Meet Our Neighbours, Part I: An Early Hub of Industry at Reynoldsville
This is the first of a two-part series exploring the history of a community that has neighboured The Brown Homestead since the 1780s. Though the Power Glen community has cycled through different names over the centuries along with the industries that sustained it, there is continuity in the resourcefulness of people who lived here, and how they harnessed the power of the hills and waterways in this particular corner of Niagara.
When John and Magdalena Brown first settled on their plot of land straddling the old Mohawk Trail (later to become Pelham Stone Road) on Lot 3, Concession 8, their nearest neighbours were John Decew, Nicholas Smith, and to the east, at the edge of Grantham and Louth, John Turney on Lot 2 of the same concession. The term “neighbour” should be used relatively loosely though – it wasn’t like the Browns could simply run next door to borrow a cup of sugar. In the 1780s, when many of these early United Empire Loyalists first took their claim of land across the Niagara Peninsula, it was mostly forested and inhabited only by wildlife. While Indigenous peoples had long hunted, traded, and travelled across the Peninsula, there were no permanent settlements established here at that time. The expansive crest of the Niagara Escarpment, and kilometres of treed hills, valleys, and meandering creeks stretched between the Browns and their neighbours, save for the linking Indigenous trails etched into the earth.
However, the terrain that separated the neighbours is also likely what drew them to the area in the first place. Their access to the Indigenous trail network established centuries prior were some of the most viable land routes for travel across Niagara. The currents of Twelve Mile Creek offered a supply of water power and transportation. The forests and escarpment provided resources to build whole new communities from the ground up, and once cleared, the land could be farmed.
This historical map showing the Niagara District in Upper Canada was published in 1815 by Lieutenant W. A. Nesfield., The large rectangle outlines approximately where the Brown family (yellow star) and John Turney settled, with the blue diamond shape indicating approximately where the first mill in the area was constructed in 1786. Within the large rectangle, the yellow line running across from east to west follows the Mohawk Trail. The perpendicular line leads to what would eventually be downtown St. Catharines, outlined in a smaller blue rectangle, around the name “Shipman”, after Paul Shipman. The Niagara Escarpment is associated by hachures, and Twelve Mile Creek meanders its way north into Lake Ontario. View the full map georeferenced onto a current digital map of Niagara.
Source: Library and Archives Canada, National Map Collection: NMC-21587. Reproduction available at Brock University MDGL.
In fact, for these reasons, this particular area was deemed advantageous for Loyalist settlers as early as the 1780s. Murray’s District, as it was known at the time, characterized the land along Twelve Mile Creek from the base of the Niagara Escarpment to Lake Ontario. The area was named for Lieutenant Duncan Murray of the 84th Regiment of Foot (Royal Highland Emigrants),who was appointed by the Crown to distribute free supplies (victuals) to Loyalists (1). Considering the ideal landscape, it would have been logical for Murray to begin constructing a mill after arriving- a project that may have also been pursued in service to the neighbouring Loyalists he was contracted to aid.
Whether this was on Government order, or through his own ingenuity, by 1786 Murray had begun constructing a saw mill at the base of Niagara Escarpment on Twelve Mile Creek. Located along the route of the old Mohawk Trail, the mill would have been very easily accessible to the settlers building their new homesteads and clearing land in the area. While we cannot say for certain whether it was the plans for the mill, or the Loyalist homesteaders, that came first to the area, it is possible that Brown and Turney chose to settle in the area for the proximity to the mill Murray was building as both also built their homes close to the trail (2). At the time of building, the mill would have been only the third mill in all of Niagara (3).
Sadly, Murray died before completing the mill. Recognizing the continued and increasingly more urgent need for a mill in the area, prominent Queenston merchant Robert Hamilton acquired the land and took up the work. The saw mill opened in 1787, soon followed by a grist mill. Around the same time, Hamilton also opened a “trading establishment” further downstream on Twelve Mile Creek towards St. Catharines, where the Iroquois Trail (old Highway 8/St. Paul Street) would have crossed the creek, and met the Mohawk Trail. Considered the first building erected in what would become St. Catharines, the store stood about where the Burgoyne Bridge is today. The mills and trade store would have aided Loyalist families like the Browns and their surrounding neighbours in successfully settling their new land, establishing their farms, and rebuilding their livelihoods in Niagara.
A hub for early Loyalist-era Industry
Over the course of a decade, Hamilton’s mills, nestled against the Escarpment at Twelve Mill Creek , grew into an industrial centre for the surrounding Loyalist settlements. The name colloquially given to this area, and to the mills, was Crown Mills (4). Given their location at the creek along what would become Pelham Road, the saw mill and grist mill had vital access to the growing urban centre of St. Catharines as well as the rural communities across Grantham and Louth.
An interpretive sketch of the millpond and mills at the time when they were under ownership of Benjamin Franklin Reynolds (1854-1893). Drawn by 1970s Power Glen resident Greg Miller.
Source: Don Pickers (compiler) “Power Glen (Crown Mills, Reynoldsville) : a bit of the past,” date unknown. Brock University Archives.
In 1800, Hamilton sold the mills (and most of his surrounding land) to Jesse Thomas, whose son Peter would soon take over the venture to further improve the industry. By 1811, Peter Thomas had expanded the capabilities of the saw mill and built a new grist mill further downstream (5). To increase the supply of water to the two mills, a dam was built on Twelve Mile Creek right at the escarpment base with the intent to form a reservoir. The upwards of 15 acres of land that would be flooded would become known as “Mill Pond”, now Jackson’s Flats (6). By the 1820s, the industrial activity of the area was further increased with the addition of a blacksmith shop and a wagon shop.
That the mills appear on early maps of Niagara, like the 1823 map pictured below, reflects their significance. Such maps, as well as other records, also suggest that these neighbouring mills might have been the ones closest to the Brown family. Taking advantage of their proximity to such a major thoroughfare, John Brown, and later his sons, very likely transported their grain crops along Pelham Stone Road to the emerging hub of industry at Crown Mills to be milled into flour that could then be brought home to the family, as well as sold to merchants. The sawmill would have also come in handy to the Brown family as they cleared their land for farming, and used lumber to build their barn and other outbuildings.
An 1823 map showing the location of Peter Thomas’s mill along Pelham Stone Road. The yellow star indicates the approximate location of The Brown Homestead, which would have been owned by John Brown’s son Adam at the time. Notice how the line marking Pelham Stone Road follows along Twelve Mile Creek, and eventually crosses at old Highway 8/St. Paul Street. View “Map of the proposed canal through the District of Niagara and Gore to form a junction of Lakes Erie and Ontario by the Grand River”georeferenced onto a current digital map of Niagara.
Source: Library and Archives Canada, National Map Collection: NMC-18506. Reproduction available at Brock University MDGL.
The Emergence of Reynoldsville
Nesfield’s 1815 map cropped to show Decew’s mills in approximate relation to the Brown Homestead (yellow star). View the full map georeferenced onto a current digital map of Niagara.
Source: Library and Archives Canada, National Map Collection: NMC-21587. Reproduction available at Brock University MDGL.
While the industry at Crown Mills continued to prosper through the first half of the nineteenth century, neighbouring communities could not say the same. The next closest mill to the Brown family was located atop of the Niagara Escarpment at Beaverdams Creek, operated by friend and fellow Loyalist John Decew. First opening a saw mill in 1792, Decew enjoyed enough prosperity to build a stone home in the Georgian-style in 1808. Though business was disrupted by the War of 1812, the return to peace enabled Decew to continue his saw mill operation and also construct a stone grist mill at Decew Falls. Services for the mill workers soon followed, and a small community grew around the mills called Decew Town. However, its mark on the map would be short-lived. The opening of the first Welland Canal in 1829 diverted much of the natural waterways above the Escarpment, and consequently water supply to the mills in Decew Town was drastically reduced. Industrial interests were also redirected towards the Welland Canal, not only for its more reliable water source but also its vastly expanded transportation network. The same fate was met in neighbouring Effingham and St. John’s, both early milling towns that would also find themselves with a decreased water supply and isolated from the Welland Canal.
Nestled below the Escarpment, Crown Mills may have been a distance from the canal, but Twelve Mile Creek continued to provide its mills with a consistent water supply and access to Pelham Stone Road continued to connect the industry to neighbouring farmers as well as to the now rapidly growing St. Catharines.
Crown Mills is clearly marked on Major-General Sir Francis de Rottenburg’s 1850 map of Canada West, as shown in the 2010 Power Glen Heritage Conservation District Study.
The Welland Canal may be why businessman Samuel Beckett purchased the mills from the Thomas family in 1829. Hailing from the Short Hills area, Beckett first operated a mill in a small hamlet called Beckett’s Mills (surprise). It seems Beckett may have given up on his mills there following the opening of the canal for more reliable success at Crown Mills. While the historical record lacks during Beckett’s ownership of Crown Mills (7), the industrial centre does appear on an 1850 map of Canada West (pictured to the left). The community re-emerges in the history books in 1854, when the mills were acquired by the spirited American, Benjamin Franklin (B.F.) Reynolds.
Born in Rodman, New York, B.F. Reynolds worked at a saw mill in Gananoque before purchasing the industrial enterprise at Crown Mills, in addition to land acquired “on the same Road, five miles distant” (8) in Pelham Township. Renamed Reynoldsville, within a few short years, the little hub of industry seemingly exploded. In addition to the saw mill, grist mill, blacksmith shop and wagon shop already operating, Reynolds erected a barrel factory, and a sizeable dry goods store. A “large and commodious new residence” (9) was constructed for Reynolds and his wife Maria (nee Moffat) in 1855 where the family could oversee their bustling industrial centre, as well as at least thirteen houses to accommodate the men who worked for Reynolds and their families (10). At the time, at least twenty men worked at Crown Mills.
Reynolds’ milling facilities enabled the businessman to produce and supply ship masts to the Shickluna Shipyard, located along the Second Welland Canal in St. Catharines, about where Twelve Mile Creek met the canal (11). The masts were made from the pine, maple and oak timber cut from Reynolds’ Pelham property. The timber was also used in the enlargement of the Second Welland Canal (12). As the farm was also located on Pelham Stone Road, the Brown and, after 1858, Chellew families may very well have watched the large logs pass The Brown Homestead on their way to Reynoldsville to be shaped into masts.
Reynoldsville, c. 1870s. Notice the stone, three-storey standing towards the bottom right of the image. Overlooking the industry, atop of the hill at the top left corner stands Reynolds’ home. Image as shown in the 2010 Power Glen Heritage Conservation District Study.
Reynoldsville listing in the 1871 Lovell’s Canadian Dominion Directory. Notice the varied types of employment held by the heads of households listed, all linked to the industries known to operate at Reynoldsville at the time. Furthermore, that N.H. Emmett is a teacher suggests Reynoldsville may have also been in close proximity to a school.
Reynoldsville quickly grew into a distinct settlement large enough to be listed in provincial, and even cross-Canada directories. Lovell's Canadian Dominion Directory for 1871, for example, which published the “names of professional and business men, and other inhabitants, in the cities, towns and villages throughout the province” described Reynoldsville as “"a small village on Twelve Mile Creek" with a population of sixty inhabitants” (13). That Reynoldsville appeared in such large directories suggests that it may have included a post office. Not only would neighbouring farming families like the Browns and the Chellews travel down Pelham Stone Road for their lumber, flour, and other dry goods, but they may have also been able to keep in contact with friends and family by post.
Despite its close proximity to the Homestead, the trip to Reynoldsville was likely a shock to the senses for the Brown and Chellew families. Though Pelham Stone Road was a well-travelled thoroughfare by the mid-1800s, the Homestead was still relatively tucked away in the peaceful quiet of rural life. Yet, only a few kilometres down the road, nestled by the Escarpment, was a centre of industrial activity - a small, but mighty neighbour that travellers might have very well missed if they were looking in the other direction when they passed.
An 1876 map locating Reynoldsville in relation to its rural neighbours, and along Pelham Stone Road which linked to the Great Western Railroad and St. Catharines. View the full map of Grantham georeferenced onto a current digital map of Niagara.
Reynolds continued to actively run a very successful establishment at Reynoldsville until 1885, when he sustained a serious injury from a fall. Now in his 70s, Reynolds attempted to sell his enterprise “on account of poor health and advanced age”, posting an advertisement in the St. Catharines Constitutional. The pride Reynolds’ held for his operation clearly comes through in his advertisement, writing:
The full property sale advertisement published in the St. Catharines Constitutional, as shown in the 2010 Power Glen Heritage Conservation District Study.
Situated in the “Garden of Canada” on the Pelham Stone Road, two miles south-west of the City of St. Catharines..this property is located near Decew Falls and the St. Catharines City water works…on the Twelve Mile Creek which furnishes an unlimited and never-failing water power…Situated on the farm is a large and commodious new residence, eight tenement houses, barns and outbuildings, wagon shop, blacksmith shop, saw mill (with circular saws, wood splitter and shingle machine, barrel heading manufactory, etc. all in good repair, and at present doing fine business. There is located on the farm an inexhaustible quarries of water, lime, quick-lime and red sandstone… (14)
Despite Reynolds’ glowing advertisement, the property did not sell. Instead, his son William, who was already running the wagon shop at this time, also assumed responsibility of the mills. In 1893, the mills ceased operation and shortly afterwards, the buildings were destroyed by a fire. Benjamin Franklin Reynolds sadly spent the last years of his life bedridden, watching the decline of the once prosperous Crown Mills industry. He died in 1896. Reynold’s obituary was published in the St. Catharines Daily Standard, where it’s noted that his funeral was held at “the residence of his son, W.G. Reynolds at Reynoldsville, and was attended by many of his old friends.”(15)
The decline of Reynolds’ health, and Crown Mills, towards the end of the nineteenth century occurred alongside rapid industrial change in the area signalled by technological advances in transportation and production. The expanded Third Welland Canal, which rerouted the waterway away from downtown St. Catharines, opened in 1887. While this allowed for larger steampowered cargo ships to transit between Lake Ontario and Lake Erie, the new canal signalled a dramatic change to the area’s shipbuilding industry - where the main building material was now iron rather than lumber. Shickluna’s shipyard no longer required Reynold’s lumber for masts. In fact, the shipyard closed in 1890. Mills too were transforming into larger production factories, increasingly acquiring more advanced machinery that could be powered by steam. The world around Reynoldsville and its rural neighbours was changing at a dizzying pace.
Through more than one century of change, Twelve Mile Creek continued to flow and the edge of Niagara Escarpment stood tall. As the Loyalists settled and those settlements grew over the decades, the stone was quarried from the Escarpment, and the waterway was dammed and widened, straightened and narrowed, to serve the needs of the people who built their livelihoods around it. All the while, the creek continued to flow and the Escarpment endured. In many ways, Twelve Mile Creek enabled the community that settled around it to prosper and persevere in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, the Niagara escarpment looming over like a protective guardian. At the cusp of the twentieth century, both Twelve Mile Creek and the Niagara Escarpment would once again play a vital role in the perseverance of the community nestled at its base. This time, the surrounding landscape faced its most dramatic change yet: the advent of hydroelectric power generation.
Stay tuned for Part II of the Meet our Neighbours series where we’ll explore the transformation of Reynoldsville into Power Glen and the impressively daunting feat of building one of the first hydroelectric power generating stations in Canada.
If you would like to learn more about the marine industry that was established in part to service and support the mills and industry discussed in this article, check out this episode of our podcast, The Open Door, with maritime archaeologist Dr. Kimberly Monk.
Footnotes
(1) Alun Hughes, “Shades of Reynoldsville and Decew Town: A History of Power Glen and Vicinity”, Historical Society of St. Catharines (Dec 2008), 7.
(2) On the other hand, though early land records show that John Brown and John Turney received land next to each other in Murray’s District as early as 1786, historians agree that, like most early Loyalists, both families may have occupied their land as early as 1784, when the land comprising the Niagara Peninsula was purchased from the Mississaugas of The Credit. Andrea Klose, A History of Short Hills Provincial Park, Friends of the Short Hills Park, St. Catharines, ON (2002): 12.
(4) Though the available historical record does not explain why the mills and surrounding area were named Crown Mills, or exactly when this naming was established, it may speak to the possibility that Duncan Murray’s initial decision to built a mill at this location was under order from the British government.
(5) In a curious connection to The Brown Homestead property, local recollections suggest that several decades after the 1890s fire that destroyed the mills, the cornerstone engraved with “P.T. 1811” after Peter Thomas and the year the mill was built, was salvaged by Jon Jouppein, former owner of our historic site. The cornerstone is said to have sat somewhere on the property, but its whereabouts are currently unknown. Klose, 20.
(6) While the area is no longer flooded, its flat terrain and young trees are a direct reminder of how the landscape was altered. Klose, 20.
(7) It is noted in the 2010 Power Glen Heritage Conservation District Study that the settlement was not sufficiently large to warrant any mention in W.H. Smith’s Canada: Past, Present and Future, which was published in Toronto in 1851, nor in MacKay’s Canada Directory published in Montreal in 1851. City of St. Catharines, Planning Services Department and the St. Catharines Heritage Committee, Power Glen Heritage Conservation District The Study, City of St. Catharines, (2010), 24.
(8) B.F. Reynolds, “Farms, Mills, and Manufacturing Property”, St. Catharines Constitutional, 15 December 1885.
(9) Ibid.
(10) As an interesting aside, it is said that the mill’s single male workers boarded in rooms above the kitchen, while the married men lived in the tenant housing.
(11) Henry P. Nicholson, “Only Few Traces Left of Busy Mills in Reynoldsville”, Now Part of City,” St. Catharines Standard, 12 May 1971.
(12) “The Late B.F. Reynolds,” St. Catharines Daily Standard, 26 September 1896.
(13) Lovell’s Canadian Dominion directory for 1871 containing names of professional and business men, and other inhabitants, of the cities, towns and villages, throughout the provinces of Ontario, Quebec, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Newfoundland, and Prince Edward Island, Montreal: John Lovell, 1871: 692.
(14) Reynolds, “Farms, Mills, and Manufacturing Property”, 1885.
(15) “The Late B.F. Reynolds,” 1896.
Sara Nixon is a public historian and Community Engagement Coordinator at The Brown Homestead.