Innisfil Videos
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Jean Warrington - Dog Powered Cream Separator
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Jean Warrington, a long-time Innisfil resident, discusses growing up in Innisfil and the farming community. This clip explains her mother's use of a dog-powered cream separator. The dog was a bull mastiff named Major, and her grandfather would harness the dog into a homemade device that would separate the cream from the milk as the dog walked along the track. There is a photo of Jean's mother as a young girl with a bow in her long hair standing beside Major as he powered the separator.
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Jean Warrington - Fishing And The 9Th Line Creek
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Jean Warrington discusses going fishing as a child in the creek near the 9th Line of Innisfil. She used a stick with a string and safety pin tied to it, and she remembers catching a small perch but can't recall if the family ate it or not. The creek had been diverted to the east side of the Line by her uncle once the family moved onto the land. The creek is now about 10 feet wide. To keep the land along the sides of the diversion, her uncle planted limbs from willow trees, which eventually took root and grew there from 1935 until 2011 when the last one was cut down after new sewers cut off their roots and prevented the trees from thriving.
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Jean Warrington - Islands Of Lake Simcoe
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Jean Warrington describes the islands of Lake Simcoe and her memories of the First Nations people who resided on Snake Island. She remembers going to Fox Island to swim, but the island itself was covered with poison ivy. She recalls it also had a lighthouse, which was a relatively small structure with a white tower pictured in the video from c. 1920 to light up the shallow shoal nearby. There were no cottages on the island when she was a youth. She does recall some of the native residents on Snake Island coming to shore by birch bark canoes to sell canoes and bead work boxes with porcupine quills to cottagers.
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Jean Warrington - The Cottage
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Jean Warrington discusses her childhood visits to her grandmother's cottage, which had been built by her grandfather near Lake Simcoe. Her grandmother spent summers there after her husband passed away in 1933 because the family property passed to her son and she stayed at the cottage so that she wouldn't be in the way in the main house. Jean stayed with her for the duration of the summer, and that is where she learned how to swim by copying a neighbour. The cottage was built in 1925, and her grandfather had transported the wood down the 9th Line by horse and then across the hard sand on the shore of the Lake. The cottage was well-built by a Mr. Glover and was beautifully lined inside with tongue-in-groove cedar. It contained at least three bedrooms, a living room, and a kitchen.
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Jim Roberts - "Generations"
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Jim Roberts, a long time resident of De Grassi Point, discusses the construction and meaning of his home, which he and his family call "Generations."
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Jim Roberts - Early Cottage Utilities
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Jim Roberts recalls the utilities such as electricity and waste collection that were available to early cottagers, as well as having to use ice boxes as there were no refrigerators.
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Jim Roberts - First Nations At De Grassi Point
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Jim Roberts describes his memories of visits from the Ojibwa First Nations people of Snake Island and Georgina Island in Lake Simcoe who arrived in birch bark canoes to sell various handcrafted items to De Grassi Point residents.
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Jim Roberts - The De Grassi Point Commission
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Jim Roberts talks about the De Grassi Point Commission, a committee of residents of the eighteen cottages on the point, and the significance of these cottages to the area's history,
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John Grant - Bee Research On Thorah Island
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John Grant discusses the honey bee research conducted on Thorah Island by researchers from the University of Guelph. His wife Laurie was one of the people who started the study as North American honey bees have a tracheal mite and an Irish monk had developed a strain that was resistant to the mite. Because honey bees can't fly further than one mile, and there was no indigenous honey bee already on Thorah Island, it was selected as the best location for the study. The study is ongoing, and John recalls going to visit once and seeing that the Guelph students had smudge pots for smokers to make the bees docile. When their professor had told them to collect green vegetation to make smoke, John noticed they were collecting poison ivy. The Beaverton Distrcit Conservation Club was formed in the early 1990s to initiate conservation efforts for Lake Simcoe. The group regularly obtains permits to stock walleye and maintain the acreage on Thorah Island where the bee study takes place.
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John Grant - Entertainment
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John Grant recalls what youths in Beaverton did for recreation and entertainment in the past. His grandfather Playfair Brown initially settled in Beaverton with his grandmother Jessie Williamson, and when he returned to Beaverton after the Second World War he noticed there was nothing for people to do. He then decided to open a gymnasium so that the boys could learn the "manly art of fisticuffs" to get them off the street and allow them to get their aggression out. He eventually ended up in Toronto as Canada's boxing promoter. He worked with Conn Smythe to build Maple Leaf Gardens. He also coached the Canadian Olympic Team, promoted many professional events in the 1920s including long distance running, and swimming. John also recalls that when he was growing up there were townsfolk and cottagers, and cottage girls would come into town to meet the town boys and summer romances would blossom, which doesn't happen anymore since many cottages have been converted into homes when the owners retired. He also recalls the Port Bolster drive-in, and in particular a tale from when he went to see the film Love Story. There he saw a tractor entering the drive-in that was pulling a trailer with a couch on it, and he recounts that "the love story on that couch was better than the one on the screen." He also talks of the Commodore Theatre as "the" place to go to in its prime, and recalls a story about his father traveling there with friends in a Model T Ford on a particularly cold day. They thought they'd drain the fluid to stop the radiator from freezing but didn't realize the fluid would freeze on contact and ended up having to walk six miles in the cold. Finally, he also talks of the Strand movie theatre, which had an Edison projector that still survives today. A resident of Thorah Island originally purchased the projector in the late 1890s, and the family retained the projector until it was donated.
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John Grant - Family Legacy
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John Grant describes his family's history in Beaverton, where the originally came as cottagers. His mother and aunt dated two brothers of the Divine family, whose house John now lives in. His mother also stayed in the house during the polio epidemic in Toronto. His mother's side of the family were settlers in the 1820s on a 100 acre farm near Argyle, which was given to his ancestor as a veteran of the Napoleonic wars in return for clearing land each year. His great-grandfather, William Williamson and his wife Mary Suitor opened a pharmacy in Beaverton and lived over the store in an apartment. In the summer the heat in the apartment was unbearable, so William purchased property on Cedar Beach and built the first cottage there as a cooler place to stay in the summer. The cottage stayed in the family until the 1960s when his maternal uncle passed away in his 40s after working in uranium mines, and no one could afford to buy it out. His mother acquired another property in 1970 though so the family always had a place in Beaverton. John himself worked as a cook for a summer, and later traveled around the area in a rock band on weekends. William Williamson also opened the Beaverton telephone company and ran 12 lines out of a switchboard in the back of his drugstore. He also details how his grandmother and her siblings were afforded the opportunity to attend university and as a result, his grandmother Jessie Williamson graduated with a Bachelor's Degree from the University of Toronto in 1913. William also developed what he called invisible ink, and his son-in-law (John's grandfather) who was a soldier in the first world war told his field commander about the invisible ink William had invented and suggested it for possible use in delivering messages. John retains a copy of an official letter stating the idea who be passed on, but he is unsure of the ultimate outcome.
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John Grant - Moonshine On Thorah Island
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John Grant recounts some stories of moonshiners growing their own grain and distilling their own alcohol on Thorah Island in an effort to stay self-sufficient during prohibition. It was called Thorah Island honey, or sometimes Thorah Island bang. The last still was dismantled in the 1970s but evidently parts can still be found on the island. John discusses how one had to be caught with the coil of the still in their possession in order to be charged, and how there was a signal system worked out between the island and Beaverton so that the island residents knew when the RCMP would be coming to do a raid. The signal was seen one day and when the police arrived they followed a trail to the fence and saw the coil of the still had been thrown over. After producing a warrant to search the property, the property owner stated that it only allowed a search of his property and not the neighbour's, so he ended up avoiding charges. John also talks about a man he met several years ago who had only left the island twice in his life - once to serve time in jail, and once to participate in the Second World War. Some of the moonshine manufactured on the island, and it is claimed that some of it ended up working its way to the United States, where prohibition lasted longer. There was also a rumour that some of it was distributed by Joseph Kennedy.
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John Grant - Preserving Lake Simcoe
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John Grant discusses the significance role of Lake Simcoe in the past as well as the important efforts made to preserve the lake both culturally and environmentally. He discusses how Roche's Point on Lake Simcoe was discussed as a possible location as the capital of Ontario, which was owned by one family but has been dedicated on a 999 year lease to the Conservation Authority (although the family still retains the right to hunt on the property. He then goes on to mention that he has served four terms as an elected municipal councilman and as such was the Durham Region and Brock Township representative on the Board of Directors of the Conservation Authority where he became aware of the fact that sport fishing on the lake is a $200 million/year industry. He also mentions the challenges of keeping the lake healthy - including keeping phosphorous levels down, which is harmful to the lake because it depletes oxygen and the cold water fishery suffers for it. From the 1970s until the 1990s trout and whitefish were almost entirely depleted and eventually had to be restocked by the Ministry of Natural Resources. Thanks to combined efforts from the Authority, the Ministry, and farmers and municipalities the phosphorous has diminished and trout have begun to naturally reproduce again. John also discusses how difficult it is to balance conservation efforts with waterside development, as well as understanding which authorities are responsible for what and securing funding in order to maintain conservation efforts.
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John Grant - Thorah Island In The Past
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John Grant discusses Thorah Island's past and the continuing pioneer spirit there with a number of anecdotes. He talks about how Beaverton is the ice fishing capital of Lake Simcoe as there are more departures from the Beaverton harbour than anywhere else. He discusses the ingenuity of ice hut construction, including one man who used the hut as his home and had to cut a hole out of one side to make room for his feet when he laid down to sleep. He also mentions how the Thorah Island harbour included a small store and post office, and how the first day issue of a stamp from that post office ended up being highly sought after. An archaeological dig was also established on one corner of the island where a settlement of native Canadians was discovered dating back to 2500 B.C. Additionally Keith Bissell, a teacher from Scarborough with ties to the island wrote the Ontario song often sung in elementary school. Only one person lives on the island during the winter in a three floor building that may have originally been intended to be a hotel, but never came to fruition after rail transportation began to dominate over water shipping. John also recalls a story of a couple who honeymooned on the island in 1935 in a small wooden hotel on Centre Rd. where there was no running water or electricity. Electricity didn't come to the island until approximately 1955 by underground cables from the point of Mara, rumoured to be a result of the vice-President of Ontario Hydro purchasing a cottage on the island. The first cottagers on the island were said to be three sisters with American husbands, and another early cottager was a shipbuilder by trade and thus built a cottage using dowel pins and dovetails, and no nails.
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John Grant - Thorah Island Today
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John Grant recounts how when he first ran for city councilor, he traveled to Thorah Island and was told that he was the first to come to the island to campaign and once he was in office, he could count on the people of the island to support him. He describes how the island has a small harbour built in the 1930s and only recently rebuilt, with one dirt road circling the island. He purchased a property there in 1993 on the north side of the island. As someone who enjoyed hearing stories of the island, he recalls how the Chippewa First Nations sold the island in the 1870s, and it was eventually divided into eleven 100-acre lots for European use. The deal was re-ratified in the Williams Treaty in the 1920s, and the Chippewas still retain seven acres for camping, hunting, and fishing. The original farmsteaders had sheep, cattle, grain, and tried to be as self-sufficient as possible, though barges were still necessary to move livestock and goods. Descendants of the original settlers still live on the island, and John repeats a saying that if you buy property on the island but aren't related to anyone on the island, you will be in 20 years.
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Keith Kell and the Royal Winter Fair
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Keith Kell shares fond memories of showing cattle at the Royal Winter Fair with friends and family. He also recounts a story about seeing the Toronto Maple Leafs play the Montreal Canadiens (tickets cost only two dollars).
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Keith Kell on Farming
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Keith Kell reflects on his family history of farming, touching on threshing and threshing parties and history of tractors, with particular focus on Fergus-Ford tractors.
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Keith Kell on Horses and Sleigh Bells
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Keith Kell recalls traveling to the Gilford Church by horse on a cutter and sleighs. He shares stories about the horses and the distinctive sound of sleigh bells of this period of their life, with insights into Church and farm life. There is great discussion about selling wood, hauling it across a frozen Lake Simcoe.
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Lou Kelly - Changing Costs of Property
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Longtime Innisfil resident Lou Kelly discusses how properties have changed in Innisfil over the years, including their rising costs. Interviewed by John Trotter at the Innisfil ideaLAB & Library on 23 September 2016.
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Lou Kelly - Development in Stroud
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Longtime resident and real estate business owner Lou Kelly talks about the latest housing development in Stroud, and his role in creating it. Interviewed by John Trotter on 23 September 2016 at the Innisfil ideaLAB & Library Lakeshore branch.
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Lou Kelly - Early Career
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Longtime resident and real estate business owner Lou Kelly discusses his early career as a soft drink delivery driver and his first encounters with Innisfil. Interviewed by John Trotter on 23 September 2016 at the Innisfil ideaLAB & Library Lakeshore branch.
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Lou Kelly - Evolution of Innisfil's Demographics
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Longtime Innisfil resident and real estate broker Lou Kelly reviews the ways in which he has seen the demographics change for residents of Innisfil since the 1980s. Interviewed by John Trotter on 23 September 2016 at the Innisfil ideaLAB & Library.
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