Welcome

Wolastoq Wharfinger is a blog is dedicated to the history of the former steamboat wharves on the Lower Wolastoq and its tributaries, a section of the St. John river valley stretching from Fredericton to Saint John, New Brunswick, Canada. The Wolastoq or St. John River runs 673 kilometers from headwaters in the State of Maine and Province of Quebec to Saint John where it crosses the Reversing Falls and feeds into the Bay of Fundy. For 130 years, from 1816 to 1946, riverboats full of passengers and freight paddled along the river between New Brunswick’s commercial centres at Fredericton and Saint John. Almost every community along the Wolastoq can claim some part in the story of the river’s steamboat days, but it is this lower section and its tributary lakes and rivers which feature most prominently and which still retain some of the infrastructure that supported this transportation system. These wharves are the last tangible connection to the once vital riverboats that have long since sunk or burned up.