Bracebridge

A Brief History of Bracebridge

A GOOD TOWN GREW HERE...................A GOOD TOWN CONTINUES

On June 5^th, 1874 the County of Victoria passed bylaw #162 “...to erect the Village of Bracebridge and neighborhood into an incorporated Village...”, and a new municipality was born. The settlement here was first known as North Falls and received its name Bracebridge as a Post Office in 1864.

Bracebridge had become the focus area for development in those early days because of the extremely important availability of the hydraulic power provided by the water falls to run the wheels of industry, further enhanced by the superb access to the great lakes of Muskoka provided by the Muskoka River.

It was in 1859 that the first settler, John Beal, came to Bracebridge and built his rudimentary log shanty on the east side of what we know now as Manitoba St., just north of Ann St. Why he chose that site is unknown because he must have endured climbing several steep ravines to get there. He was followed shortly by David Leith and James Cooper, who had been contracted to clear the colonization route called Muskoka Road, leading to the settlement of North Falls.

From the very start Bracebridge was blessed with settlers of great entrepreneurial spirit, perhaps because it would have taken that type of individual to succeed in what was then a rugged and difficult land. The hardships they had to face must have been incredible.

They truly deserve our most serious appreciation and respect.

It wasn’t long before things started happening. The Alexander Bailey sawmill, grist mill and Victoria Hotel, Harvie Line of Royal Mail Stages, The District Exchange Store of John Teviotdale, Hiram James McDonald’s store and Royal Hotel, James Cooper’s Hotel and Thomas McMurray’s newspaper The Northern Advocate were among the first business ventures; all supporting a thriving lumbering industry attracted by the huge pine, hemlock and hardwoods dominating the landscape and which were in such demand by shipbuilders, especially in Britian.

The Bird Woollen Mill, Beardmore Tannery, Huntsville & Bracebridge Tanning Co., Muskoka Linen Mill, J.D. Shier Sawmill, Singleton Brown Shingle Mill, Marble Works, and many others all settled in Bracebridge within a short period of time and steered the community into the leadership of Muskoka commerce that it still enjoys to this day.

There have been many celebrations in Bracebridge since those early days, the earliest being the celebration of the Confederation of Canada on July 1^st, 1867 and the most recent being our 100^thbirthday in 1975.

In the year 2000, Bracebridge celebrated the 125^th anniversary of the creation of the Bracebridge municipality.

Kenneth Carman Veitch