Lynx Images Inc.

320-page book & 72-minute video

This breathtaking film and book reveals Lake Superior as a world belonging to the gods. The human experience here is one of challenge- our attempts to exploit this place have left ghost towns and other fading marks on these wild and rugged shores. Rare archival footage and photographs, voices from the past, stunning cinematography and a haunting score enrich these compelling sagas. The book includes over 200 sites, maps and archival photographs.
96pp.photos & illus.sc 1999
book and video package $49.95
book $24.95 and video $29.95

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About the book and video...

The Book

An inland ocean of incredible power, Superior is an ancient and mysterious dwelling place for the gods. Its spirit rises far above that of an ordinary lake. Explorers, dreamers, and industrialists moved in to plunder and possess, but Superior took them all to task.

In Superior: Under the Shadow of the Gods, the history of the lake's Canadian shore is explored in all its drama. The book is filled with compelling stories of the adventures, failures, triumphs, and deceits of those who came to fulfill their dreams.

Tales of ghost villages, islands, shipwrecks, the railway and POW camps will fascinate anyone intrigued by the world's largest freshwater lake. For those travelling by land or by water, the book's 200 sites, maps and archival photographs will enrich your journey from Sault Ste. Marie past Thunder Bay to the Minnesota border.

 

The Video

The accompanying 72-minute video takes you to places on this magnificent lake you might otherwise never see. Superior's past and present come alive through remarkable 16mm and aerial photography, archival footage and photographs. The film is about the human experience on Lake Superior. It is about the ancient gods who still haunt these water and rocky headland. And it is a celebration of the mythic giant.

To read highlights from the book click on title

• Superior Shoal, an under water graveyard--a mountain whose peak, lurking just under the surface of the water directly in the shipping lanes, was only discovered in the 1930s. It is likely responsible for many unaccountable ship disappearances over the years
• German P.O.W. Camps--Superior's rough and rugged North Shore made escape far worse than imprisonment.
• Silver Islet Mine-- Built on an 90-foot island, hundreds of men worked over a thousand feet under the lake in this dangerous location.
• The Long March--"Two hundered miles of engineering impossibilities" --Van Horne's comment was about building the Superior portion of the Canadian Pacific Railway. Railway construction along this rugged shore nearly bankrupted the country, and our national railway "from sea to sea" almost didn't happen. That was until Van Horn pitched a wild plan, a plan that jeapordised the lives Canadian soldiers.

Reviews

The Video

Gloriously visual and absorbing. It sets out to show that the history of Lake Superior is filled with drama and there's plenty of spectacle here. Superior is a superior film.

--John Doyle, The Globe and Mail

 

A startlingly dramatic documentary about the lost communities of Lake Superior. The photography is so gorgeous it will keep you watching, but the surprize is the story holds up right to the end...brilliant cinematography...imaginative direction.

--Jim Bawden, The Toronto Star

 

The Video and Book

 

Their ability to present our history in lively and vivid terms serves them well in both book and video. Lake Superior's history is an ambitious project to take on, but these historians and cinematographers have performed brilliantly.

--Linda Turk, The Chronicle-Journal, Thunder Bay

 

To research the book, and to produce a 72-minute companion video, the authors and filmmakers travelled by boat along the entire Canadian coast of the lake to collect stories and images, and to complete their research...The result is a remarkable collection of stories that shed light on the past of six regions from Sault Ste. Marie on the St. Mary's River to the US border past Thunder Bay at Pigeon River.

--Laszlo Buhasz, Travel Section, The Globe and Mail

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