Ghost cottage

[vaneramos]

The forests of Haliburton County feel like wilderness. No wonder so many people make the three-hour trek here from Toronto to relax at the cottage every summer weekend. But contrary to appearances, most of the land was logged and settled 150 years ago. On Lake Fletcher, a 19th-Century farmhouse and barn stand isolated at the end of Robinson's Bay, and throughout the region there are remnants of an earlier, more arduous existence, if one knows where to look for them.

In 1989 I had the privilege of meeting and interviewing Edna Staebler, a Canadian journalist and non-fiction writer who was already aged at the time, but I find no indication she has passed away. She was noted for creating a news furor years earlier when some food corporation (Nabisco?) took her to court for publishing a cookie recipe she learned from local Mennonites, alleging she had somehow cheated the food industry. The community helped raise her legal costs and the lawsuit failed. I don't remember the details. Someone needs to write a Wikipedia entry about Edna Staebler. I interviewed her at a lakeside home near Waterloo, so we fell to talking about lakes. I mentioned Fletcher and was surprised to discover she had visited it decades ago, in the 1920s if memory serves, while staying at a lodge, which still exists on nearby Livingstone Lake.

The area must have many old stories to tell, and they're rapidly dying. About 20 years ago I saw a ghost town beside Wolf Lake. Saturday afternoon Dad, Marian, Brenna and I returned, but the town has vanished, replaced by new cottages.

We drove further down the road to Crown Lake, which practically lies within two kilometres of the boundary of Algonquin Park, but there are no popular access routes anywhere around. Leaving the car, we wandered along a rolling gravel road without hydro lines.

Dad discovered an overgrown driveway leading to an abandoned cabin that must have included four or five rooms. Outside was a cold storage constructed of logs, styrofoam and an icebox door. Most of the cabin's walls had collapsed, though the kitchen was still covered and contained a few artifacts, practically undisturbed. Brenna salvaged a small glass bottle. Among the rubble on the floor Marian and I found a copy of Starweek dated August 24 to 31, 1985. It was easy to believe no one had touched some of those items or trodden the dead leaves in more than two decades.

Who abandoned the place? Much of this land belongs to the Crown, but does anyone own the land that cabin stands on? I wonder what ghosts we left behind.

More photos are posted in rural_ruin. A closeup of the exterior paint is posted in texture. A complete gallery of 12 images is posted on Flickr.

Comments

[clairenolen.livejournal.com]

let's move in....LOLOL
nice portraits of the girls!!

[vaneramos.livejournal.com]

Thanks! Old stuff makes such good props for photos.

[bearfinch.livejournal.com]

The picture and description reminds me of an old shack in the woods near Magnetawan that we found. I was about 12 at the time, and the place was basically assembled out of logs and pieces of other houses. There were all kinds of old mouldy books and empty bottle and things, but my dad wouldn't let us take anything.

The creepy thing about it was that the owner was a recluse who, according to the locals, was from Germany and had settled there just after WW II, and might have been a Nazi in hiding. He dissapeared in the early 80's and the place had been left abandoned.

[vaneramos.livejournal.com]

His disappearance adding to the mystery. What an interesting story!

[bitterlawngnome.livejournal.com]

I recently read a book of essays by Margaret Atwood ... I can't remember did I lend it to you? anyway this reminded me of one of the essays.

[vaneramos.livejournal.com]

No, I'm not familiar with that one, but it sounds interesting.

[bjarvis.livejournal.com]

Ah, the old Jarvis family homestead... :-)

Your photos brought me back to a discussion I have with myself from time to time. I've had a fascination with abandoned houses and properties from my childhood area in northern Ontario. It seemed so illogical that someone would go through the bother of creating or obtaining a house, then simply abandoning the property. Where did they go? Why did they leave? Why not rent out or sell the old property rather than letting it decay into the ground?

I've had the same thoughts living in cities, every time I see a building boarded up. With housing in such short supply, it seems almost a crime.

[vaneramos.livejournal.com]

Across the lake from our cottage is a beautiful property on a rocky point with tall, picturesque pines. Most of that shore is Crown Land, so there are no other cottages near it. A family used to live there who everyone called derisively The Sportsmen, because they would race their boats dangerously and do target practice in the woods behind the place. They also used a lot of drugs. The place had no road access, only by water. On more than one occasion they arrived at the lake, were too lazy to cross, and broke into someone else's cottage instead. Needless to say they were pretty unpopular. One summer they disappeared and we later learned half the family had been killed in a car accident. Nobody on Lake Fletcher mourned their loss. Their shack stood unused for several years until whoever inherited the place sold it. The people who bought it fixed it up and are far more civilized. The place was in terrible shape before they bought it. Without hydro or road access, it might easily have gone forgotten and neglected. So whenever I see an abandonned property like that, I wonder what happened.

[jwg.livejournal.com]

I particularly like the exterior paint.

Brenna looks a bit like she is living there and is somewhat indifferent to the fact that some strangers are peering in to the house.

[vaneramos.livejournal.com]

Well I suppose she was indifferent to me taking her picture, anyway. But to me it looked like an oddly painted portrait of a girl.

[brotherskeeper1.livejournal.com]

Hi, you gave me this link to your lj when I commented on your post in rural_ruin. These are great photos, especially the first. I also read the article accompanying these photos. I'd love to find a place like this to explore and photograph.

Like you, I always wonder about the people who lived there, especially when I see photos of objects that were theirs. Why did they leave? Where did they go? Sometimes I wonder why so much is left behind. It's a mystery.

Thanks much for sharing this link and also the link to flickr. I hope you'll find more places to explore and photograph.

[vaneramos.livejournal.com]

Glad you enjoyed!