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| Spring 2008 | Volume 6 Number 1 |
Over the past few years I have been actively participating as a volunteer with the Blockhouse and was also on the working committee for the Rideau 175 Lecture Series. This year I feel will not be quite as hectic for the Society as we will not have the lecture series and I don’t think the Prime Minister will be dropping by again soon, but who knows. And of course the UNESCO World Heritage Site Designation for our wonderful Rideau Canal. Still we are planning to continue our work with the Historical Archives, thanks to the Ontario Trillium Foundation for their funding, and we are working on a Living (Oral) History Project, where members of the society will be conducting interviews with some of our more senior residents who will be able to enlighten us with their memories of an earlier time in Merrickville and the surrounding areas. This Spring and Fall we will be holding our regular meeting at Ste. Marguerite-Bourgeoys School and a list of interesting speakers has been put together for members and non members alike to enjoy. We look forward to seeing you there. And, a final reminder, the MDHS operates on a volunteer basis and there always seems to be more work projects than we can handle. We would appreciate hearing from any of our members who would like to lend a hand with a few hours of volunteer work to help keep our Historical Society the splendid organization it has become. Nina Donald,
President, March 2008
Meanwhile Denis Faulkner reported that lights have been sighted at night in the Blockhouse leading to the possibility there was something supernatural behind the alarm incident. Our more prosaic past president thought it may have been our keen archives staff working late.
We are terribly saddened to report the sudden death of Pat Molson, First Vice President of the Merrickville and District Historical Society. Pat loved people and could usually be found at the Blockhouse, greeting visitors and proudly explaining the history of our National Historic site and of our Village. He delighted in discovering and displaying forgotten treasures from our archives and was playing a key role in the preservation of this important heritage collection at the time of his death. With Parks Canada he played a leading role in the creation of our new exhibition panels celebrating . Pat spent many hours administering our annual public School historical essay contest. But he always found the smiles of the proud winners more than full reward for his efforts. He will be greatly missed. He was a colleague and a good friend. Our sympathies are extended to his wife Andrée and all his family.
Alice Hughes was recently awarded the Lieutenant Governor’s Ontario Heritage Award for Lifetime Achievement. In her quiet way, no-one has worked longer or more relentlessly than Alice Hughes to ensure our local heritage will be preserved. Since her retirement from teaching Alice has spent many thousands of hours delving into the histories of local families. Searching records of church weddings, marriage and death certificates, to find when folks were “matched, hatched and dispatched” , as she colourfully put it during one of her presentations to the Historical Society in the year 2000. By Alice’s own admission she really did not set out to create the invaluable record of local genealogy which now resides in the Merrickville Public Library and the Heritage House Museum in Smiths Falls. But she did. All 20,000 pages of it! Nor did she expect to be crawling through the brush of abandoned local cemeteries, transcribing virtually every tombstone inscription. But she did.
It is hard to imagine anyone more worthy of recognition for a lifetime achievement award. Congratulations Alice. When the words “Successful Entrepreneur” are mentioned in connection to Merrickville the name Harry Falconer MacLean comes readily to mind. This giant of engineering and construction ingenuity literally put the name Merrickville on the map. But did you know there was another entrepreneur, before MacLean, who began his business in the basement of his family home on Elgin Street and built it into a leader in its field with over 1000 employees and over $100 million in sales. The story began with the marriage of Hiram Crain to Margaret Langford on Dec 24, 1862. Hiram Crain had been born in Maitland in 1832, a son of United Empire Loyalist David E. Crain and his wife Mary Pepper. Hiram moved with his family to Wolford Township, just south of Merrickville, where as a young man he began a construction company. In the course of his work, young Hiram would no doubt have encountered Samuel Langford who was a master builder in the Merrickville area. Most of the prominent stone buildings in Merrickville are attributed to his building skill. including the Stephen and Aaron Merrick homes as well as the Old Town Hall. At some point, Hiram met Samuel Langford’s daughter Margaret and on December 24, 1862, they were married.
From an early age Rolla showed exceptional enterprise and ambition. After early education in Merrickville at 17 he joined his father’s construction company as a bricklayer but with layoffs due to weather he found that his earning potential was influenced by factors beyond his control. Snowfall in March of 1883 meant another late spring and another late start at building. It also meant no bricklaying for at least a month, and no income. Completely frustrated at these periods of unemployment he turned to his new hobby, setting up a crude printing press in the cellar of his home on Elgin Street and purchasing used type which he learned to set by hand. His first advertising card, "The Merrickville Cheap Printing Office" became his first order. The beginning of what was to become the multi-million-dollar corporation of R. L. Crain Inc.
No overnight success, Rolla Crain continued to energetically expand his business and enter new partnerships while diversifying into book-binding, posters, specialized printing forms, business systems and ultimately the continuous printing forms for which the company became renowned. Rolla Crain died in 1947 at the age of 82 and was succeeded by two sons who continued to run the company, and build printing and bookbinding plants across Canada. By the time of its sale in 1989 to an international conglomerate, after 94 years in family hands, Crain’s sales were over $100 million and employed over 1000 people. Not bad for a Wolford farm boy! It is not unlikely the enterprising Rolla Crain inherited his hard working, straight shooting modest character from his father. About 1845, Hiram Crain came to Wolford Township with his family, settling on a farm just south of Merrickville. As he developed his construction business, Hiram Crain was upset to witness so much drinking in the Community and, with his strong Methodist background, decided to do something about it. With the help of a few kindred souls he organized a "Good Templars" Society which grew and thrived until in 1874 they were able to build their own ”Hall” which became known, as "Carley's Church", located just south of Merrickville at Carley’s Corners beside an 1865 school. (still surviving as a private home.) Meanwhile the sale of intoxicants had fallen off so much that the liquor interests became alarmed. Letters were written to Mr. Crain that his buildings were likely to go up in smoke, if “he did not leave off temperance activities”. About that time he tied his horses in a shed in Merrickville, and found when he was ready for home that his good set of harness had been cut to pieces. But none ¬of these things deterred him and opposition seemed only to add to his determination to advance the temperance program. “Carley’s Church” thrived and remained active until 1966 when its Congregation in block voted to go to the Merrickville United Church. Carley’s Church was later destroyed by fire and although nothing now remains of the historic Church, its dated cornerstone is in the collection of the Merrickville & District Historical Society Blockhouse Museum. References: “Historical sketch of Easton’s Corners United Church” Mrs. Jennie Earl, Mrs. Alice Hughes and Mrs Donald Empy, July, 1959 It is a little-known and sad reality that African slavery came to Ontario in large part with the United Empire Loyalists who emigrated here after the American Revolution, some bringing slaves with them or purchasing them on arrival. In Ontario in 1793 Lieutenant Governor John Graves Simcoe, reacting to the forcible removal to the United States of an enslaved Black woman, passed legislation that prohibited the importation of slaves into Upper Canada and set terms that limited slavery here. This “Act to Limit Slavery” which was the first anti-slavery act in the British Empire, signaled the diminishment, but not the end of slavery in Canada. There is no evidence to indicate the pioneers and frontiersmen who challenged the wild new territories of the Rideau in the late 1700s, such as the Stevens, Burritts or the Merricks brought with them any slaves. But it is a certainty that slavery existed along the shores of the St Lawrence and Lake Ontario in the more “progressive and prosperous” settlements. For Simcoe’s 1793 “Act to Limit Slavery” did just that; it did not completely ban the practice of owning slaves and using them in domestic service.
Apparently in this case, with the support of the Indians who refused to release them, the slaves stayed and the raiders returned empty-handed. Finally, in 1834 the inhumane practice of slavery was totally abolished across the British Empire, and, much later, in 1863 Abraham Lincon’s Emancipation Proclamation set American slaves free and in doing so, ignited the bloody American civil war. References: Heritage Matters, Ontario Heritage Trust, August 2007, The Grenville sentinel, Grenville County Historical Society, Apr/May 2007, no. 223 As always we are very grateful for the support of our members and of the community in general, and are pleased to bring you glimpses of our local history and heritage. Membership in the historical Society is renewed annually from January to December at a present cost of $5 per person or $10 per family. Last year a number of members joined through our $50 life membership per person category. If you have not already done so, please renew your membership with a cheque payable to the Merrickville & District Historical Society, and send to the address below. Also, if you are interested in keeping in touch via email, be sure and send us your current email address. It is not a requirement to join the Historical Society to attend our monthly general meetings. They are open to all members of the community. But it helps us to defray costs. This year, following the very successful Rideau 175 series, the Historical Society returns to its regular program of monthly lectures. Tuesday March 25 “For King & Country”,The Military history of Eastern Ontario, by retired Major Harry Needham, at Ste. Marguerite Bourgeoys School, 7:30. Everyone welcome. Refreshments. Tuesday April 29 Spring Dinner & Speaker One of the regular highlights of our year is our annual Spring Dinner, to be held this year in the Kilmarnock Room of the Sam Jakes Inn. The event will begin with an open bar at 6:30, followed by dinner. A special delicious dinner has been laid on by Sam Jakes chef, Tom Riding, consisting of an appetizer of soup or salad, a choice of braised beef or salmon, followed by desert, lemon tart or crème caramel. The cost is $35 per person paid in advance or $40 at the door, reservations required in any case. Jill Gray, 269-4236 Following dinner, Rideau author and historian Mark Jodoin, will present the story of, Stephen Burritt. “Stephen Burritt, - Soldier, Settler,Spy”. Most of us know the story of Stephen Burritt (U.E.L) and his role in founding the Village named for the Burritts. Less well known is his heroic story of loyalty during the American Revolutionary war, fighting for the British under General Burgoyne and later acting as a daring spy for Rogers Rangers. Copyright The Merrickville & District Historical Society, 2008, John Cowan, Editor Merrickville and District Historical Society PO Box 294 Merrickville, Ontario K0G 1N0 website design donated by Ken W. Watson ©2008 The Merrickville and District Historical Society |
