April, 2019:

Oshawa, Ontario – Book 2

Oshawa is a city in Southern Ontario on the Lake Ontario shoreline. It is about sixty kilometers east of Downtown Toronto. The name Oshawa comes from the Ojibwa word meaning “the crossing place” or “where we must leave our canoes”. More than 5,000 people work and more than 2,400 university students study in the downtown core.

Oshawa’s roots are tied to the automobile industry with the Canadian division of General Motors located here. It was founded in 1876 as the McLaughlin Carriage Company. The lavish home of the carriage company’s founder, Parkwood Estate, is a National Historic Site of Canada.

Historians believe that Oshawa began as a transfer point for the fur trade. Beaver and other animals trapped for their pelts by local natives were traded with the Coureurs des bois (voyagers). Furs were loaded onto canoes by the Mississauga Indians at the Oshawa harbor and transported to the trading posts located to the west at the mouth of the Credit River. Around 1760, the French constructed a trading post near the harbor location; this was abandoned after a few years, but its ruins provided shelter for the first residents of what later became Oshawa.

In 1822, a “colonization road” (a north-south road to facilitate settlement) known as Simcoe Street was constructed. It ran from the harbor to the area of Lake Scugog. It intersected the “Kingston Road: at what became Oshawa’s “Four Corners.”

The newly established village became an industrial center, and implement works, tanneries, asheries and wagon factories opened. In 1876, Robert Samuel McLaughlin, Sr. moved his carriage works to Oshawa from Enniskillen to take advantage of its harbor and of the availability of a rail link not too far away. He constructed a two-story building, which was soon added to. This building was heavily remodeled in 1929, receiving a new facade and being extended to the north. Around 1890, the carriage works relocated from its Simcoe Street address to an unused furniture factory a couple of blocks to the northeast, and this remained its site until the building burnt in 1899. Offered assistance by the town, McLaughlin chose to stay in Oshawa, building a new factory across Mary Street from the old site. Rail service had been provided in 1890 by the Oshawa Railway; this was originally set up as a streetcar line, but by about 1910 a second freight line was built slightly to the east of Simcoe Street which provided streetcar and freight service, connected central Oshawa with the Grand Trunk (now Canadian National) Railway, and with the Canadian Northern (which ran through the very north of Oshawa) and the Canadian Pacific, built in 1912-13.

Oshawa, Ontario – Book 1

Oshawa is a city in Southern Ontario on the Lake Ontario shoreline. It is about sixty kilometers east of Downtown Toronto. The name Oshawa comes from the Ojibwa word meaning “the crossing place” or “where we must leave our canoes”. More than 5,000 people work and more than 2,400 university students study in the downtown core.

Oshawa’s roots are tied to the automobile industry with the Canadian division of General Motors located here. It was founded in 1876 as the McLaughlin Carriage Company. The lavish home of the carriage company’s founder, Parkwood Estate, is a National Historic Site of Canada.

Historians believe that Oshawa began as a transfer point for the fur trade. Beaver and other animals trapped for their pelts by local natives were traded with the Coureurs des bois (voyagers). Furs were loaded onto canoes by the Mississauga Indians at the Oshawa harbor and transported to the trading posts located to the west at the mouth of the Credit River. Around 1760, the French constructed a trading post near the harbor location; this was abandoned after a few years, but its ruins provided shelter for the first residents of what later became Oshawa.

In the late eighteenth century, a local resident, Roger Conant, started an export business shipping salmon to the United States. His success attracted further migration into the region. A large number of the founding immigrants were United Empire Loyalists, who left the United States to live under British rule. Later Irish and then French-Canadian immigration increased as did industrialization. Oshawa and the surrounding Ontario County were the settling grounds of a large number of nineteenth century Cornish immigrants. The surveys ordered by Governor John Graves Simcoe, and subsequent land grants, helped populate the area. When Col. Asa Danforth laid out his York-to-Kingston road, it passed through the Oshawa area.

In 1822, a “colonization road” (a north-south road to facilitate settlement) known as Simcoe Street was constructed. It ran from the harbor to the area of Lake Scugog. It intersected the “Kingston Road: at what became Oshawa’s “Four Corners.”

In 1846 there were about 1,000 people in a community surrounded by farms. There were three churches, a post office, and tradesmen of various types, a foundry, a grist mill and a fulling mill, a brewery, two distilleries, a machine shop and four cabinet makers. The newly established village became an industrial center, and implement works, tanneries, asheries and wagon factories opened. In 1876, Robert Samuel McLaughlin, Sr. moved his carriage works to Oshawa from Enniskillen to take advantage of its harbor and of the availability of a rail link not too far away. He constructed a two-storey building, which was soon added to. This building was heavily remodeled in 1929, receiving a new facade and being extended to the north. Around 1890, the carriage works relocated from its Simcoe Street address to an unused furniture factory a couple of blocks to the northeast, and this remained its site until the building burnt in 1899. Offered assistance by the town, McLaughlin chose to stay in Oshawa, building a new factory across Mary Street from the old site. Rail service had been provided in 1890 by the Oshawa Railway; this was originally set up as a streetcar line, but by about 1910 a second freight line was built slightly to the east of Simcoe Street which provided streetcar and freight service, connected central Oshawa with the Grand Trunk (now Canadian National) Railway, and with the Canadian Northern (which ran through the very north of Oshawa) and the Canadian Pacific, built in 1912-13.

Ajax and Pickering, Ontario

Ajax is a town in Durham Region in Southern Ontario, Canada, located in the eastern part of the Greater Toronto Area. The town is named for HMS Ajax, a Royal Navy cruiser that served in World War II. It is about twenty-five kilometers (16 miles) east of Toronto on the shores of Lake Ontario and is bordered by the City of Pickering to the west and north, and the Town of Whitby to the east.

Before the Second World War, Ajax was a rural part of the township of Pickering. The town was established in 1941 when a Defense Industries Limited (D.I.L.) shell plant was constructed and a town site grew around the plant. By 1945 the plant employed over 9,000 people at peak production. It had its own water and sewage treatment plants and fifty kilometers (31 miles) of railroad and 50 kilometers (31 miles) of roads. The entire D.I.L. plant site was about twelve square kilometers (5 square miles).

Pickering is a city located in Southern Ontario, east of Toronto in Durham Region. It was settled by British colonists starting in the 1770s. Many of the smaller rural communities have been preserved and function as provincially significant historic sites and museums.

Whitevale, formerly Majorville, is a community located within the City of Pickering. The community was first settled in the 1820s when John Major built a sawmill; there were many Majors living in the area. Around 1855 Truman P. White bought the saw mill, built a gristmill and a cooperage, and in 1866 built a planing factory. In 1867 he built a large four storey brick woolen mill. The community owed so much of its development and business prosperity to T.P. White that in acknowledgement, it adopted Whitevale as its permanent name. In 1855, Donald McPhee opened the first store.

In 1890 Whitevale contained a stave and heading factory and a barrel factory both owned and operated by the Spink brothers; three general stores, one owned by James Taylor and Donald McPhee; a wagon and carriage factory, operated by the Pollard brothers; a cheese factory, owned and operated by P.R. Hoover and Company; the merchant and tailoring firm of J. Rose and Son; the shoemaker shops of John Allen and D. Moodey; the butcher shop of Israel Burton and the tinsmith shop of S.B. Wigmore. In addition, Whitevale contained two blacksmiths, two wagon shops, a school house, undertakers, harness shop, grist mill, brush factory, grindstone factory, barber shop, three dressmakers, three gardeners, money order and post offices, hotel, brass band, two churches and four lodges.

The Whitevale Heritage Conservation District was established to ensure the preservation and enhancement of the special character of Whitevale. It is dominated by its rural setting and modest vernacular buildings; the hamlet has not changed significantly in character since the late 19th century. The building style in Whitevale is a mixture of typical rural Ontario vernacular architecture combined with Victorian influences and materials in common usage at the time of construction. The overall nineteenth century village character has been retained.

Whitby, Ontario – Book 2

First Nations people were the original inhabitants of the area that would become Brooklin. In the 1820s European pioneers established a small settlement in the area. The settlement expanded in the 1840s when brothers John and Robert Campbell established a flour mill on Lynde Creek. Most of the buildings in the area of the walking tour are single-detached houses. It is a diverse collection of traditional architectural styles from the mid-nineteenth to mid-twentieth centuries. These diverse styles complement the landscape as the spaces between buildings offer glimpses of the creek, small parks, and treed open spaces.

In 1819, John Scadding, clerk for Lieutenant-Governor John Graves Simcoe, was awarded a large tract of land now known as Port Whitby. Originally known as Port Windsor, the area encompassed the natural harbor in the south up to Victoria Street in the north. Soon after settlement, the harbor was used to ship local grain, lumber, and farm produce across Canada and the United States. Farmers transported their produce to Port Windsor using a plank toll road, now Brock Street, and the Port Whitby, Port Perry, and Lindsay Railway. From the 1840s to the 1870s, Windsor Harbour prospered, leading to a number of developments that modernized the harbor’s infrastructure and surrounding industry. It was also during this time, in 1847, that Windsor Harbour was officially renamed Whitby Harbour. The bustling community of Port Whitby sprung up around the harbor with a number of houses, hotels, shops, and breweries supporting further development. Port Whitby, including the harbor, was one of three communities that formed the original Town of Whitby in 1855 along with Hamer’s Corners and Perry’s Corners.

Whitby, Ontario – Book 1

Whitby is located in Durham Region in Southern Ontario, east of Ajax and west of Oshawa, on the north shore of Lake Ontario. It is about twenty kilometers (twelve miles) east of the Toronto borough of Scarborough. The southern part of Whitby is predominantly urban and an economic hub; the northern part is more rural and includes the communities of Ashburn, Brooklin, Myrtle, and Myrtle Station.

Whitby was named after the seaport town of Whitby, Yorkshire, England. Settlement dates back to 1800, however, it was not until 1836 that a downtown business center was established by Whitby’s founder Peter Perry. Whitby’s chief asset was its natural harbor on Lake Ontario, from which grain from the farmland to the north was first shipped in 1833. In the 1840s, a road was built from Whitby Harbor to Lake Simcoe and Georgian Bay, to bring trade and settlement through the harbor to and from the rich land to the north.

Many residents commute to work in other Greater Toronto Area communities, and General Motors Canada in Oshawa is a major employer for all of Durham Region. Whitby has a steel mill, a retail support center operated by Sobeys, and a major Liquor Control Board of Ontario warehouse.

Four railways pass through Whitby. The Toronto-Montreal corridor main lines of the Canadian National Railway and Canadian Pacific Railway both pass east–west through the south end of town. A second CP line running from Toronto to Havelock passes through the northern part of Whitby. Via Rail trains travel through Whitby, but the nearest station is in Oshawa. GO Transit provides frequent service via its Lakeshore East line.