Thunder Bay History
The city known today as Thunder Bay takes its name from the immense bay at the head of Lake Superior, known on 18th-century French maps as Baie du Tonnerre (Bay of Thunder). The city is often referred to as the "Lakehead" or "Canadian Lakehead" because of its location at the end of Great Lakes navigation.
Evidence in the form of primitive tools and implements indicates human habitation in the area as far back as 11,000 years. Little is known of the Paleo-Indians from those times but there is evidence that they mined copper in the area, fashioned it into tools and traded these tools west to the prairies and east to the Atlantic coast. Centuries later the dominant culture in the Thunder Bay Area became the Ojibway tribes who occupied the North shores of Lake Superior and Huron. Their reach extended from Georgian Bay to the Prairies - an expanse that was travelled relatively easily by their birch bark canoes.
European settlement in the region began in the late 17th century when French fur traders arrived on the scene. By 1803 The Northwest Company, a competitor to the great Hudson’s Bay Company, had established Fort William which served as a hub of the Canadian fur trade. The community that grew up around the fort later became a centre for the area’s mining industry.
In 1867, the newly formed country of Canada was interested in expansion. A Scottish-born engineer named Simon Dawson chose a location known as “The Depot” near Fort William as a starting point for a road west to Fort Garry in what is now Manitoba. Although there was already an established community at Fort William, The Depot, used as a landing spot for ships since 1805 presented fewer logistical difficulties. A few years later the name was changed to Prince Arthur’s Landing and then Prince Arthur. Dawson could not have foreseen that his selection would lead to a great rivalry between the two growing centres.
The two cities grew into an important transportation hub with the port forming an important link in the shipping of grain and other products from western Canada through the Great Lakes and the Saint Lawrence Seaway to the east coast and on to Europe. Although they have declined in recent years, forestry and manufacturing played important roles in the regional economy.
On January 1, 1970, the cities of Fort William and Port Arthur merged to become Thunder Bay. Since amalgamation, developments such as Lakehead University, Confederation College of Applied Arts and Sciences, and the reconstruction of Fort William Historical Park as it existed in the early 1800s have increased the community profile as an education centre and tourist destination.