Thunder Bay

Anishinaabe peoples, among them the Ojibwe, have long lived at the head of Lake Superior. French fur traders built posts on the Kaministiquia River in 1683 and 1717, both later abandoned, and in 1803 the Montreal-based North West Company made Fort William its mid-continent depot for the fur trade. In 1849 Jesuits founded a mission on the river, and under the Robinson Treaty of 1850 a reserve was set aside for the Ojibwe south of the river. A few miles north, a construction depot for the road to the Red River Colony was named Prince Arthur's Landing in 1870 and renamed Port Arthur by the Canadian Pacific Railway in 1883.

The railway set off a long rivalry. After a tax dispute and Port Arthur's seizure of a locomotive in 1889, the CPR moved its staff and facilities to Fort William, which boomed while Port Arthur slumped after its silver mines failed. The Prairie wheat boom then lifted both towns: rail lines and grain elevators multiplied, Port Arthur built Canada's first municipally owned electric street railway in 1892, and the twin cities claim the world's first use of daylight saving time, in 1908. Pulp and paper mills followed from 1917, and the Canadian Car and Foundry plant built Hawker Hurricane fighters during the Second World War.

On 1 January 1970 the two cities merged; a referendum chose the name Thunder Bay by a narrow plurality over "Lakehead". Since then trucking, the shift of grain exports to Pacific ports and the decline of forestry have closed elevators and mills, and the city has rebuilt itself as a centre of health care, education and government.

Thunder Bay's identity comes from its isolation and its mix of peoples. Finnish immigrants made it the home of the largest concentration of people of Finnish origin in Canada, and halls such as the Finnish Labour Temple, Scandinavia House, the Italian Cultural Centre and the Polish Legion reflect the immigrant communities that worked the railways, docks and mills. Saunas are common. The city also has a large Indigenous population, and the Thunder Bay Art Gallery is Northern Ontario's largest gallery specialising in contemporary Indigenous art.

The city was named a Cultural Capital of Canada in 2003. The Thunder Bay Symphony Orchestra, founded in 1960, is the only professional orchestra between Winnipeg and Toronto, Magnus Theatre has staged plays since 1971, and film festivals run through the year. Local customs include the shag, a combined shower and stag party held to celebrate an engagement, which originated here, and the Sleeping Giant appears on the coat of arms and the city flag, while the city logo is Animikii, the thunderbird.

Outdoor life is central. The Canadian Shield and the lake put hiking, skiing and paddling on the doorstep, and the city has hosted the 1981 Canada Summer Games, the 1995 Nordic World Ski Championships, the Scotties Tournament of Hearts in 2022 and the Women's Baseball World Cup in 2024. It also runs six indoor ice rinks and dozens of outdoor ones each winter.

The 2021 census counted 108,843 people in the city and 123,258 in the census metropolitan area, which includes surrounding townships and the Fort William First Nation. Indigenous people made up 14.1 per cent of the city's population at the census, a figure thought to be a substantial undercount. The city keeps two distinct civic identities, Port Arthur in the north and Fort William in the south, separated by the Intercity area where much business has moved.

As the largest city in north-western Ontario, Thunder Bay is the region's commercial, administrative and medical centre. Its biggest employers are public: the city, the regional hospital, the school board and the provincial government. Lakehead University, Confederation College and the western campus of the Northern Ontario School of Medicine, along with a law school, anchor its knowledge economy; a paper company is the largest private employer, and an Alstom plant builds transit vehicles. Shipments through the port have stabilised, and it remains an important part of the St. Lawrence Seaway, though grain traffic is far below its heyday.

The city faces serious problems. It had the highest per-capita homicide rate of any Canadian city from 2012 to 2014 and from 2016 to 2019, and set a record of 15 homicides in 2022. Daily life is shaped by long, cold winters, long drives and a strong attachment to the lake and the bush beyond the city limits.

Thunder Bay's best-known food is the Persian, a deep-fried sweet roll shaped like a cinnamon bun and topped with a pink icing, especially popular here and unrelated to Persia despite its name. Locals eat it as it comes or split, buttered and grilled, and the Persian Man, with two locations, is the name most associated with it.

Finnish cooking has left a deep mark. The Hoito, a co-operative restaurant opened in 1918 in the basement of the Finnish Labour Temple on Bay Street, was famous for its Finnish pancakes and ran for more than a century until it closed during the pandemic in March 2020; the building was badly damaged by fire in December 2021, and the hall is being rebuilt. The Bay and Algoma neighbourhood around it still has bakeries, cafés such as the Calico Coffeehouse, and restaurants.

The lake and the forest supply the rest. Lake Superior and the inland lakes provide fish such as pickerel and whitefish, and Anishinaabe communities in the north-west harvest manoomin, wild rice, by canoe. Local breweries, among them one named after the Sleeping Giant, serve beer in taprooms around the city, and diners and pubs cater to a population that eats heartily through long winters.