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Jesuit Mission to the Hurons, The
In 1728, a mission to the Huron Indians was established near Fort Pontchartrain (Detroit) by Father Armand de la Richardie, S.J. The Mission was moved to Bois Blanc Island and the adjacent mainland in 1742. In 1747 it was destroyed by disaffected Hurons and a party of Iroquois, and the next year re-established in this vicinity. The Huron Mission became the Parish of the Assumption in 1767 and was entrusted with the spiritual care of... -
Unitarian Universalist Church of Olinda
The Universalist faith developed in New England in the late 1700s and reached Canada in the early 1800s. Its central doctrine of universal salvation made it more liberal and inclusive than most Christian churches of the day. Local farmer Michael Fox began organizing Universalist services in the hamlet of Olinda around 1860. Twenty-three men and women formed a congregation in 1880 and built this church the following year. It was one of six Universalist churches... -
Huron College 1863
The college was founded by the Right Reverend Benjamin Cronyn who, following his election in 1857 as first Anglican Bishop of Huron, saw the need for a theological school and institution for advanced studies to serve the rapidly expanding population of the region. He selected Archdeacon Isaac Hellmuth to raise funds in England and Canada, and Huron College was incorporated in May 1863. Under Hellmuth's capable direction, 1863-66, the institution provided theological training and a... -
First Regular Baptist Church, Dresden
The First Baptist Church of Dawn - established by former slaves and free African Americans in the 1840s - held its meetings in private homes, then in a log chapel at the British American Institute. In the 1850s, a Baptist congregation met on Main Street in Dresden, until a lot was purchased from parishioner George Johnson on the present site. A church was built by the congregation and the inaugural service of the First Regular... -
Catholic Colored Mission of Windsor, 1887-1893, The
The first Roman Catholic mission for Blacks in Canada was established in Windsor in St. Alphonsus Parish in 1887 under the leadership of the Very Reverend Dean James Theodore Wagner. The "Catholic Colored Mission of Windsor" was created to serve disadvantaged Black children, while encouraging Blacks in Windsor to adopt the Catholic faith. It was first located in the original frame church building at Goyeau Street and Park Street East. With the support and partnership... -
First Jewish Congregation in Canada West, The
In 1849 the Trustees of the Toronto Hebrew Congregation purchased a site in Toronto from the Hon. John Beverley Robinson for the first Jewish cemetery west of Montreal. Regular religious services were not held in Canada West until 1856 when seventeen Jewish families from England and Continental Europe formed a congregation in Toronto. This group, after acquiring the cemetery in 1858, became known as the "Toronto Hebrew Congregation - Holy Blossom". They held services in... -
Little Trinity Church
Founded in 1842, this is the oldest surviving church in the city of Toronto. Under the patronage of the Right Reverend John Strachan, first Anglican Bishop of Toronto, funds were raised to start construction in 1843. Its first rector was the Rev. W.H. Ripley, and regular services commenced on February 18, 1844. Attended largely by industrial workers, it was known as "The Poor Man's Church", although such prominent citizens as William Gooderham, James Worts, Joseph... -
Metropolitan United Church
This "Cathedral of Methodism" was designed by Henry Langley in the High Victorian Gothic style. The cornerstone was laid by the Rev. Egerton Ryerson, D.D., in 1870 and the church was dedicated in 1872. It replaced an earlier structure at the southeast corner of Adelaide and Toronto Streets. The first missionaries from Canada to Japan were commissioned in this church on May 7, 1873. The inaugural service of the Methodist Church of Canada was held... -
Thomson Settlement, The
The first permanent resident in Scarborough Township was David Thomson, a Scot who came to Upper Canada with his brother Andrew in 1796. Each was granted 400 acres, and David built a log cabin on his property that year. He was soon joined by other settlers, including his brothers Andrew and Archibald. The Thomsons, who were stone masons, worked on the first Parliament Buildings at York (Toronto). A road connecting the settlement with York was... -
Wycliffe College
This college was founded in 1877 to prepare men of evangelical conviction for the Anglican ministry. Four years earlier, a group of Anglican clergy and laity committed to evangelical principles had formed the Church Association of the Diocese of Toronto. The Association brought a noted theologian and administrator, the Reverend James Paterson Sheraton, from Nova Scotia to establish the Protestant Episcopal Divinity School and serve as its Principal and first Professor. It opened on October... -
First Mennonite Settlement, The
Following the American Revolution, Mennonites living in Pennsylvania began to come to the Niagara Peninsula in search of good farmland. A small group settled on land west of Twenty Mile Creek in 1786. Then, in 1799, Jacob Moyer, Abraham Moyer and Amos Albright scouted land in the vicinity of Vineland and Jordan and secured a 1,100-acre tract. They returned later that year with a number of families. Others joined them the next year. These industrious... -
Niagara Baptist Church Burial Ground, The
The Niagara Baptist Church congregation was established in 1829. A meeting house was erected at this site in 1831 through the efforts of John Oakley, a white former British soldier turned teacher and minister. Initially, the church congregation mainly consisted of colonists, with a small number of Black members. The Black population of the Town of Niagara grew to about 100 due to the influx of freedom seekers after Britain passed the 1833 Slavery Abolition... -
Brethren in Christ Church, The
A distinctive religious denomination similar in doctrine and practice to Mennonite assemblies, the Brethren in Christ Church emerged in Pennsylvania during the 1770s. It was established in Upper Canada in 1788 when Johannes Wenger (John Winger), who later became bishop, and Jacob Sider formed a congregation here in the Short hills. The denomination advocated adult conversion and baptism, and rejected secular pleasures, fashionable dress, and political and military involvement. A small, tightly knit religious group... -
Ridley College
One of Ontario's most prominent independent boarding schools, this college, named for a 16th-century Christian martyr, was opened in 1889. It was established by Anglican churchmen to provide boys with a sound preparatory education and to instill in them enduring moral and spiritual values. Initially housed in a converted sanatorium, Ridley expanded steadily, adding a junior school, reputedly the first of its kind in Canada, in 1899 and moving all facilities to this site by... -
Shingwauk Hall
The Shingwauk Indian Residential School operated on this site from 1875 to 1970 as part of the Canadian Residential Schools system. An Anglican minister, E.F. Wilson, named this school for Chief Shingwaukonse (Little Pine). Shingwaukonse had a vision of creating teaching wigwams where Anishinaabe and settler children would learn from each other's cultures. In 1935, Shingwauk Hall was built to replace the former school building, known as the Shingwauk Industrial Home. The assimilationist Residential School... -
Sacred Heart College
The Society of Jesus opened a classical college at this site in 1913. The next year, the province granted Sacred Heart College a charter giving it degree-granting powers. At first, the college was bilingual, but after 1916, it taught exclusively in French. Sacred Heart College became a centre for the education and formation of young Franco-Ontarian men. In 1957, it changed its name to the University of Sudbury, which became the Catholic component of Laurentian... -
Sainte-Anne des Pins
An important centre of the Roman Catholic Church in northeastern Ontario, Sainte-Anne-des-Pins was established as a mission by Jesuits in 1883. A log church, now the presbytery, was built to serve as a school, as well as a place of worship for the congregation, and to provide a base for missionary work in Manitoulin Island and Sault Ste. Marie and settlements along the Canadian Pacific Railway. Active in community life, Sainte-Anne's played a prominent role... -
Manitowaning Mission, The
In the 1830s, officials urged native peoples in Upper Canada to abandon seasonal fishing and hunting migrations and settle permanently in agricultural communities. To this end, the government established a mission at Manitowaning under the auspices of the Anglican Church in 1838. A school, houses and workshops for teaching trades were constructed. The mission encouraged farming, but crops were meagre. Few aboriginal people chose to settle permanently at Manitowaning, and in 1864 the mission was... -
Mission of the Immaculate Conception 1849, The
In 1849, two priests of the Society of Jesus, Father Jean-Pierre Choné and Father Nicholas Frémiot, established the Mission of the Immaculate Conception on the Kaministiquia River. From there, the Jesuits traveled the north shore of Lake Superior on missionary journeys. They also supported Ojibwa demands for compensation for Indain lands acquired by the Crown in the region. Within five years, the Mission, centred in an Indian village of about 30 dwellings, had a large... -
Timiskaming Mission, The
In 1836, a Catholic mission was established directly across the lake at Fort Timiskaming, a Hudson's Bay Company post where, by 1842, a chapel had been completed. The mission was moved to this site in 1836 and a presbytery was constructed by the Oblates who had commenced missionary work in the region in 1844. A second presbytery was built here in 1867.The Grey Sisters of Ottawa, who had arrived the previous year, then established the... -
New Credit Indian Reserve and Mission
Faced with the pressure of white settlement, the Mississauga Indians began considering in 1840 the relocation of their Credit River Village near Toronto. In 1847, the Six Nations Council made them an unsolicited offer of land on its Grand River reserve. Native spokesmen for resettlement, including the Reverend Peter Jones, a Mississauga chief, selected land in Tuscarora and later in Oneida township. Although several had located elsewhere, some 266 Mississauga settled on lots on the... -
Mohawk Village
Allies of the British during the American War of Independence, the Six Nations Iroquois received extensive lands along the Grand River in 1784. Mohawks, led by Joseph Brant, established a village of some 400 inhabitants here by 1788. The community was situated at an important crossing point on the river ("Brant's Ford") and prospered as a resting place for travellers on the "Detroit path", a trail linking the Niagara and Detroit rivers. Increasingly, European settlers... -
New Fairfield 1815
In 1792 Fairfield, a Moravian missionary settlement of Delaware Indians was established by David Zeisberger just north of here across the Thames. It was destroyed by invading American forces following their victory at the Battle of the Thames, October 5, 1813. Christian Frederick Denke, who guided the homeless Fairfield Indians during the war years, re-established the mission here at New Fairfield in 1815. A small log church was then built which was replaced by a... -
Gull River and the Clergy House
This site was an early Indian camping ground, the Gull River watershed being the hunting territory of bands living around Lake Simcoe who came by way of the Balsam Lake portage and Gull River waters. Before the days of the settlers, lumbering companies moved large quantities of white pine from the area and it is probable that they erected this building about 1870. In 1899, it was acquired by the Anglican Diocese of Toronto and during the early years of this century, served as headquarters for itinerant missionaries who travelled extensively throughout the surrounding district. -
John Weir Foote, V.C. 1904-1988
The only chaplain in World War II to receive the Victoria Cross, Foote was born and raised in Madoc. He entered the Presbyterian ministry in 1934 and enlisted in the Canadian Chaplain Service five years later. Assigned to the Royal Hamilton Light Infantry, Foote distinguished himself during the ill-fated Dieppe Raid on August 19, 1942. Acting with utter disregard for his personal safety, he ministered to the wounded and carried injured personnel from exposed positions...