Merrickville, Ontario – My Top 16 Picks
The United Empire Loyalists were the first non-aboriginal people to settle in the Merrickville area. Beginning in 1783, they were forced to leave the United States after the British defeat in the American War of Independence. Most of these settlers were farmers of Welsh, German, Dutch, Scottish and Irish descent. By settling along the Rideau River, they had access to rich soil, a source of fresh water, and a communication lifeline as the river could keep them connected to each other and to other communities along its banks. In 1793, William Merrick acquired a saw mill from Roger Stevens at the “Great Falls” on the Rideau River (there was a drop of fourteen feet in the river), and then began building new mills which formed the nucleus of Merricks Mills.
As industry grew, farms provided the mills with resources to process. Lumber, corn, oats, wheat, hides, and wool kept the mills running and ensured the region’s growing prosperity. Transporting agricultural goods and raw materials such as pig iron became even easier with the construction of the Rideau Canal. From the 1850s to the 1890s, Merrickville was a very important manufacturing center along the Rideau corridor.
Wheels and tools to cut, saw, seed, cultivate, harvest and store agricultural crops were very important. In the 1850s Merrickville leached wood ashes and evaporated the liquid to make potash; they produced twenty barrels, each weighing five hundred pounds, in a year. Potash was used in fertilizers, soaps and other manufactured goods. A cooperage in Merrickville was established in 1845; coopers produced butter churns, tubs, and barrels (for flour, salt pork, etc.). Several brickyards offered an alternative to wood and stone for building materials. Several tanneries were located here; they produced leather from animal skins.
905 St. Lawrence Street – The Aaron Merrick House – built in 1844 of local stone with refined stone window surrounds and oversized stone quoins for the son of the founder
806 St. Lawrence Street – Gothic, verge board trim, decorative wood-turned spindles supporting second floor balcony
529 St. Lawrence Street – mansard roof, dormers, corner quoins, voussoirs
405 St. Lawrence Street – Dr. J. O. Walker House, c. 1870 – Family Physician (1912-1946) – hip roof, dormer
242 St. Lawrence Street – John Mills’ Furniture Showroom and Funeral Home – c. 1868 – operated until the 1930s – corner quoins, cornice brackets
111 St. Lawrence Street – Jakes-McLean Block – c. 1862 – Baldachin Inn and Restaurant – dentil molding, pilasters, string courses, voussoirs
211 St. Lawrence Street – Windsor’s Courtyard, fine garden and home décor – dichromatic brickwork, stepped parapet
Main Street West – hip roof, corner quoins, voussoirs and keystones
223 Main Street West – Royal Canadian Legion – old Town Hall – c. 1856 – stone, corner quoins
205 Main Street West – Queen Anne style – corner tower, dormer with Palladian window, turned veranda roof supports, open railing
Block House – 1832 – could accommodate fifty men – 3.5 foot walls designed to withstand small cannon fire; pyramidal tin-sheathed roof to withstand torching; upper level overhang allowed for machicolated defense holes cut in the overhang to allow downward fire on an enemy; no military action here – served as lockmaster’s quarters, a church, and a canal maintenance building – now a museum
206 Main Street East – Percival House (Ardcaven) – c. 1890 – Richardsonian-Romanesque style – home of foundry-man Roger Percival – heavy stone arch around door, decorative chimney, two-storey bay window topped with open pediment, dormer, tower, stone courses
111 Main Street East – Pearson House – c. 1890 – Gothic Revival – former location of the Merrickville Public Library – verge board trim with finials on gables, dormer, bay window; veranda roof supports with ornate capital detailing
Church Street – Gothic – verge board trim on gable above bay window, dormers, pillars with decorative capitals
405 Elgin Street – decorative capitals on veranda supports, open spindle railing; dormer in attic
212 Lewis Street East – log cabin
