CLASSIFIEDS ADVERTISING SPECIAL ISSUES SPORTS OBITUARIES NORTHERN JOBS TENDERS

ChateauNova

http://www.neas.ca/


NNSL Photo/Graphic


Canadian North

Home page text size buttonsbigger textsmall textText size Email this articleE-mail this page

Tin Can Hill is not just a charming name
'Oh, there were thousands of cans. Oh, truckloads.'

Kevin Allerston
Northern News Services
Published Friday, February 10, 2012

SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
Many parts of Yellowknife earned their names because of a prominent person who lived in the area, others out of desire to recognize a sense of civic duty (Veteran's Memorial Drive is a good example).

NNSL photo/graphic

Yellowknife photographer Bill Braden captured this picture of Ecology North members cleaning up Tin Can Hill during the early 1970s. The area earned its name by being a dumping ground for trash - including a lot of tin cans - by people working at Con Mine. - Bill Braden photo

Perhaps no area of Yellowknife has earned its name more honestly than Tin Can Hill, the unofficial name of the area northeast of Rat Lake.

The area gained its name because of the trash left there by employees of Miramar Con Mine, which began production in 1938 and operated until 2003.

"Now going back to the early years, what happened was that the Con Mine cafeteria was just on the hill overlooking Con Camp in what you would now call the Tin Can Hill area. So what they were doing was simply a matter of dumping their domestic trash into it, in whatever nook and cranny they could," said Ryan Silke, a Yellowknife historian and member of the NWT Mining Heritage Society.

He said the mine only used the area for garbage disposal for the first two or three years of its operation before centralizing its trash into a tailings pond area on the mine site.

"There were a lot of rules in place after about 1940 when the government instituted sanitation ordinances and the mine started thinking more about where they were dumping their trash. So Con collected everything and dumped it into their tailings after that," said Silke.

He said he used to help clean the area as a child with Scouts Canada and that he still returns to the area to look for relics from the past.

"I've spent a lot of time in that area collecting stuff for collecting value and you often find really old bottles. I mean I've found really old beer bottles that still have their labels on them, they're that well preserved," said Silke. "So you can still find some really cool stuff if you dig around these trash piles.

Though the mine changed its practices, many Yellowknifers continued using the area as an informal trash dump.

"These piles are pretty well buried and overgrown in the bush. I mean, most people probably don't know that they're there," said Silke.

Bill Braden, a Yellowknife photographer and MLA for Great Slave from 1999 to 2007, said that while the use of Tin Can Hill as a dump was unfortunate, it was a sign of the times.

"That was how we did things back then," said Braden. "So to me it was not a big deal, it was just the way they did it. Too bad, but it was the way it was done then."

He joined the newly established Ecology North in the early 1970s for one of its cleanup efforts and took pictures of the scene. He recalls several dumptrucks worth of cans and other trash being taken away during the cleanup.

"Oh, there were thousands of cans. Oh, truckloads. In places four or five feet deep, rusted cans and old bottles, clothes and rags, and you name it - whatever kind of junk that would be coming out of a mining camp," said Braden. "The whole area that it covered was quite substantial. Maybe half the size of a hockey rink and various depths."

Braden said he is happy with how Tin Can Hill has changed over the years and that he frequently walks the trails in the area. He said the area has great potential for development.

"I think it has wonderful potential as a recreation area, but I also think it has extraordinary potential as a neighbourhood," said Braden.

E-mailWe welcome your opinions. Click here to e-mail a letter to the editor.