The region designated “The Keewatin Area” comprises that part of what was formerly the provisional district of Keewatin which lies east of the province of Saskatchewan, south of the 60th parallel of north latitude, west of James bay and southwest and west of Hudson bay. Its southern limits are defined by the former (up to 1912) northern boundary of Manitoba and the former (up to the same date) northwesterly boundary of Ontario.
During the first session of the 12th Parliament of Canada (1911-12) the whole of this territory was annexed to the two provinces lying immediately to the south of it, Ontario and Manitoba. The dividing line between the portion of the former district of Keewatin annexed to the province of Ontario, and that annexed to the province of Manitoba, is described in the legislation extending the boundaries of the two provinces as a line from the extreme north end of the eastern boundary of the province of Manitoba as it existed at the time of the extension of boundaries, “thence continuing due north along the same meridian to the intersection thereof with the centre of the road allowance on the twelfth base line of the system of Dominion Land Surveys; thence northeasterly in a right line to the most eastern point of Island lake, as shown in approximate latitude 53° 30′ and longitude 93° 40′ on the railway map of the Dominion of Canada, published, on the scale of thirty-five miles to one inch, in the year one thousand nine hundred and eight, by the authority of the Minister of the Interior; thence northeasterly in a right line to the point where the eighty-ninth meridian of west longitude intersects the southern shore of Hudson bay; thence easterly and southerly following the shore of the said bay to the point where the northerly boundary of the province of Ontario as established under the said Act intersects the shore of James bay.”
At the date of the final revision of these pages for the press, the division of the territory was too recent to permit of effective separate treatment of newest Ontario and newest Manitoba as separate territorial units, and any attempt to effect such separate treatment, it was felt, would only result in confusion.
The “Northern Saskatchewan Region” comprises the whole of the province of Saskatchewan, north of the surveyed area.
The “Northern Alberta Region” comprises the whole of the province of Alberta, north and east of the surveyed area.
The “Mackenzie River Region” includes all the territory in the great Mackenzie basin, north of the province of Alberta, extending northward to Beaufort sea, west to the boundary of Yukon territory, and eastward to the basin of Coppermine river, that of Yellowknife river, a line in prolongation of the latter stream across Great Slave lake and following the right bank of Slave river to the northern boundary of Alberta.
The area comprised within the designation “The Barren Lands” includes the immense territory extending eastwards from that last defined to Hudson bay, and including the bare, treeless, but wrongly called “Barren Lands.”
With this brief and general outline of the various districts before him, the reader will more readily follow the attempt to present in a systematic and intelligible form all the data of practical value available regarding the varied natural resources of this vast territory.
| [1] | At the Semple murder trials at York in October, 1818, Sherwood, the Northwest Company’s counsel, ironically described Red river valley (Manitoba) as the “land of milk and honey, where nothing, not even a blade of corn, will ripen.” |