuclear target. Recall a few "duck and cover" civil defense exercises under the old wood desks.
I also remember standing in the same schoolyard when I heard the sad news that President Kennedy had been assasinated.
I am still friends with several of my old grade school classmates.
Photo below - my teachers circa 1966.
1968
Being an industrial town, almost everyone (including my father) worked at the massive local smelter which was located at the south east corner of the town.
This is was basically the view from our living room picture window. Pretty unappealing looking back at it today - but at that time it represented 70 years of generation after generation employment stability- lifetime job security and industry and progress.
Every country needed STEEL to grow their economy, and all STEEL needs NICKEL. Our small community supplied 80% of the world's nickel, so we were all proud of our global place of importance and saw the world through very different eyes back then.
2014
History of the Coniston Smelter.
Prior to 1912, Coniston was mostly a farming community. The Mond Nickel Company decided to build a new facility, and felt that Coniston was ideal due to the close proximity of both major railroads.
Construction of a new smelter began immediately. Mond would continue to develop Coniston, not just as a nickel plant, but also as a town until 1928 when it would be bought out by INCO.
INCO would continue to expand its presence here, and the growth of Coniston until January, 1972. INCO announced it would began phasing back production at the Coniston facility due to government restrictions being placed on environmental damage. Three months later, the plant was closed completely. Many workers either took early retirement, or followed the shift of production from Coniston to INCO's facility in Copper Cliff.
The plant began to deteriorate quickly, and in 1976, the decision was made to demolish the buildings completely. Today only the smoke stacks remain.
Note on Photo 1 - The "Big Nickel" - a centennial (1967) tribute to Sudbury and it's mining heritage.
Note on Photo 2 - "Slag Dumping" - pouring of molten rock after the nickel had been extracted by smelting. Very dramatic at night!