The breeze off the water has an edge to it and I pause beside a stand of common reed along the marsh trail leading to the Petitcodiac River. They whiffle back and forth and I listen to their soothing music for a moment before climbing the riverside dyke towards two towering silos, leftovers from a gypsum industry that closed in the 1980s. The marsh wasn’t so quiet back then.
From this vantage, I look back towards the village of Hillsborough, N.B., tucked into the lee of the hills that inspired its name. A variety of landscapes stretch before me: patches of young forest, hay pastures and wildflower meadows, seas of greening cattails bordering a trio of shallow ponds. Habitat for geese and ducks, warblers and hawks, muskrats and beaver, coyote and fox — a diversity of wildlife that changes with the seasons. One spring, I walked here with a birder and he spotted 52 different species in an hour.
All the marsh trails lead towards these giant silos, connected like a pair of cement binoculars at the water’s edge. An anomaly in the surrounding landscape, they certainly draw attention. Industrial remnants reborn as curiosity; a canvas for youthful graffiti that also changes as the seasons pass.
Workers built the silos in 1926 to store gypsum awaiting shipment to ports worldwide. They remain a resilient landmark on the river’s edge, anchored on wooden pilings sunk in mud, the rest of the accompanying wharf long gone. Time, tide, and blustery storm surges undermine them, eroding the mud, worrying away chunks of cement. Someday, these forces will prove too much. But for now, the silos resist.
In this era of rapid change, we need reminders of resilience and resistance.
Smuggler heaven and the white kingdom
Geological time was kind to this region. What was once an ancient sea evaporated, leaving behind white gypsum cliffs of exceptional purity. In her 2003 book, Gesner’s Dream: The Trials and Triumphs of Early Mining in New Brunswick, the late Gwen Martin wrote that settler families in the 1700s quarried gypsum on their own properties to use as a soil conditioner and sold the excess to the captains of schooners plying the Petitcodiac River. I spoke to her about her research a few months before she passed away.
“The captains sailed down the Bay of Fundy to the Fundy Isles,” she said, “keeping just this side of the international boundary. American ships waited for them, hiding among the various islands. The sailors then traded the gypsum for liquor, tea, and other goodies. It was smuggler heaven. What you might call the earliest cross-border shopping.”
Samuel and Charles Fowler were the first to officially ship gypsum direct from Hillsborough to their mill in Lubec, Maine. Then in 1854, New York businessman Calvin Tompkins came north to start the Albert Manufacturing Company (AMC). Initially, to avoid import fees, he quarried and shipped raw rock to New England for manufacture, but after tariffs lessened, he opened a mill on this marshland to process the gypsum into plaster.
The mill burned in 1872, but Tompkins rebuilt. The new site had a steam plant, calcining house, plaster storehouse, plaster mill, cooper shop, hoop storehouse, engine house, boiler room, and sawmill.
According to Martin, AMC was once the largest gypsum manufacturing plant in North America, winning awards and employing up to 325 men. Some called it the “white kingdom.” Multiple quarries fed the plant as mountains of the famous Hammer Brand Hard Wall Plaster, stacks of wallboard, and material for denture molds shipped across the planet. At one point, large alabaster-like blocks journeyed to New York and Pennsylvania, destined to become sculptures, pedestals, and clocks.
After miners exhausted surface deposits, they cut tunnels into the bedrock and worked with acetylene lighting. They drilled, pounded, and hacked subterranean rock into piles that they loaded into rail cars and hauled to the surface with horses. By the turn of the century, two tiny steam locomotives replaced the horses. The Tad and Connie towed long strings of open cars filled with rock to the mill, four times daily.
Occasionally, the trains also ferried bedecked and parasoled party-goers to company garden parties; other times they were hijacked for more clandestine expeditions.
“In the early 1900s, younger residents had another form of entertainment,” Martin told me. “On Sundays, they’d sneak uphill to a quarry, loosen the brakes of an empty ore car, and ride it hell for leather down the tracks to town.”
Another fire levelled the plant in 1911. The company rebuilt and was back in operation within a year, however, the cascading impacts of the First World War, increasing export tariffs, and the stock market crash of 1929, triggered a downturn. A year later, AMC sold its assets to the Canadian Gypsum Company Limited, which continued production until 1982.
White rock kept the village thriving for almost two centuries, feeding both local families and the bank accounts of its wealthy owners. It gave, but it also took away.
“Many were the injuries or deaths from collapsing roof rock,” said Martin. “Believe it or not, New Brunswick didn’t even have mine safety legislation until 1933.”
My own family members tell me stories of coming home from work with hair and clothing plastered in fine, white dust, and of fellow workers dying of lung disease.
When the company ceased operation, the quarries were abandoned, the plant dismembered, the site levelled, and remaining debris ploughed into the dyke system. Besides the silos, all that remained were a few repurposed buildings and a rusting water tower. The land starved and seeped; little grew on the barren ground. The village suffered, too, in the way of boom and bust, but harnessing a resilient spirit, it staggered on.
A site reclaimed
Eventually, a community-led initiative provided the impetus for creation of a visitor centre, wetland ponds, and walking trails on the former plant site. Just as an artist might paint a new landscape over an old canvas, excavators dug holes and diverted drainage creeks. Ponds filled and stabilized, plants moved in, saplings sprouted and stretched into trees, dragonflies, ducks, and muskrats took up residence.
Other changes took place too. Members of the Fundy Outdoor Club cleared more than 18 kilometres of cross-country ski trails through the abandoned quarries, constructed a log shelter, and hosted popular provincial ski races known as loppets.
Local students participated in tree planting, biology, environmental, and physical education programs and outdoor pursuits on the land once quarried by their ancestors. Many of the trails were cleared by high-school teacher and mountain bike enthusiast Richard Faulkner, his colleagues, and students. He initiated and hosted the first mountain bike races in the area and for years, the White Rock Fat Tire Festival was considered a top race in the Maritime circuit, attracting hundreds of cyclists. Orienteering New Brunswick mapped the area and also hosted world-class championships on the site.
Over time, the quarries, mines, and rock piles grew into a forest of giant poplar, hemlock, spruce, and birch. Moss transformed old machinery, foundations, and workings into living sculpture and rain turned sinkholes into lush vernal ponds.
Mountain bikers’ mecca
The White Rock Recreation Area is now a mecca for mountain bikers who careen around the hills, gullies, and sinkholes, while hikers enjoy meanders through dappled shade. When shadows lengthen into night, coyotes slip soundlessly between the trees and owls call to each other from hidden perches.
Often, when hiking in the White Rock, I encounter Jean-Guy Babineau, who has been biking the area since 1989. A founding member and former president of the Codiac Cycling Trails (CCT) group, he helped expand and maintain the trail system now enjoyed by bikers, hikers, snowshoers, and cross-country skiers year-round.
“Originally, we determined what it needed to be a viable area for cyclists,” he says. Locals were familiar with the area, but newcomers found it a confusing rabbit warren of paths and roads. “We needed mapping, naming, and signage to give them the confidence to ride.”
The group made a proposal outlining the economic value the recreational area would bring in terms of tourism, visibility, and visitation, and the village council agreed to allow CCT to steward the trails.
As volunteers, the original directors of CCT wanted to spend their time biking, not maintaining, so they planned routes with sustainability in mind. While most existing trails were appropriate for intermediate cyclists, they needed more options for experts and beginners.
“Our goal was to make it better for beginners so people would bring their families and grow more mountain bikers,” says Babineau.
The White Rock now has 77 trails totalling 45 kilometres for all experience levels. While there are plenty of rolling switchbacks and slower meanders, adrenalin junkies appreciate the trails with sharp turns, jumps, steep climbs, and swift descents.
“The climb is the payment for the descent,” explains Babineau. “When you’re riding a bike over difficult terrain, you have to maintain focus. You can’t think of anything else because there’s a high risk of falling off.”
Another part of the appeal is the land itself.
“When we build a trail, we don’t just go straight through the woods, but look for interesting features. You don’t often see this type of landscape. It has some of everything: steep rock faces, caves, sink holes, water features, rooted sections, incredible views.”
A Snowdog (similar to a gas-powered dog sled) enables volunteers to groom some trails through the winter months, although Babineau admits the unusual terrain means it’s a challenge to keep them in good shape. The same tight turns and steep hills that make the riding so exhilarating push the limits of the equipment. But the grooming allows for a year-round outdoor experience and visitation. Which is also good for community services, like restaurants, grocery, and snack-bars.
During the first years of COVID, bikers, hikers, and snowshoers to the area increased tenfold as people developed a newfound appreciation for outdoor experiences.
“The forest always wants to take back the trails so we still have a few issues,” Babineau says. “The great thing about having wonderful trails is more users, but the bad thing about more users is more wear and tear.”
I think about all this while skirting the marsh ponds on my return from the dykes. I breathe in the scent of wildflowers where once a factory stood. Visitors enjoying Hillsborough’s network of trails might be curious about the silos and water tower, or wonder about the odd, white cliffs and chunks of marble-like rock littering the paths. But there’s little else to signal they’re walking on centuries of history. The sounds from the back-breaking labours of hundreds of men and boys through the ages have been replaced by the rustling of reeds and splash of a startled muskrat.