100 years and beyond – Dryden Mill

Abstract

The Dryden pulp mill in northwestern Ontario managed to thrive for most of the past century, despite periodic hardships. This is credited to the desire of successive owning companies to not only improve production and ensure economic viability, but also to sustain the resources on which the mill depends and better the lives of employees and people in the surrounding communities. Beginning production in 1913, the Dryden mill was the first kraft pulp mill in Ontario, and only the fourth in Canada. Over its first decade the mill prospered but financial difficulties that began in 1921 resulted in a long period of receivership. The mill emerged from receivership in 1928 but the Great Depression that started with the stock market crash of 1929 caused the mill's storage areas to fill with pulp and paper products that could not be sold. This decade-long downturn dramatically changed at the outbreak of the Second World War in 1939, when an increased demand for many manufactured items and products, including pulp and paper, occurred. Advancements in kraft technology, which had not been fully developed when the mill was first built, also positively impacted the Dryden mill's performance. General prosperity persisted beginning in the early 1950s through to the late 1990s, with many improvements and upgrades to the mill, and general advances in technology and practices within the broader forest sector. Beginning in the early 2000s however, the fine paper industry, long fuelled by steady year-over-year growth in consumption, began to experience a decline driven by electronic substitution. Paper machines were systematically shut down and the 90-year history of paper production at the Dryden site came to an end. There was a recognized need to adapt to and address these changes if the mill was to continue to operate. The Dryden mill's century of history and continued operation demonstrates a strong commitment to employees, communities and to sustainable forest management.