Soo, the

The area around Sault Ste Marie, the falls on the Saint Mary's River, in south-central Ontario and the east of Michigan's Upper Peninsula. The Soo Canals here are among the world's busiest waterways.

The first Europeans to venture into the Soo were French explorers, notably Etienne Brulé in 1618. Both the French and British maintained outposts in the area throughout the 18th and 19th centuries. From 1799 until it was destroyed in the War of 1812, there was a lock and canal here; in 1853 the USA began construction of the first of the modern Soo Canals. Opened for traffic in 1855, the two canals on the Michigan side are 2.6 km/1.6 mi long, while on the Ontario side, the single canal (which opened in 1895) is 2 km/1.4 mi long. The canals were vital links in the waterway network that brought iron ore and grain from Lake Superior to the eastern USA and Canada, and eventually, with the opening of the St Lawrence Seaway, to the world.