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| Junction Gore (detail) as part of Gloucester Township |
By Rachel Muston
The Carleton County Atlas from 1879 is one of many that were produced across Ontario that year. More than what we now consider an atlas to be, each of these books contain a detailed history of the area, beautiful sketches of local farms, businesses and people of stature, as well as maps for each township and village with the names of who owned the larger land parcels.
It is fascinating to read through some of the history. Take Water Works for example; due primarily to a need for water for fire-fighting, many proposals were made to establish a water system in Ottawa. From the first in 1859, which included a ‘reservoir site on Parliament Hill and water power at Chaudière Falls to supply it’ (1), to another in 1868 which recommended
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| One of the many homesteads depicted in the 1879 atlas |
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| Janeville and Clandeboye (now Vanier) and Gloucester (now New Edinburgh) |
To supplement the information in the atlas, the Vanier Museopark website has some great information on how Vanier came to be. But If you want to have a flip through the atlas, you can find it at the Main Branch of the Ottawa Public Library (in the Ottawa Room), at Library and Archives Canada (in the Genealogy area on the 3rd floor), and at the library of the Ottawa City Archives. There is also a digitized version on Internet Archive.
(1) Illustrated Historical Atlas of Carleton County, H. Belden & Co., 1879
(2) http://www.gloucesterhistory.com/
Images: Illustrated Historical Atlas of Carleton County, H. Belden & Co., 1879