Northwoods Memories Multimedia Productions

The NamakanNarrows site is fascinating.  It has white images in addition to red ones.  It has a large number of images.  In spite of easy access and many reports, we found two hand  prints that to our knowledge have never been mentioned before.

But the most interesting part of the site is the story of the missing rock.   Dewdney, in his book Indian Rock Paintings of the Great Lakes, describes the site.  On page 41 Dewdney states:

“At Arthur Pohlman’s place I stared in undisguised amazement at a slab of rock from the Namakan site leaning against the wall of his garage:  painted on it a white moose and a red fish-like form.  Pohlman and his brother-in-law, Dr. J. A. Bolz, author of Portage into the Past, had found the 100-pound slab in imminent danger of falling into the water, had rescued it, and were only too happy to accept my offer to deliver it to the Royal Ontario Museum.  There the Namakan Stone now rests.”

We purchased a high resolution photo and the rights to print that photo for the Northwoods Pictographs bulletin about the Namakan Narrows site and the King Williams Narrows site.   In processing that photograph we found other images on the rock not described in the Dewdney account.  Those images are detailed in the Northwoods Pictographs bulletin.

We found in the Ridley Library at French Lake in Quetico, a photo taken very close up of the rock when it was still in place on the cliff.  However, the photo shows very little of the surrounding rock.  From the photos we have and from our visits to the sites we cannot determine with accuracy exactly where on the cliff the fallen rock was located.  Dewdney has a drawing in his book locating the rock just to the left of the white drum and drum stick currently in situ.  But there are intriguing questions.

If Dewdney first saw the rock in Pohlman’s garage, what information told him the location on the cliff?  If Pohlman and Bolz found it ” in imminent danger of falling into the water” how did they know its location on the cliff other than concluding that it fell directly down from above?  Could it have moved sideways when falling along the rocks on the surface?

So here is the help we need from you:  Dewdney published in 1962.  Does anyone have a photo or photos taken prior to that time that shows the rock with its white moose still on the cliff.  Additionally, do you have a photo that shows enough of the cliff to determine the exact location of the fallen rock on the cliff?  If so, or if you know someone who might have taken early photos in that area, will you please contact us.  email  info@northwoodsmemoriesmmp.com or call 405-823-0469.

Thanks.  We will aknowledge  you!!

Edwina and I just returned from Canoecopia.   I presented a short program on our three-year project to compile a complete and accurate record of all known pictograph sites in Canoe Country.  As we were driving home from Madison, we talked about how we meet the nicest people in canoes!  While that is not exactly literally what I mean, since we were not in a canoe in Madison, we do mean that canoeing and related activities have introduced us to a group of really great people.

A number of years ago we flew into Atikokan on a float plane and were met by our friends from Canoe Canada Outfitters.  They shuttled us to our hotel room.  It was July 1.  We had planned to spend the rest of the day in Atikokan walking around, visiting, shopping and generally enjoying the small town canoeing atmosphere.  We did not know that July 1 is Canadian Independence Day and businesses would be closed.  We enjoyed being around the town anyway and have gone back a number of times since.  The next day, the folks from Canoe Canada dropped us off at the French Lake entry and we began our trip back to Prairie Portage.  We  looked for the remains of old log cabins, steam boat relics on beaches, and visited the Dore Lake pictograph site.  Nearby was the sunken steam boat in shallow water.   But the best part of the trip happened in Sturgeon Narrows. (more…)

Any discussion of resources available to learn about Quetico Provincial Park would be entirely inappropriate without mention of the John B. Ridley Research Library ( www.catalogue.legacyforest.ca ). If you travel into Quetico from any entry in Canada, you should plan a day or two before or after your trip to visit this excellent library. Several comfortable hotels are available in Atikokan to allow you a day or two to visit the library and enjoy Atikokan. The library is located in the lower floor of the Quetico Park Information Pavilion which can be found at the Dawson Trail Campgrounds in Quetico Provincial Park. If you have a French Lake area entry permit, you will check in with the Rangers in the Pavilion, and the library is downstairs. (more…)

Our first trip of 2008 took us to a total of 14 pictograph sites around the periphery of Quetico and in the Boundary Waters.  To complete our series of Northwoods Pictograph Bulletins, we committed to revisiting every site we have visited in the past to check the accuracy of our photographs and records, and to visit the few remaining sites we had not yet visited. (more…)