Retired Cambrian College professor Bill McLeod has just self-published a book about his grandfather, William McLeod, and how he saved the skin - literally and figuratively - of several fur-bearing species in the Chapleau area and ultimately the province.
Entitled The Chapleau Game Preserve, History Murder and Other Tales, it explains the link between McLeod, the preserve and a ?paradigm shift? in how trappers and the government view wild livestock as a resource.
The book is also about bootlegging, poaching, Grey Owl and half a dozen murders.
In the 1920s, populations of moose, deer, beaver and other fur-bearing animals were in grave danger of disappearing from the Chapleau area due to over-trapping.
William McLeod, a trapper, saw a crisis and in 1923 submitted a paper to the provincial government outlining the serious problems facing the Ontario trapping industry.
By 1925, the game preserve was created.
?In less than a quarter of a century,? his grandson says, ?both the government of Ontario and the trappers completely changed their perspective of the fur-harvesting industry. Trapping grounds came to be regarded as fur farms, not places where every animal should be slaughtered....?
That change in thinking took time, though, and not everyone changed the way they operated.
Fur bootlegging and poaching was rampant in the preserve until about 1950. During a period of 30 years, there were six murders in the area.
The book also takes a snapshot of Chapleau in those early days, including accounts from Cree children who attended the residential school there, and the New Brunswick House Indian Band that was kicked out of the preserve in 1925.
Stories of trailblazing in Northern Ontario, a visit to the Sultan grave of the author of two lines etched into the Peace Tower and the McLeod family?s connection to Grey Owl, fill out the volume?s 318 pages.
Retail copies of the $24.95 book are available by visiting www3.sympatico.ca/wemcleod or by phoning 522-3858.
-Craig Gilbert
