The Lakeview House, an Early Bear Island Hotel
One of Bear Island’s early buildings, which survived until 1973, was the Lakeview House, where the TFN (Temagami First Nation) recreation center is now located. Seen here in a c. 1920s real-photo postcard, it was a two-story substantial L-shaped residence. Area residents as well as what appear to be tourists pose on the porch in this image.
Also known as “Old John Turner’s place,” we were told in an oral history interview that the house was built about 1885 and was constructed of log. This would probably have been just the first story of the building; although two-story log houses exist, they are uncommon. Notice that by the time this photograph was taken by the Canadian National Railways as part of Northern Ontario tourist promotion, clapboard had been applied to the house. Many settlers’ cabins throughout both Canada and the United States were covered with wood siding at the earliest possible opportunity: while clapboard made the building more weather-tight, the primary motivation from a social history perspective was often “keeping up with the Joneses.”
The unused postcard bears a King George V stamp which was issued on 6 June 1930 and printed in Ottawa by the British North American Bank Note Company, Limited, according to the Canadian Postal Archives Database.
Read about a rare Canadian stamp sold recently at auction for over $250,000 USD.
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