Arthur Milnes
Northern News Services

NNSL (Nov 23/98) - Throughout his life in the North, John Denison made a habit of doing things people said couldn't be done.

In fact, he did it so well, and so often, it began to look easy.

As the part-owner of Byers Transport, Denison was one of the pioneers who built a series of ice roads in the 1960s which forever changed the face of Northern development.

Because of these pioneering efforts, Denison, now 82, was brought to august Rideau Hall in Ottawa last month to have the Order of Canada placed around his neck by Gov. Gen. Romeo LeBlanc.

"He said we sure needed guys like you to help open the North," Denison said of his exchange with the Queen's representative to Canada.

"I didn't know a thing about it (his award) until the letter arrived from Ottawa."

Reached at his retirement home in Kelowna, B.C. last week, Denison said he's is particularly proud of his work on one Northern ice road.

"The one to Tundra Mine was important," he said. "People said you couldn't go into the Barren Lands because of the wind and cold... Most of the reason I went was because I didn't know you couldn't -- we just did it."

Working on the lengthy road between Yellowknife and Great Bear Lake was another important job, he said.

Denison said the secret to a successful ice road is working with, not against, the snow. A key is packing it down in order to get the air out of it.

Another time when he confounded the naysayers was when his muskeg tractor went through the ice at Prosperous Lake.

"We lost it and it went down about 350 feet," he said. "People said you couldn't get it out (from that depth). (But) I was in a bind and I had to get it."

Not surprisingly, he did, the salvage taking 10 days before the tractor was successfully brought up from the icy depths.

Denison's work was the subject of a book published in the 1970s and he is a legend among many still living in Yellowknife and far afield.