The Reminder is making its archives back to 2003 available on our website. Please note that, due to technical limitations, archive articles are presented without the usual formatting.
Here is the third and final part of Trent FrayneÕs ÒThe Town Where Everybody PlaysÓ from the January 4, 1958 issue of MacleanÕs Magazine. * * * On the other hand, the company created out of complete wilderness an unbelievable summer resort and golf course for the residents. The beach forms a horseshoe around one arm of Phantom Lake, a mile southeast of the town. The lake is bordered by a hundred yards of soft fine sand which in turn has a two-hundred-yard border of grass nestled under birch and poplar trees, far enough removed from the companyÕs smoke stack to escape the deadly fumes. The beach was literally created. The company sent a fleet of trucks sixteen miles north of Flin Flon to a sand pit and the trucks transported hundreds of thousands of yards of sand to the edge of the lake in early spring. The sand was dumped across deep stretches of ice and snow. When spring came and the ice melted, the sand settled at ground level, dried out in the sun and formed the beach. Tons of sand are transported every spring to the waterÕs edge and the beach refurbished. The operation must be conducted in spring because in the words of Howard McIntosh, assistant to the general manager, ÒThe trucks would sink out of sight in the bog if we waited for the spring thaw.Ó The company operates greenhouses near Phantom Lake in which growth is started in March and then transplanted on June 15 to provide gardens of flowers and plants around the beach area. Music from the local radio station floats out of speakers hidden in the trees. There are docks and slides and boathouses and bathhouses and locker rooms and a dance pavilion, all painted sparkling red and white. Shallow areas are roped off for small children, and there are diving boards in the deeper sections. There are softball diamonds and tennis courts, and thereÕs a camping area with an ice-house and stoves and lockers at which a family can throw up a tent and camp for two weeks for fifty cents. All the other facilities at Phantom Lake are free. The nine-hole golf course is another phenomenon. It was fashioned out of rock and muskeg. The course, a couple of miles from the plant, now has greens of Washington bent grass, and fairways of Kentucky bluegrass. Howard McIntosh, the company spokesman, says that Òas long as you use a commercial fertilizer in the proper proportion, you can grow grass on damned near anything,Ó and Flin FlonÕs golf course is the living proof. It took three years to build, presented drainage problems as the engineers endeavored to follow ravines in the rock outcroppings to clear the muskeg, and turned up thousands of tons of stones and boulders which potential golfers helped clear in work parties armed with rakes and shovels and their bare hands. A pump at nearby Phantom Lake feeds a pipeline that winds across the course to supply water for the fairways and greens. A rambling two-storey clubhouse provides locker-room, dining and recreation facilities, and membership dues total $32.50 for a married couple, $25.00 for a single man and $7.50 for juniors. This goes toward upkeep and improvements; the company covers all deficits. The company provides things like the golf course and the summer resort, Howard McIntosh explained in a recent tour of the area, Òto keep the people happy.Ó ÒWeÕre pretty remote,Ó he amplified. ÒThere can be monotony. But if the people are happy, the work gets done.Ó There was nothing but harsh rock and muskeg and hundreds of lakes in the Flin Flon area until thirty years ago when the Hudson Bay Mining and Smelting Company was formed to operate a property discovered in January of 1915 by a pioneer prospector named Tom Creighton. Creighton named the town. See 'Explor...' on pg. Continued from pg. While he was exploring the area with a group of prospectors he came upon a tattered book called The Sunless City in which the hero, one Flintabattey Flonatin, descended through a bottomless lake to a subterranean world where gold was the common metal. When Creighton made his discovery he reportedly told his friends that he felt like Flintabattey Flonatin. ÒIÕm going to call my find Flin Flon,Ó he announced. It was a frontier town when the mine began to be developed in December 1927, with tent homes and saloons and gambling rooms and ladies of pleasure, a town whose main street oozed dirty water from its muskeg. Jack Freedman came soon after. A small voluble cigar-chewing man of sixty-eight, Freedman was a newsie on the CNR when the spur line first reached Flin Flon. Now he owns a confectionery store and newsstand with a slanting floor on the main street called the Fall In because, as he explains, ÒYouÕve got to practically do that to get in the joint.Ó He has a large blackboard outside his premises on which he chalks daily homilies upbraiding the town council or censuring the mayor or applauding the hockey team. ÒEverybody kowtows to the company, including the council,Ó explains Freedman. ÒI speak my mind.Ó To a visitor in Flin Flon, it seems that most people speak their minds. TheyÕre obviously aware of their isolation because when they speak of taking a trip they always use the word Òout.Ó But, at the same time, they have far more time for such extracurricular activities as curling or golf. Saul Nathanson, the manager of the Rex Theatre, one of the two movie houses in town, has left Flin Flon five times but heÕs always returned. ÒIÕve lived in Saskatoon, Edmonton, Lloydminster, Dawson Creek and Calgary, but IÕve always come back,Ó he says. ÒYou feel youÕre part of something here. For example, we all felt we were personally connected with the Bombers as they made their way toward the Memorial Cup. It really wasnÕt the Bombers; it was us showing the country what we can do.Ó
