The Arctic Incubator

For three decades, IOC and Wabush Mines faced the same problem: how do you keep skilled workers and their families in a place this isolated and this cold? Part of their answer was to build recreation facilities far better than a town this size had any right to have. It worked, and it produced something nobody planned for: Olympic champions.

The Winter Domain (October–May)

With seven or eight months of ice and snow a year, the money went where the weather was, into winter sports. For Labrador City and Wabush, two towns with a combined population of around 13,000 at their peak, the investment was extraordinary.

• The Arenas: Central ice arenas (the Labrador City Arena and the Mike Adam Recreation Centre) functioned as primary community hubs, critical for social cohesion and athletic development.
• The Rivalry: A fierce inter-community rivalry between Labrador City and Wabush schools (Menihek/Labrador City Collegiate vs. J.R. Smallwood Collegiate) drove competitive engagement and pushed every athlete to improve.
• The Train Tournament: Every year the minor hockey teams rode the train to Sept-Îles for tournaments. What started as a way to get around the lack of roads became one of the great traditions of Lab West life, for the kids and the parents who went along.
• Figure Skating: The Polaris Figure Skating Club grew into a serious program, with an annual ice show that showed off how good the local training really was.
• Skiing: Smokey Mountain for downhill and the Menihek Nordic Ski Club for cross-country gave kids first-rate training grounds right outside town. The Menihek trails were laid out to a professional standard, a remarkable thing to find in a community this remote.

The companies took this seriously. A 1968 issue of The Producer, the employee newsletter of Pickands Mather & Co., which managed Wabush Mines, reported that women employees and wives at the Scully Mine had organized a fitness class at the Wabush Recreation Centre, with more than 20 taking part by spring. The article mentioned that the centre’s outdoor swimming season opened in August, and that the isolation of Wabush had, oddly enough, left people more committed to fitness and community programs than most city dwellers. “Apparently Wabush residents journey ‘outside’ to visit families and friends,” it noted, “and many women found the obvious advantages of losing weight and improving tone.”

Summer Operations

Summer ran on the long northern daylight. Softball and ball hockey leagues played late into the evening, with the older men’s leagues passing the game down to the kids who tagged along.

The companies also paid for a good indoor pool, which let the Northern Lights Swim Team train year-round. That was the whole advantage: they were the only team in the province with an indoor pool, so while everyone else waited for summer, Lab West kept swimming, and kept winning provincial meets.

The Rivalry That Drove Excellence

The basketball and volleyball rivalries between Menihek, Labrador City Collegiate, and J.R. Smallwood were the heartbeat of teenage life. The gyms were packed and the games were fierce. Growing up playing everything, against the same handful of rival schools year after year, gave a lot of these kids a competitive streak that stuck with them long after high school.

The 1982 Newfoundland and Labrador Winter Games

Hosting the 1982 Winter Games was a landmark for the region. It put Labrador West’s facilities on display for the rest of the province and proved the town could pull off something big. More than a sporting event, it was a statement to the rest of Canada that this remote mining town was a real and complete community.

The Champions It Produced

For two towns of maybe 13,000 people between them, Labrador City and Wabush turned out a remarkable number of elite athletes. It’s hard to explain until you see the facilities they grew up with.

Curling

• Mark Nichols (Labrador City): Olympic Gold Medalist (2006, Turin), Olympic Bronze Medalist (2022, Beijing). Nichols developed entirely within Labrador City’s professional curling club, funded by iron ore revenue. The proximity and quality of the facility meant he never had to leave town to reach an elite standard.
• Mike Adam (Wabush): Olympic Gold Medalist (2006, Turin) as an alternate. The curling centre he trained in now bears his name.

Figure Skating

• Joey Russell (Labrador City): 2011 Canadian Bronze Medalist and the first Newfoundland and Labrador skater to win a national junior title. He came up entirely through the local Polaris Figure Skating Club, proof that the coaching and the ice time were there if you wanted them.

Hockey

• Darryl Williams (Labrador City): The first Labradorian to play in the NHL (Los Angeles Kings). He later transitioned into NHL coaching.
• Chad Penney (Labrador City): The first Labradorian drafted into the NHL (2nd Round, 1992, Ottawa Senators).
• Pascal Pelletier (Labrador City): NHL Forward who played for the Boston Bruins, Chicago Blackhawks, and Vancouver Canucks.
• Dan LaCosta (Labrador City): NHL Goaltender, Columbus Blue Jackets.

Why It Worked

None of this happened by accident. The mining companies knew families would only stay in a place this remote if life there was good enough, and that meant first-rate places to play. They built the arenas, funded the clubs, and the results followed.

What came out of it was a generation that was tough, tight-knit, and fiercely competitive. Those qualities were forged on the ice, but also by growing up in a place where you had to make your own world.