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throughout Ontario since 1872.

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Standing Up For Ontario's Old Growth Forests


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The OSA has been involved in conservation and preservation since 1929 when the organization began negotiations with the Ontario Government to preserve "trees and the flow of water on the large waterfalls". . . . 

Read more about the history of the OSA and conservation from the Centre for Contemporary Canadian Art

"Conservation and Preservation of the O.S.A.*

As early as 1929 the OSA was involved with conservation and preservation of the land by negotiating with the government to introduce a special clause into all contracts with companies developing water power or lumbering in Ontario. The clause would give the government "power to restrict any unnecessary destruction of natural beauty." They also requested special attention for "the preservation of trees and the flow of water on the large waterfalls.”

In 1931 to 1933, A.Y. Jackson, F.H. Brigson and Arthur Lismer along with several determined environmentalists, began a campaign to halt the Spanish River Lumber Co. from reaping the benefits of their timber rights along the shore of Whiterock Lake. The 1933 agreement was renewed in 1965-66.

In 1961 Whiterock Lake was renamed O.S.A. Lake in honour of the efforts of the OSA to save the Killarney Lakes region from timbering to the shoreline. (According to online tourist information, it was Trout Lake and renamed in 1933.)

OSA officers helped create the Killarney Recreation Reserve Act which halted land sale of 4,000 square miles of Great Lake shoreline. (Great Mountain Lake may be the lake referred to here.)

1964 Killarney Recreational Reserve Act was amended, and North Georgian Bay Recreational Reserve was developed. In 1965 the OSA renewed the campaign to save Killarney Lakes area from commercial exploitation with Eric Aldwinckle acting as organizer and spokesman.

By 1971, partially as a result of OSA campaigning, Killarney Lakes area was designated as Ontario's 2nd "primitive" provincial park.""

*Information from the Centre for Contemporary Canadian Art, Ontario Society of Arts Timeline ccca.ca

Ontario Society of Artists will be creating in White Bear Forest and joining naturalists to bring awareness of the importance of White Bear Forest to the public.


2023 Event

Ontario Society of Artists joined artists of The Broken Forest  Group to bring awareness to plans to  develop Escarpment lands and farms near Collingwood, ON May 26 to 28, 2023


In 2022, its 150th year, the OSA reinvigorated this involvement by developing the Project "Standing Up for Ontario's Old Growth Forest".
























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