Find us on Social Media


Volume 16 No. 4

Happy Valentine’s Day, PaBers! We hope everyone is healthy and safe! Now that we are in 2024 and the Groundhog is suggesting (at least in some places) an early spring…looking ahead to summer at the cottage is looking promising!

Thanks to everyone who signed on to hear more about the draft proposals from ToA regarding the Site Alteration and Tree Preservation By Law drafts. Good dialogue and further discussions are summarized below by Katie Findlay.

If you or someone you know (like a young adult or grandchild) would like to get involved with PaBIA’s growing social media platform, we’d love to help new members develop/share some of these skills! Check out Margaret’s blurb below! She’d love to get others involved! It’s a great opportunity to build/grow one’s skill sets!

Membership dues deadline is fast approaching – March 15 is the drop dead date for inclusion in the yearbook listings!


Table of Contents In this Eblast:

PaBIA

  • Update on the new Site Alteration and Tree Preservation By Law Drafts
  • Membership Invoices – Due by March 15th!
  • Marine Patrol 2024 – Deadline this Friday Feb 16.

OHPS

  • History Moment – Emmaline Madigan

OF INTEREST

  • Community GBay Bat Survey
  • GBLT King’s Bursary 2024 – Applications are due by February 23.
  • GBA Update
  • GBB – January Update
  • Yearbook Update
  • In Memoriam – Blair Bongard, Paul Ludwig
  • Lake Michigan-Huron Water Levels – February 12, 2024

PaBIA



The Township of the Archipelago held two Open Houses in January, one in person and one online, to update the community and obtain input on the Draft Site Alteration and Tree Preservation By-Laws. These meetings were one step in an ongoing process that included, in its early stages, a municipal best practice review of other similar jurisdictions. 

The By-Laws are intended to provide a layer of protection to prevent major alterations to the landscape like clear-cutting and rock blasting, which the Township has witnessed recently but currently has no power to regulate. Township staff are continuing to receive feedback over the next couple months, and there is no date set yet for a decision. 

Township staff is engaging thoroughly with community stakeholders through this process, and I encourage anyone who has feedback on the Draft By-Laws to email their specific, constructive comments to Cale Henderson, the Township’s Manager of Development and Environmental Services. Please also feel free to reach out to me, Katie Findlay, PaBIA Director of Ratepayers and Regulatory Affairs. I will continue to share updates with our members through the e-blast. 

The Drafts and all the related information is available on the Site Alteration page of the Township of the Archipelago website.



Marine Patrol Applications Due by Friday

This is your last chance to apply for or tell a young adult you know about Marine Patrol for Summer 2024! Applications close on Friday the 16th.

Do you know someone…

  • who likes spending the summer outdoors in the Pointe au Baril area?
  • who is interested in the natural world?
  • has a desire to work in the Pointe au Baril cottage community?

Please send this eBlast to them! A detailed job description can be found here.



Looking to get connected with our community from anywhere in the world? Follow us on Instagram @pabiagram or Facebook at “Pointe au Baril Islanders Association“. We have a team of volunteers working to share what’s happening in our community from May until September. Over the past few years, members have enjoyed learning more about PaBIA through our social media channels. We post about Marine Patrol’s community and sustainability work, the PaBIA Sailing community, wonders of nature, local events, and other opportunities in our community. 

We are looking forward to seeing you online and on the docks in Pointe au Baril for another memorable summer in 2024.

We are seeking more volunteers to help manage our social media presence. If you’d like to get involved with our social media or have feedback to share, send an email to [email protected] we love to hear from you!



So many members have taken advantage of our online payment methods for getting your dues in by March 15 to be listed in the Yearbook!

This is just a gentle nudge in case you haven’t yet paid! Remember that with your dues, you help to pay for the new larger channel markers, fund our Regattas and support our Marine Patrol!

Two ways to pay online:

• CREDIT CARD through the PaBIA website (there is a surcharge for this service). Fill out the online form and submit.

 OR

• E-TRANSFER from Canadian bank accounts to pabislanders[email protected] (auto-deposit enabled). Please note spelling for auto deposit.

xxxxSend all the payment details listed below to Elise Findlay [email protected]:

  1. Membership dues based on membership level,
  2. Extra items being ordered,
  3. Donations being made, and
  4. Any changes/additions/deletions from the 2023 Yearbook listing you want made for the 2024 Yearbook. Please put “2024 dues/changes for [your name] listing” in the subject line.

OHPS

Brought to you by the Ojibway Historical Preservation Society

To restore, preserve and protect those structures in the Pointe au Baril area designated as historically and architecturally significant

Emmaline was a smart, resourceful and pretty, seventeen-year old who worked in the laundry of the Ojibway Hotel in the summer of 1954.  Six laundry-girls lived behind the hotel in quarters above the large room with wash tubs, ironing boards, and an enormous mangle. It was hard, hot work. But it was also great fun, with shenanigans, summer flirtations and romance. But then something unusual happened. Someone appeared who was not part of the young, happy-go-lucky gang of the hotel staff. Carl Madigan was the lighthouse keeper at Pointe au Baril. “One day, he asked me if I wanted to go for a boat ride,” Emmaline remembers. “So I went. And that was it. We talked for hours in the boat, just floating around in the water. It was love at first sight.”

Emmaline moved into the lighthouse, spent thirty happy years overseeing its operations by Carl’s side, then ten years on her own after Carl passed, some of those with a new love who appeared in her life. Bill Pugsley, a friend, promised Carl he would take good care of Emmaline. Together with Bill, Emmaline continues to welcome visitors to the lighthouse, 70 years after a romantic summer long ago, when a pretty girl met the man of her dreams.

For Emmaline’s full story, see OHPS website.

Happy Valentine’s Day to all!

Carl Madigan
Girls in the Laundry Room
Friends at the laundry line
Bill Pugsley & Emmaline Madigan

HISTORY MOMENT written by Celia Milne, Jane Manning-Marshall, Nancy Lang ~ OHPS Board Members

Of Interest

This survey (see flyer below) will allow Steven Kell and his team to collect some general information on bats in the inlet and surrounding areas to help better understand bats on the islands. Please consider scanning the UR code and filling out the survey. With this information, Steven would like to do a PaBIA program in the future. He and his team hope to visit the top floor of the hotel this summer to see if bats are still using it. Secondly, just hearing some stories for you all about the bats that were there would also be helpful to build the picture they wish to create. Please contact Steven Kell with any questions or would like further information.

Steven Kell, BSc., M.Sc. | Head Biologist 

Species at Risk, Conservation, & Wildlife Programs Coordinator

Mobile: 705-321-6490 / Office: 705-366-2526 ext 232 

Shawanaga First Nation

2 Village Rd. Nobel, ON P0G 1G0



We are now accepting applications for the 2024 King Family Bursary. This $3,500 bursary, funded by Wally and Marilyn King, supports projects that promote knowledge and appreciation of Georgian Bay and the North Channel’s environment, history, communities, or culture. It is open to all disciplines, including but not limited to: science, art, literature, humanities, and more. If you have an idea for a project, we would love to hear from you!

Visit GBLT Bursary for more information and to apply.

Applications are due by February 23rd.





Here is the January GBB News



Here is the latest GBA Update for December!

In Memoriam

Blair Bongard, past owner of A247 and PaBIA member, father of Lynn (Ken) Heikkila and Cindy (Steve Cook) Bongard, December 2023.

Paul Ludwig, past owner of B832 – 5 ‘Lo Sha Ba’, husband of the late Susan Ludwig, father of Laura and John, brother of Bob (Marilyn) Ludwig and Carrie Ludwig, December, 2023

Water Levels

Lakes Michigan/Huron Water Levels February 12, 2024

To better read the charts, please click on the chart for the Daily or Six Month Forecast Water level chart and the corresponding websites


Please support PaBIA’s Yearbook Advertisers 2023

This site’s advertising feature was created to provide assistance for special local information & events for existing Yearbook advertisers only.