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Maria Martin

Maria Martin (nee Beatty) has the very possible distinction of being the first woman to settle in Kirkland Lake. Born Maria Beatty in 1869 in the Township of Nipissing in central Ontario, her family was among the first settlers in the Parry Sound district.

Marrying Tom Martin, the couple remained in Nipissing, raising four children before moving north in 1904, joining the silver rush to Cobalt. Tom arrived at Kirkland Lake just after Christmas in 1911, living in a tent near the lake on the Teck-Hughes property while building his 'Stopping Place' - a rudimentary but homey split-level boarding house with the lower level serving as a stable and the upper level as a hotel.

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Maria Martin
circa 1950
Kirkland Lake, Ontario, Canada


Credits:
Image loaned from MNH Auxiliary (Women of Kirkland Lake 2012 Exhibit)

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The family reunited in 1913 when Maria and the four children; Jean (24), Gordon (20), Robert (18) and Elizabeth (15), joined their father in Kirkland Lake, a small community then consisting of about 200 persons living in tents, shacks and log cabins at the Tough-Oakes mine and the Teck-Hughes properties and other holes in the bush. One cabin of significance on the Lake Shore property was the abode of Harry Oakes.

The Martins were truly pioneers surviving primitively without plumbing systems, utilizing wood burning stoves for heating, cooking and washing, traveling muddy trails, fighting off black flies and disease, and enduring long cold winters and quiet isolation. Nevertheless, they successfully looked after themselves and readily served the needs of their clients which numbered 15 to 20 at a time. Legend has it that Harry Oakes was a boarder for a short period, while his cabin was being built.

Tom Martin died in 1927 and Maria in 1961 in her 92nd year at the Kirkland and District Hospital, following a lengthy illness. Both now rest peacefully in the Kirkland Lake cemetery.