a depletion of timber, difficult economic conditions and the eventual closing of the mill in 1969. The lumber history is commemorated in the Timber Village Museum. In 1955, uranium was discovered near Blind River. The first uranium mine began operation as the Pronto Mine in Algoma Mills. Although its life was short-lived, its significance was that it led to the discovery of the entire Blind River-Elliot Lake uranium mining camp. In 1983 a uranium refinery was built just west of Blind River. This uranium refinery is owned and operated by the Cameco Corporation, which processes uranium concentrates from all over the world into uranium trioxide. The town of Blind River made headlines in 1991 for a double homicide that occurred at the local rest stop off the Trans-Canada Highway. On June 28, 1991, an unknown assailant shot an elderly couple from Lindsay, Ontario, Gord McAllister, 62, and his wife Jackie, 59, and 29-year-old Brian Major. The killer gained entry into the McAllisters' motor home by posing as a police officer. Jackie McAllister and Brian Major died of their wounds. The case was profiled in 1993 on NBC-TV's Unsolved Mysteries. No one has ever been charged in the homicides, but a suspect, Ronald Glenn West (a former Toronto police officer convicted of two rape-murders in Toronto in 1970 for which he is currently serving two life sentences, and of a series of robbery-assaults in Sault Ste. Marie in 1995), was under suspicion. Gord McAllister died on February 14, 2012. Until 1997, Blind River had its own radio station, CJNR-AM 730. In 1997, the station was absorbed into the new CKNR-FM, based in Elliot Lake. Demographics In the 2021 Census of Population conducted by Statistics Canada, Blind River 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. Population trend: Population in 2016: 3,472 Population in 2011: 3,549 Population in 2006: 3,780 Population in 2001: 3,969 Population in 1996: 3,152 (or 4,374 when adjusted for 2001 boundaries) Population in 1991: 3,355 Economy Its main businesses are tourism, fishing, logging, and uranium refining. Transportation links are Highway 17 (part of the Trans-Canada Highway), the Huron Central Railway operating on the leased Canadian Pacific Railway line that runs through the town, and the Blind River Marine Park, a town-owned marina