Heritage Cramahe's application for provincial award

Historical Context

Local newspaper editor Eileen Argyris’ history of Cramahe Township and Colborne in 2000 opens with John Ralston Saul’s phrase that “the past is not the past, it is the context.” Without an awareness of heritage that has been built over 200 years and that then is integrated into its modern life, Cramahe would lose its visible distinctiveness, its own narrative, its sense of place. Cramahe deserves recognition by the Ontario Heritage Trust’s Community Leadership Program, for heritage is a value that is a fundamental aspect for sustaining this community. We draw your attention in particular to the record of the years 1995-2009, during which an awareness of heritage has progressively been built, becoming a unifying force for the two distinct local entities that were summarily amalgamated by the province on January 1, 2001.

This summer marks the celebration by Cramahe Township of the 150th anniversary of the organization of Colborne into a separate municipality. The township – originally much larger - was officially created in 1792, and the town’s own history certainly predates the opening of the first store in 1815. Settlement in the township began to create a regional identity in the first decade of the nineteenth century, the very first “Late” Loyalist having arrived in 1793. Many of these settlers had ventured north from the Albany region of New York and west from Vermont while the area around Salem east of Colborne had been a land grant to an officer commanding a provincial regiment, Col. Peters. The founders that commissioned the first survey laying out a town-site around a village square (infrequently used in Ontario) were the first two generations of the Joseph Keeler family, the settlement originally being known as Keeler’s Tavern. (M. McBurney and M. Byers, Homesteads, U T P, Toronto, 1979, 144-155). Indeed, according to this source, two frame homes dating to the War of 1812 period and still in good condition on King St., (old highway 2) nearby each other might be the original Keeler tavern (146-147) for the one locally associated with the Keeler name was not actually family property until 1832. The town that had also been known as The Corners, was renamed while Sir John Colborne was Lt. Governor, possibly after a visit by Sir John to the Cobourg area with the Keelers. (E. Argyris, How Firm a Foundation, Boston Mills, Erin, Ontario, 2000, 39)

“Young Joe” Keeler (surely a distinctive Ontarioism) is also credited with advancing the project of building the Murray Canal to the Bay of Quinte at Carrying Place, as well as the founding of Norwood on the Trent River, and the mill village of Castleton ten kms. north of Colborne. (The Purdy grist mill with its equipment still stands in Castleton and its designation is currently being considered by the owner and the Heritage Committee.) Transportation links between these three settlements by stage coach from three railway stations in Colborne linked eastern Northumberland County, and the Grand Trunk/CN station remained in use from its opening in 1856 until its closure in 1968. Both Castleton and Colborne were therefore centres of local government until their amalgamation for this century, the one of a rural township, the other a small town whose economic fortunes were closely tied to the region’s agriculture.

Heritage Today
Both the public and private resources of such a small and largely rural community are limited. Modest municipal budgets are consumed by the provision of essential services, while most industries are not large employers. Until its sudden and regrettable closing this year, the community was well-served by a weekly newspaper, The Colborne Chronicle, which undoubtedly contributed to the ability of small community groups to attain visibility. Several of these have participated with Council and its own committees of volunteer members to sustain a community awareness of local and regional heritage.

Examples of effective consultation by Council with Cramahe’s Heritage Committee and the wider community include:
• Designation of several heritage edifices and consultation about signage and events.
Ed. note - Cramahe has designated 14 properties in the township including three churches (Shiloh, Castleton and Salem), Victoria Square and the former Orient Hotel in Castleton
• Redesign of King St. in Colborne (through a design competition) to modernize it but also to retain its character as a wide market-town street with angle parking on each side, replacing its previous unique but traffic-slowing configuration.
• Heritage murals painted on three buildings for 2000, and township assistance for the surface restoration of the original brick face of the Queen’s Hotel in Colborne, and the private residence, and former Inn at the central cross-roads of Castleton in 2007.
• Victoria Park (Colborne’s original town square that has been designated): re-installation of the fire bell this summer that had once stood in a park tower facing the high school (now re-used as the Town Hall of the township), addition of a suitably designed gazebo this summer; reconstruction of the fountain in 2006 - copying its original design.
• Printed pamphlet of a self-guided heritage walking tour of Colborne and Castleton; guided tours of Colborne by Heritage Committee members during town festivals.
• Inclusion of local homes and gardens in various Northumberland garden/open house tours; a Cramahe home and gardens tour in 2008 in support of the Castleton Townhall restoration organized by the Friends of Castleton Townhall.
• Harmonious restoration and upkeep work on the area’s brick, stone and “carpenter gothic” frame churches; examples include the 1997 replacement of the steeple of St. Peter’s Anglican church (opened in Colborne in 1846), the anniversary restoration of the top of the steeple of 1861 Salem United Church in 2008; exterior restoration work in 2008 on Colborne United Church (1830-31) and earlier repairs to Old St. Andrew’s locally quarried limestone building in Colborne (1830).
• Commemorative plaque and readings at Salem church events of the poetry of Edna Jaques whose work includes a poem about the Salem church cemetery.
• Publication in 2000 of a fine local history source, Eileen Argyris, How Firm a Foundation, a highly readable study that places the town into its regional context, and includes fascinating vignettes of individuals who fashioned and sustained a sense of community through several decades of work. (Read the narrative on Eliza Padginton, the local postmaster, and United Church Sunday school teacher for seventy five years who unfailingly wrote regular letters to “her boys” serving in four wars from 1899 to 1953).

Two community heritage projects stand out.

1. The Colborne Registry Office

The 1859 Registry office in Colborne stood empty after land records were transferred to Cobourg in 1992. In 1995 the LACAC’s advice was accepted that the Neo-classical, barrel-vaulted brick building be purchased from the province (this was done for a dollar) and designated. The Colborne Council, concerned about the deterioration of the building’s internal space, canvassed the community for suggestions about its re-use. The leading ideas to be advanced were a local museum, a “History Centre” and an art gallery to be managed by a local cooperative of fourteen artists.

The artists’ cooperative received the hall to manage, with one room reserved for local historical materials, and rotating art exhibits from the current seven local artists in the cooperative are shown in three of the four rooms. Individual shows are also mounted. A local heritage room occupies the fourth, its exhibits and space renewed by the Heritage Committee and exhibit director in 2008. Although rather inflexible space, it is quite a lovely gallery. In recent years small grants in support of the cooperative’s costs for upkeep of the building have come from other local volunteer groups, such as the Northumberland Film Society. The Registry Office is a fine example of community input creating a physical cultural presence within the community, where otherwise no such centre would exist. All over this province it is difficult to maintain town centres that sustain vitality and commercial/professional services, and commercial success on King St. in Colborne varies considerably; the gallery/historical centre with its proven success is now one of the street’s anchors.

2. The Castleton Town Hall

The village of Castleton north of Colborne was the government seat of Cramahe Township prior to 2001. It sits at the cross-roads of two county roads that take traffic west or to the east and north of Rice Lake toward Warkworth and the summer Westben Music Festival at Campbellford, this crossing forming a T junction in the village’s centre. Today, Castleton is the eastern terminus of the Oakridges Moraine Trail. The T is outlined by three remarkable historic buildings that together provide a continuing and evocative historical presence: an imposing square frame private home that once was a large Inn; a large frame general store that may be one of the finest such stores remaining in active business in the southern province, and the red brick Castleton Town Hall. The township had purchased the lots north and south of the Hall, thereby opening vistas of the building’s intricate brickwork; and its classical design, pilasters, and large classically curved, coloured-glass windows in both stories are thereby easily observed. This beautifully proportioned 1893 building is, in Philip Carter’s words, “a gem.”

The Hall also tells us of community vision over a century ago. In the well-lit, raised basement were the municipal offices, jail cell, walk-in vault; these were intact; the offices were turned into a small library branch after 2001 – but not into well-designed space for either library or community meeting purposes. The main floor, accessed originally by twinned wide stairways to right and left from the central door was a hall where Council met, with stage, and rear balcony, lit by four large windows on each side and a curved classical window at the rear of the stage. Although the room was in constant use by a variety of community groups, the era of lectures and local amateur theatre and concerts was only a faint memory, and its physical condition – unsightly, close to dreadful.

The building bespoke makeshift usage; it was fast becoming a stark symbol of division between the old township and the new amalgamation, especially since the municipal resources had been exhausted building the Keeler Centre and arena in the largest population centre - Colborne. While the Heritage Committee had demonstrated a commitment to the preservation of this space and had designated the building, municipal resources did not begin to meet the financial requirements for its upkeep; its professional restoration was not even being discussed. At this juncture, the Township’s Recreation Committee in 1995 also wished to revitalize the building and convinced a divided Council, supported by the Heritage Committee, after informal advice had been sought from Will Greer, to commission a Heritage assessment report. Philip Carter, as Greer suggested, was successfully sought out for this purpose. In the meantime, removal of plywood paneling along the walls and the false ceiling had nearly exhausted local funds and had rendered the space unusable. Community reaction to its closure was robust.

The solution lay with this new professional advice, the formation of a “Friends of Castleton Town Hall” umbrella support group of volunteers, consultation with leaders of all user groups, the seeking of several provincial grants once Carter’s report was completed, and vigorous local newspaper coverage. Although no Heritage grants have supported this restoration, several others along with local fundraising and municipal contributions have provided the means for the successful completion of this large municipal Heritage project.

The early redeployment of the building was essential to several local groups, - “just get on with it” - but sympathetic restoration that would not harm the original fabric or the building’s design was a leading element of the community’s ongoing decisions. It would have been easy to jettison such professional care, by simply prioritizing the employment of local contractors with modern mortar and track lighting; instead Mayor, a united Council, staff, community groups, the newspaper all bought in to the vision of modernizing this building through being faithful to its unique physical setting, its design, and its many detailed features. The result is a stunning community achievement.

The makeshift kitchen in a stairway landing is gone, the sagging balcony re-stabilized, deteriorated supports replaced, a matching stairway to one side of the hall re-opened, the original stage restored, food-serving facilities hidden from view under the balcony. An accessible washroom was created upstairs to one side of the stage and another in the basement jail cell (complete with retained metal door, window bars and wall graffiti). The original back-stage window was uncovered; new ceiling, plumbing, electrical work and suitable lighting installed, the walls painted in “Castleton Green.” In order to restore the stairway symmetry, a lift was rejected in favour of external ramps up to the back west door from the parking area for upstairs access on the north side of the stage, and separately down to a side library door that has replaced the a middle lower window. Thus, modern safety standards have required that compromises be made, but the restoration and enhancement of the building’s heritage qualities and features, the renewal of its architects’ original vision, and use of the multi-purpose edifice to sustain village and rural community life locally as well as for public functions throughout the township have guided this project throughout the past three years.

This extensive, and at junctures controversial, project was planned and effectively overseen by municipal staff and completed on budget; the Mayor has been a project generator (not merely a supporter) from the outset and Council has joined with him; the editor of The Colborne Chronicle provided extensive coverage and editorials that supported the building’s renewal throughout the public meetings and “Friends’” discussions. Ongoing, integrated consultation was the password. When, in 2008, the Library Committee considered reducing costs by consolidating into its larger library, community reaction in Castleton was swift and unified, with wider support from “the south” and in adjacent areas of Haldimand. The restoration was working its magic. This space is now being reconfigured into an open-plan small branch, along with a designated historical collections/archive room. The Heritage Committee is planning two public lectures on historical themes for the hall this fall, re-launching the building’s vision of 1893. Colborne’s sesqui symbolically is extending “north,” as befits its history.

The Castleton town hall restoration meets the highest Heritage standards of this province! The progressive nurturing of Heritage values within this small community constitutes a cumulative record that merits Ontario Heritage Trust recognition.