Part miner, part tour guide

John Wiens worked at the Steeprock iron mine, from 1952 to 1979. When he arrived at the deep red pit, 10 km outside Atikokan, in northwestern Ontario, he took a job as a truck driver for $1.47 per hour. When the mine closed in 1979, he was a 56-year-old balling disk operator making nearly $14 per hour. Those were good days.

Wiens still lives in Atikokan and acts as the town’s unofficial tour guide at Steeprock.

The 76-year-old has shown the site to about 20 people over the past two summers and recently guided several scientists and geologists who wanted to see how the mine had rehabilitated itself.

“I had a bunch of earth scientists out there, and that made me a little uncomfortable,” recalls Wiens. But the veteran miner was able to draw on his experience and hold his own with the scholars.

A few years ago, when Steeprock bus tours were offered during Atikokan’s centennial, organizers called upon Wiens to narrate the tour, or, as he says “guys paid five bucks apiece to ride the bus and listen to me.”

It wasn’t always easy to go back to the mine.

“When the mine closed, I didn’t go back for about six or seven years afterwards,” he says. “And then when I worked for the Ministry of Natural Resources, we needed some rock to make boat landings and the boss sent me out there to look for some. I found it very emotional.”

Three or four times a week, he still has coffee with a few guys from the mine. They sit around a table and reminisce about the time they spent at Steeprock. They talk of the pranksters who nailed lunch boxes to the bench, the hard work, and the red dirt that often covered them from head to toe. They look back fondly on their youth, which was spent toiling in one of Canada’s greatest iron mines.

Things started in 1897. The Geological Survey of Canada indicated that Steeprock Lake held a “hematite of good quality, which appears to be generally covered by the lake.”

But it was not until 1939 that Steeprock Iron Mines was established, under the leadership of Joseph Errington, a mine developer from Sudbury. The company was listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange with 375,000 shares at $1 apiece.

Heavy ground water made progress slow, and it was determined that two of the three arms of Steeprock Lake would need to be drained and that a dam be built on Marmion Lake, which flowed into Steeprock. Water from Marmion Lake would then be diverted to a body of water downstream by an underground tunnel. The fish would have to be taken from the lake and shipped to market in Montreal. In addition, roads would need to be built, telephone lines brought in, and an ore-loading dock constructed at Port Arthur, Ont. It was a costly undertaking.

Cyrus Eaton, a famous philanthropist and financier, came on-board in 1942 and bankrolled the project with help from special war-time tax concessions. In October, the first load of ore was taken from the Errington mine and transported by train to Fort Frances, Ont., on its way to refineries in Superior, Wis.

All in all, 34 million tonnes of ore were mined when operations ceased in 1979. The mine generated $2.3 billion, and that does not include the Caland Ore Co., a subsidiary of Inland Steel, which leased the east arm of Steeprock Lake and began shipping ore in 1960. It is estimated that the whole project involved moving twice as much earth as was moved during the building of the Panama Canal.

Today, one would never know the area was once filled with heavy machinery, and hundreds of workers. Shawn Allaire, manager of the nearby Atikokan Mining Attraction, says that when she first saw Steeprock she was captivated by its beauty. “When I bring a friend from Thunder Bay and I get them to drive me out [to the mine], they are as astonished as I am at the majesty of it.” Allaire has even created a web site dedicated to the history of Steeprock(steeprock.freeservers.com).

Wiens doesn’t need a web site; in his mind he constantly relives his days at the mine.

He worked on graters, bulldozers, shovels and the pelletizing plant.

“I never turned down promotions,” he says. “Sometimes I took less money to get a promotion. I wanted to learn, I always loved heavy equipment. I enjoyed working. I always have. After the mine closed, I kept that work ethic.”

Wiens landed a job with the Ministry of Natural Resources after Steeprock and says most of his fellow workers found jobs too.

“There was nobody that needed to worry about getting work when the mines closed; they had the experience. Steeprock was one of the best proving grounds there was for men and machinery. They trained all their own people.”

When he and his wife Violet arrived in Atikokan, they had one child; they now have four, all of whom are grown up. They still live in Atikokan and want nothing more than to stay put. Steeprock has served Wiens and his family well.

“It has given me a good family life,” he maintains. “We have no intention of going anywhere.”