Dolbeau-Mistassini is a town in northern Quebec, Canada, at the confluence of the Mistassibi River, Riviere aux Rats and the Mistassini River, on Lac Saint-Jean. Dolbeau-Mistassini is in the Maria-Chapdelaine Regional County Municipality and is the commercial hub of Lac-St-Jean with big stores and shopping centres. The city was formed in 1997 through the amalgamation of the cities of Dolbeau and Mistassini. Dolbeau is located on the right (west) bank of the Mistassini River, in the geographic township of Parent (not in the adjacent Dolbeau Township). The town of Mistassini is on the left (east) bank of the Mistassini River at the confluence with the Mistassibi River, directly opposite Dolbeau. History The first settler in Mistassini may have been François Gaudreault in 1884. But credit is given to Trappists for founding the town, an exceptional case in Quebec. In 1892, the Trappists of Oka were granted of land between the Mistassini and Mistassibi Rivers by the government of Charles Boucher de Boucherville. They first settled at the mouth of the Mistassibi then on the shores of Lac Saint-Jean. In 1895, the Parish of Saint-Michel-de-Mistassini was founded, and two years later, it was incorporated as a municipality. In 1930, the town centre of Saint-Michel-de-Mistassini separated from the municipality to form the Village Municipality of Mistassini. During the construction of the Chute-des-Passes Dam on the Peribonka River in 1944, it experienced commercial growth and gained city status in 1947. In 1976, the Municipality of Saint-Michel-de-Mistassini and the Village Municipality of Mistassini were merged again to form the City of Mistassini. As for Dolbeau, it was founded in 1926 by Swedish-born industrialist Emil Andrew Wallberg and his industrial German-born partner John Stadler who established there the Lake Saint John Power and Paper Co. paper mill. The town, incorporated in 1927, was named after Jean Dolbeau (1586–1652), Récollet missionary in the Tadoussac and Lac Saint-Jean area from 1615 to 1617 and from 1618 to 1620. On December 17, 1997, the cities of Dolbeau and Mistassini were merged to form the City of Dolbeau-Mistassini. Demographics In the 2021 Census of Population conducted by Statistics Canada, Dolbeau-Mistassini had a population of living in of its total private dwellings, a change of from its 2016 population of . With a land area of , it had a population density of in 2021. In 2021, the median age was 50.8, as opposed to 41.6 for all of Canada.