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Wed October Tom Thomson Two years before he died mysteriously the legendary artist Tom Thomson painted the scene of his own death on Algonquin Park s Canoe Lake The painting which hangs in the McMichael Canadian Collection is a poignant reminder of one of Canada s great geniuses Thomson died years ago and as one commentator put it his life was the pure stuff of legends Most of his later years were lived alone in the forest His early dcith in mysterious circumstances plus the meteor like briefness of his dazzling career combined to turn him into a national icon of art The painting is a small oil on wooden panel measuring fl 10 inches and is one or a series made around Canoe a favorite haunt of the artist It sketched from a point of land at he north end of the lake where Thomson often camped and where there stands an historic cairn erected by friends after his The view to the south shows the star autumn hills of spruce and birch ind pine which still grow to the shoreline It is painted in i distinctive style which characterized some of his most famous works The panel shows the islands which figured in Ihe final chapters of the Thomson story and the vivid sparkling water where his body was found on July eight days after he was last seen alive Thomson was born in it Ontario and spent his boyhood at near Owen Sound The years of his young man hood have been described as indifferent lacking in a solid dircc He wandered briefly to Seattle Washington then settled Toronto as a commercial artist Well into his thirties Thomson was doing dull imitative and not very accomplished figures and land scapes at an age when most artists had already achieved a personal authority of style But in Toronto Thomson met and worked with other artists who were later to form the famous Group of Seven Canidas most powerful art moement men whose bold elemental portraits of the country were to give new meaning to idea of being a Canadian Among them were J E Arthur Fred Varley A Y Jackson Frank Johnson Franklin Carmichael and others Thomson made his first trip into Algonquin Park in 1912 when the Park was still remote northern country By 1914 he began to find the freedom and power the brilliant color and forceful brush work which characterized his art and began to attract some prominence In the winter he worked in a shack Toronto s Ravine which once served as a machine shop pre fernng it to a spacious and comfortable studio nearby Toda the shack preserved much as he used it stands at the Canadian Collection a modest building but one of the most important in Canadian art At the shack he entertained his friends a quiet man to the point of shyness tall athletic his woods THE M man stride somewhat out of place in the city environment He was an easy going man but capable of intense feelings toward his art which sometimes left him nearly inarticulate until he achieved an artistic goal cap luring an exact color an exact mood or scene Some of the most insights into Thomson were provided by the quick pen of Arthur the wit of the Group of Seven who captured Thomson simple ink sketches Thomson was last seen alive on the afternoon of July a dull wet day with a brisk northeasterly breeze He was paddling south on Canoe Lake to fish he had said cither at Gill Lake or Tea Lake dam As his life and work captured the imaginations of Canadians his mysterious death was to raise questions for generations Exict details vary from witness to witness but in the main there is no dispute with the following facts July an upturned canoe was sighted by an American cottager Martin Bletcher and his sister July 9 the upturned canoe was reported by Bletcher July 10 the canoe Thomson s was recovered July It a search for Thomson was started by friends July IS Thomson body was found near the islands which he had earlier painted and was towed to a small cove and still lying in the water was tethered to a tree to await the coroner July the coroner located more thin 100 miles had not arrived ind Thomson s body was examined by a doctor vacationing in Canoe Lake Sixteen or 17 turns of fishing line were found around the left ankle There was a wound on the left temple Thomson wis buried later that in a small graveard near the west shore of the lake which contained other Julv an undertaker arrived with orders from Thomson family to exhume the body and ship it home Unassisted he completed his grisly task between p and midnight July 19 a casketsaid to contain the artist body was shipped to Owen Sound for a family service July 21 the casket was buried in the family plot at Leith Ontario The church record notes Talented and with many friends and no enemies a mystery of Thomson s friends could accept that the skilled woodsman and swimmer could have fallen from his canoe and drowned on a reasonably calm day and within a few yards of shore No one could explain the wound nor the fishing cord around his ankle The night before his death Thomson had argued with Martin about the progress of World War I Bletcher who apparently spent long periods Canada to evade serving in the U S forces may also have had an interest in Winnie Traynor a Canoe Lake resident to whom CANADIAN COLLECTI Thomson m ly ivl bet engaged Theories his death for these and other isons have been Nor hive the ye lessened interest in the mystery One theory lit Id is that Thomson was murdered Another that he was struck ly lightning not so an as miLlil be supposed Other theories include the views of a mystic that he faked his own deith and travelled to the to join the armed fort Lb after being unable to join in Canada Over the years there was also a belief that Thomson body had never been removed from the Park and the doubts were strong In small group led by Toronto judge Willi im I Little one of the best known of Thomson s biographers and investigators locate in i pine grove I west short of I found a skeleton The skull a wound scientists said body was that of an I or half but many qua were left unanswered and a about the final rest ng place artist remain to day McMichael Canadian village of Kleinburg I fr hand he I a natural ianctuir he rar f the Hit