The year was 1926. The big news of the day was that a gold rush had broken out in the relatively remote Red Lake area of Northern Ontario. A great number of newspapers and reporters from all over the world traveled to Ontario to cover the great gold rush of 1926. Adventurers, explorers, and gold diggers from all over the world traveled to this remote location to grab their share of fortune, and perhaps fame, at this great gold strike. Soon, professional mining companies set their focus to this literal pot of gold that had seemingly popped out of nowhere with the vague promise of untold riches. Airplanes roared overhead and the barking of dogs could be heard and seen hot on the trail over the frozen lake.
The Ontario Gold Rush was the first commercial gold strike where modern transportation like airplanes were used, giving those who could afford it an obvious edge over those who had to plod along through thick snow and harsh conditions to reach their destination. Unlike the previous gold raids in the world, the adventurers and explorers returned this time with advanced geological mining equipment as opposed to using rudimentary crude tools.
As romantic as it does seem, since that time the gold rush in Ontario has seen a dramatic transformation. Today, taking part in the gold rush has become a great big commercial activity. Instead of braving snow storms and staking claims on their death beds, mining companies now send their representatives, who manage to film their stakes and claims as proof, even though the rule still involves staking claims on the mineral rights of the property. The gold rush is still continuing in Northern Ontario, but the environment has to bear a very heavy price for these encroachments.
In a modern day rush, in September 1996 in the Temagami region of northern Ontario, from staking claims to communicating with headquarters, everything was done smoothly and officially. With growing interest in the gold rush in the Ontario region of Canada, more and more people, teams of geologists and miners are flooding to these locations and as a result, huge areas of pine forests (Ontario's natural resources) are being wiped out gradually. Those days of the gold rush are gone when the stakes were small and the number of claimers was a handful. Today, staking claims is as much of an organized and commercial event as the eventual ownership of the gold filled property.