First for Manitouwadge marks the end of an era
by Karina Hunter
Row upon row of logging, and road building equipment was sold off today in the yard of the once business address of BRL Inc. as auction lots comprised of everything from wrenches and cables to excavators, feller bunchers, graders, grapple skidders, slashers, log loaders, and bulldozers were bid upon. 178 lots in all were sold. A first for Manitouwadge, the public auctioning of now bankrupt, Black River Logging Inc. was managed by Danbury Industrial, a division of Danbury Group based out of Toronto, Ontario and drew a crowd of more than 150 people with around 60 registered bidders attending in person from Canada & the United States and another 40+ online bidders at bidspotter.com. Many of those in attendance having come out to witness first hand the dissolution of a business which, last year employed approximately 135 people in Manitouwadge; yet another unfortunate casulty of February’s closure of Marathon Pulp Inc.
Local bidders were joined by those having made the trip from places such as Wisconsin, Michigan, Kapuskasing, Sault Ste. Marie, and Thunder Bay to bid. Online registered bidders included people from overseas although no purchases were made by these due most likely to the industry specific nature of the bulk of machinery up for bid. Though there was some road building equipment sold such as graders, dozers and excavators, pieces such as skidders, or feller bunchers, exclusively used for logging, are much less appealing as the logging sector continues to struggle.
Submitted to the Chronicle Journal, July 8th, 2009
