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ce courtesy McLean Mil

e Pictured is the McLean Mill near Port Alberni with the man-made log

pond. Photo taken in 1938. The mill operated until 1965.

Port Alberni to get major attraction
with May opening of McLean Mill

his summer history buffs

will get a chance to visit a

one-of-a kind place near

Port Alberni on Vancou-

ver Island. On July 1,
there will be an official opening of
the McLean Mill national historical
site which will represent the culmi-
nation of years of efforts to bring a
part of the forest industry’s past to
Canadians.

Situated about 10 kilometers
northeast of the forest industy-
based community on Vancouver
Island, the McLean Mill site will
offer history fans a sample of how
life really was in the early days.

The first mill was built on the site
in 1925, opening for business a year
later and kept in operation until it
closed in 1965. Left behind were
over 30 structures, including an
original steam powered mill, vari-
ous maintenance shops, residential
buildings, along with a mill pond, a
fish ladder and a rail siding.

Local 1-85 President Monty
Mearns says the site is and will con-
tinue be an important historical ref-
erence for I.W.A. members, their
families, the community and for
Canadians in general.

“This particular mill reflects a
part of our past that you only see in
pictures,” he says. “It’s like it used
to be in the 1930’s. Long before the
MacMillan Bloedel’s came along
around the time of the (Second
World) war, there were a number of
smaller, independent operations
that first built our communities. It
was only during the war years and
the 1950’s that the independents
got crowded out.”

“For the last 40-50 years we’ve
mostly seen just major employers in
the community (i.e. MacMillan
Bloedel and now Weyerhaueser).
The McLean Mill offers us a quality
of our past that we don’t see any
more, because the multinational
corporations, don’t have much to
reflect the past,” said Mearns.

“This (historic site) is indicative
of the roots of the I.W.A. and of the
local union,” he added.

In 1989 the mill was recognized
as a national historic site by the

Historic Sites and Monuments Board
of Canada. In fact, today it is the
only remaining site that is repre-
‘sentative of the evolution of the
B.C. Forest Industry.

It is owned by the city of Port
Alberni and is supported by the
Regional District of Alberni-Clay-
oquot, the Province of British Colum-
bia (through Forest Renewal B.C.)
and the Government of Canada,
which have all donated monies to
develop the historic tourist attrac-
tion. Over $6 million has been spent
on the site to date.

Coupled with the mill’s reopening
will be access to the site via an old
steam locomotive (restored by the
Port Alberni Historical Society) that
will leave from the city’s waterfront
district (see photo opposite page) with
two or three passenger cars in tow.
The train will travel about 5 miles up
the Esquimalt-Nanaimo mainline.

Work began on rehabilitating the

McLEAN MILU Nath ,
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site in 1995, after MacMillan Bloedel
donated the lands a year earlier. A
dam was rebuilt near the mill pond
and a salmon hatching facility and
ladder where put into place on Kit-
suskis Creek.

In 1997, reconstruction of the
actual mill buildings began follow-
ing an extensive labelling and cata-

° Getting the mill’s double circular saw into running condition are mill-
Continued on page thirteen rights Carey Smood (front) and Keith Young.

12/LUMBERWORKER/APRIL, 2000