THE HISTORY OF A&A

Written by Armin Grigaitis

One of my earliest family camping memories includes visions of my parents packing up our car with three young kids, a 14-foot Peterborough Cedar Strip boat and a reliable 10 HP Johnson outboard motor. I recall how my excitement intensified at the sight of the Canadian Shield just north of Waubaushene. When we crossed over the Moon River bridge on HWY 501/69, my mother, who had an amazing voice, would always sing “Moon River” better than Andy Williams.

Lake Naiscoot and French River were two of our favourite places to camp. Once we arrived, we would launch our heavily laden boat at the local dock and begin our trek. These trips were always magic, and depending on how far the chosen campsite was, three very tired kids would fall asleep in the back of the boat to the music of the 10 HP Johnson. Our campsites didn’t have numbers or amenities beyond shore locations that were level enough to pitch a tent, but we built fires without burning the bush down. We always had enough to eat, living on fish, instant mashed potatoes, canned vegetables and fresh blueberries.

It was an amazing and formative part of my childhood. As an adult, I recognize how fortunate I was to have had these experiences with my resourceful, loving parents who were skilled outdoors people and fierce conservationists. Those early experiences helped to develop my strong appreciation for Georgian Bay and the surrounding area. It set the foundation for my future endeavours in business and settling my family here.

Our family camping trips continued until 1972, when my parents, in collaboration with three close family friends, purchased 106 acres of raw land from the Danforth family with 1,300 feet of prime shoreline in Minnow Bay/North Honey Harbour. The group immediately applied for a severance in hopes of building four cottages. Over the next two years, we spent most weekends and all summer working on the cottage, dock and septic system. With the help of Andy Nogy, one of the property partners, we built a makeshift but efficient pontoon barge by welding together 45-gallon drums. The barge was only eight feet by 20 feet, but we used it to transport all the building materials, one load at a time.

During those two years, Andy and I often mused about starting a construction business. Andy worked for a large metal fabrication company but was charmed by the idea of getting out of the city to work in “North Country.” In 1975, when I was 19 years old, Andy and I formed a simple partnership and began the construction of our first barge that was 20 feet wide, 40 feet long and five feet deep. The removable “engine compartment” housed a Detroit Diesel motor and a Hamilton Jet drive. Luckily, I was mechanically inclined and could remove an old diesel motor from a transport truck. I spent many long hours mounting the motor in the barge and coupling it to the jet drive with a good deal of help from Emery, Peggy and John O’Rourke, the owners of E. O’Rourke Storage and Marina (now known as Nautilus Marina). I worked at the O’Rourke Marina doing boat repair jobs and pumping gas. They were very good to me, allowing me to work on the barge after hours.

By the end of the summer, the engine compartment and barge were ready. The barge was shipped in two sections to Honey Harbour, where it was welded together as one section. Once the barge was launched, we realized that the motor, although in good running condition, was underpowered to propel the barge at a reasonable hull speed.

Day after day, we watched Gerry White’s and Paul Macey's barges pass us by. It taught us how to be patient! On the bright side, our barge was larger than our competitors and had greater carrying capacity. Even though we were slower, we could deliver more material per trip.

Our first base of operations was at the courtesy of Dave’s Marina with Dave and Muriel Toby in South Bay. They gave us a great location at the back of the marina, away from the other boats, where we could load the barge and not bother anyone. Or so we thought.

About two months after we had the site ready for barge loading, and we had spent almost $15,000 of borrowed funds on a large stockpile of sand, Dave Toby received a stop work order from the Township prohibiting us from using the

Landing. Our hearts sank.

The following week, Andy, Dave and I attended our first meeting at the town council. The honourable Bert Wood was the mayor at the time and was a familiar face to me. He owned a marina in North Bay where my dad kept his boat and where I had spent two summers working part-time before working for the O’Rourke’s. He had a very official presence, and everyone called him Your Worship. In the meeting, a clerk read letters from several neighbours objecting to the barge landing. They stated a barge landing was a “change of use,” and we would need to rezone the property to allow barges to be loaded there.

Before the clerk could finish reading the last sentence in the letter, Dave Toby jumped to his feet, waving an old photo from the 1950s.

“BERT!” he yelled.

I thought Dave would be thrown from the council chambers for not calling him Your Worship. Dave continued to tell the council that he had an old scow, a wide-beamed sailing dinghy, in 1955, and that he used to haul cattle and sheep to Cow Island in South Bay to graze for the summer. There was a short moment of silence, and then all of the Council, including Mayor Wood, burst out in laughter. The mayor asked Dave Toby to approach the bench and show his photo of the cattle in the scow. Everyone studied the photo carefully, and Bert said, “Looks like you’ve got some good proof there, Dave.”

A resolution was drafted, signed and unanimously passed. Once the blood returned to our faces, we jumped to our feet and thanked the mayor and council.

Afterwards, Andy and I did anything and everything to get some projects. As unknown tradespeople in Honey Harbour, it was not always easy to get meaningful work. While we watched our competitors go by with their fully loaded barges, we raked leaves, fixed docks and boathouses and did small renovations. Our new barge did a lot of sitting around. Eventually, we caught a break and got our first larger-scale project from Richard Altvater in Big Dog Channel. He hired us to build approximately 1,000 feet of gabion stone retaining walls to replace a failing old stone wall on his waterfront. It was hard manual labour installing 800 tonnes of stone in wire baskets, but we were steadfast and, as a result, got some other meaningful work out of the exposure.

We used the landing at Dave’s Marina for the next four years until it was sold to a new owner who preferred that we move our operation elsewhere. Around that time, Andy decided to leave the partnership because he missed being with his family in Waterloo full-time. We came to a very reasonable settlement, and I continued working alone. A few months later, the bank interest rates went up to 22%, and like everyone who has a memory of needing to borrow money at that historic time, I held my breath and persevered. At that time, there was a lack of options for barge sites. I temporarily worked between Brandy’s Island, courtesy of Gord and Sheila Brandon, and the old government dock landing at the Delawana Inn. After a few months, I approached Paul Macey, who owned the barge site and shop currently owned by Dennis Robitaille, about renting a space from him. Paul sold his barge and was semi-retired, so he said yes. Paul and I had a symbiotic relationship, always willing to help each other.

In addition to working at building my business, I was a volunteer firefighter for a few years. One night, just before dark, we received a fire call regarding a cottage fire on Smith’s Island. I jumped in my boat with my fire gear and boated to Smith’s Island, where the flames were visible from miles away. Chief Norm Boon arrived with Jack Legault in a water taxi, along with a few more volunteers. Together, we began the task of putting the fire out. The fire had done significant damage in the thirty minutes or so it took everyone to arrive, and, as a result, the cottage was a total loss. The owner, Ed Smith, arrived later and watched in dismay. The following week, Ed met me in town and asked if I would be interested in taking on the job of the fire clean-up for the insurance company. I agreed, and we cleaned things up nicely under Ed’s direction. Although he was a very stern employer and had a gruff disposition, I soon discovered that he had a heart of gold.

Later that fall, Ed stopped in to see me on a job site on Deer Island.