Excerpt from
www.steamtrainhuntsville.com: When completed in 1905, the Huntsville and Lake of Bays Railway or Portage Flyer, provided a crucial 1.8 km link connecting steamboats on Peninsula Lake to Lake of Bays and opened up North Muskoka to tourism and increased development. The railway was part of a larger navigation company owned by George F. Marsh and later sold to C. O. Shaw, owner of the Anglo-Canadian Leather Company in Huntsville and the Bigwin Inn that opened on Lake of Bays in 1920. A narrow gauge train fondly named the "Portage Flyer" plied the grade between the lakes carrying mail, tanbark and tourists for 55 years. By 1959, a decline in steamship travel led to the end of what was once promoted as the "Smallest Commercially Operated Railway in the World".