From an Article:


The primeval wilderness was broken in 1866 when lumbering operations began. A Mr. Gibson built a sawmill on Mill Island when the first Timber Limit License was issued. An efficient communication network must have existed because it was that same year that Alexis Belanger, with his wife and five children, left Mattawa with Indian guides to paddle down the French River to the more prosperous life of lumbering at Byng Inlet. In the next two years many other French-Canadian families left the Three Rivers, Quebec area where the lumber industry was declining, and journeyed to Byng Inlet for more and better paying jobs. Many of these workers built family dwellings on the north side of the river near the mill and now the village of Byng Inlet North was born.