Adieu to a giant in the district

At the opening of the Noden Causeway in 1965, a former editor of the Fort Frances Times wrote, “We do not normally like to concede that one or more of our close acquaintances may possess special aptitudes. It is a trait of human nature to take for granted our neighbours and the persons who we know personally and meet frequently.
“George Armstrong, as a result of the companies he operates in Fort Frances, has reached stature in the road construction business.”
George, in constructing much of the road connecting Fort Frances to Atikokan and the rest of the province, became a community giant. George became a regional builder.
From Carberry and Dauphin in Manitoba to Marathon, Ont., from the U.S. border to a point 400 miles north, the George Armstong Company has left the mark of progress. Constructing roads for the province, for logging, paper, and mining companies, the company has helped open up Northwestern Ontario.
George left school at 10 to work on the family farm. As he said, “Education isn’t everything . . . the lack of formal education doesn’t mean you can’t learn.”
His journey into construction began when he was hired to cut a road allowance in Dance. That lead, at the age of 16, to his driving a team of horses to haul 1.5 yard loads of gravel about district roads. At 10¢ an hour, 10 hours a day, George could earn $30 a month.
Shortly thereafter, he bought the first bobtail truck in the district to haul wood. It speeded up the delivery of wood. Others were added regularly, and George earned a reputation of being a skilled hauling contractor.
For one project, the fleet grew at one point to more than 100 trucks operating 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Some of those trucks were leased.
In 1941, he travelled to Manitoba, where the Canadian government was constructing air fields to train flyers for the war in Europe.
Returning to the district later that year, George took to constructing logging roads in the Flanders area for J.A. Mathieu, who had his sawmill located on Couchiching reserve.
George developed a reputation for building good roads yet doing it economically. And three short years later, he was constructing roads to develop the Steep Rock Lake mine property in Atikokan. His companies were involved in building rail beds to the mine, draining Steep Rock Lake, and constructing dams to divert water around the lake.
The new town of Atikokan was being created, and the George Armstrong Company was there putting in place the sewer and water lines for the expanding mining community.
It was during this time that George built a readi-mix concrete plant in Atikokan.
In 1948, George Armstrong purchased the gravel pits in west Fort Frances. In 1956, the province announced that a road was going to be built joining Fort Frances through to Atikokan.
It is written, “No man anywhere, certainly not in the district, has walked more miles over muskeg, swamp, hills, and valleys, through the roughest terrain, in search of gravel, than has George Armstrong. He probably knows where every gravel deposit in the district of Rainy River is located, whether or not it is accessible, and what it would cost to move it.”
And during the construction of Highway 11 from Fort Frances to Atikokan, George’s company probably supplied the majority of the granular fill for the road bed. George Armstrong Co. Ltd. also supplied all the concrete for the bridges along the route.
But perhaps George’s greatest feat was the raising of the road bed over Rainy Lake. He used the ice as a platform and with cranes in place, lifted each section on top of the pylons. The construction technique was written up in engineering magazines around the world.
George looked to the future. Most of the homes in Fort Frances with concrete basements have had the readi-mix materials supplied by George Armstrong Company. Many of the sewer and water lines in the subdivisions of Fort Frances were excavated by the same company.
And several of those subdivisions actually were created and developed by George Armstrong Company.
During the construction of Highway 11 east, near Bear’s Pass, following road way blasting, George recognized an outcropping of copper deposit.
His hobby was mining. And he staked mining claims throughout the area. The hobby grew, and George acquired drills and equipment to prove the claim. Over time, he found quantities of zinc, silver, copper, gold, and lead–though none of the minerals in large enough quantities to start a mine.
All but one section of the road from Dryden to Fort Frances were constructed by the George Armstrong Company.
George Armstrong was a quiet philanthropist. He had adopted two Indonesian children and provided money to raise them. And travelled to Indonesia to meet them.
He was a loyal friend and employer. Over decades, George quietly provided funds to many of his old employees who fell on hard times.
George was recognized as he travelled throughout the district in his Cadillac. His “caddy” was his 4X4. Always at hand in the trunk were a pair of construction boots, shovel, and hard hat, and in winter he added snowshoes.
The car was his office, and George was on the go from before sunrise until often after dark as he visited–almost on a daily basis–his operations.
Arriving at a construction site, George was dressed in a suit, white shirt, “bolo” tie, and hat. He stood above the rest. He was a builder.