The City That Never Was Traditional Cache
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This micro is located within a small park on Highway 21 in
Ontario's Huron County. Its open location is visible to muggles.
Parking is adjacent to the walkway. Bring your own pen.
Welcome to St. Joseph, the only French Canadian community between
the French Jesuit settlements on Georgian Bay at Midland and those
in the Windsor area. The St. Joseph Memorial Park and Historical
Walkway is dedicated to the memory of those first settlers who left
their poverty in Quebec, only to find hardship as pioneers along
Lake Huron. The walkway makes an abbreviated history of St. Joseph
readily available to the public through narrative and pictorial
signage positioned along a 450-foot long brick walkway. The names
engraved in individual bricks include those of original settlers
and some of their descendants. The park is also dedicated to
Narcisse Cantin (1870-1940) who dreamed that this location would
become the City of St. Joseph, canals for ocean-going vessels,
railways, industries, and electric power. Cantin proposed a canal
system which included one to link Lake Huron to Lake Erie (see also
GC16H5X). Much of what Cantin envisioned, such as the St. Lawrence
Seaway and hydro-electric developments, were completed by various
governments in Canada and the USA. Although his proposed canal was
never built, many others were -- Cantin was referred to as the
"Father of the St. Lawrence Seaway". Cantin's dream of the City of
St. Joseph never came to be. However, although St. Joseph remains
"the city that never was", it was certainly a thriving town with
many businesses and a population in the hundreds. Although almost
all the buildings were torn down in the 1920's, the few that remain
are reminders of this great history. The park began with a proposal
from Brother Andre, founder of the famed Oratory of St. Joseph in
Montreal, that a statue honouring St. Joseph be placed in the park.
In the early 1900's, he took a metal pipe and pounded it into the
ground where a statue of St. Joseph now stands. The statue was put
in place in 1972 and a provincial historic plaque was also erected
honouring Narcisse Cantin. Enjoy this fascinating chapter of local
history as you search for the cache. A "Google" search will provide
additional information and, if you have time, visit the St. Joseph
Archives and Museum located 1/2 km north at the Hessenland Country
Inn.
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