HomeMy WebLinkAbout745"Article taken from the News Advertiser, Wednesday, August 7, 1985, pages c1 to c4, written by Richard Beals and photos by B.G. Niddrie.
Community spirit is alive and well in Brougham
This is the second of a series on the northern hamlets of Pickering. This week, writer Richard Beales and photographer B. G. Niddrie join Isabel and Merv Annis for a look at Brougham, past and present.
I'm a small village in Pickering Township,
I am now burdened down with my vexations and care;
I've no crime to stone for, no misdeed condemns me,
Yet stand under a threat and in great need of prayers.
Brougham is my name, of it I've tried to be worthy.
As it reaches far back into antiquity
To the forth of Brocavum built by great Roman legions.
To serve as a stronghold in perpetuity.
My roots in tradition, I've much to live up to,
to say nothing of my great incentive to be,
But now I am marked for ignominious destruction,
And ruins relieved only by the old cemetery.
On reading this book, you will know of my past life,
And many fond memories I can still embrace;
I am proud of my houses steeped so richly in history,
As well as those imparting true modern grace.
Rober Miller, in his 1973 book The Ontario Village of Brougham
By RICHARD BEALES
BROUGHAM - Nestled around the corner of Brock Road and Highway 7 lies
the sleepy community of Brougham, Ont. Once it was the heart of northern Pickering.
Today, it's just another village.
""It was a growing community,"" says 41-year resident Isabel Annis. ""Then,
expropriation stunned everybody.""
Expropriation. The word still has impact on the long-term residents of Brougham.
In the early 1970's, the federal government announced plans to build an airport in
the north of Pickering. Despite the protests of residents, 18,000 acres of prime
farmland were expropriated for use in the project.
Isabel's husband Merv has lived in Brougham since 1911, when his father took
over the Main Street (Highway 7) general store where Becker's now stands.
""People went in every direction,"" Merv recalls. ""They had no more friends or
nothing.""
Merv lost as much at anybody - a 1973 map shows his farmland stretching well
north of the Main Street-James Street (Brock Read North) corner where he still lives
in the family homestead. But he doesn't complain of his personal loss and is only too
glad to comply when I ask him to give us a car tour of the village.
Northern neighbours
We decide to head west along Main Street and, as we do, the legends of Brougham
begin to unfold. Across the street from Merv's old farmhouse
(he's lived in it since 1926) is Bentley House,
the magnificent two-storey red-brick home where early Brougham settler James
Bentley and later, his son Dr. Lafayette Bentley, lived.
Down the block, on the south side, is the site of the former Pickering Township
Historical Museum. The reconstructed pioneer-day village was a source of pride
to the locals from its construction in 1961 to the day it moved in the 1970's.
Expropriation had again taken its toll on community efforts. The museum was
assembled of all local artifacts and buildings - including the old Brougham Hotel
and the blacksmith's shop.
Now, the museum is in nearby Greenwood, shifted in the airport land shuffle.
On the site of the old museum still stands the public school, where it's been since
before Merv was a boy.
""I graduated from the school there,"" he says. The building, which now houses an
art gallery, still looks in good shape.
On the north side, a bit farther west, stands a piece of recent history.
The airport land management office sits here, in a more recently built
school building with a trailer attached.
The trailer represents hope for Brougham residents; hope that they'll be able to
reclaim the glory days of years past. Out of this trailer, a team from the University of
Guelph will make suggestions about what to do with the land, ending more than a
decade of question marks.
We turn the car around and drive east again, past the four corners.
On the northeast corner is Jack Mairs' hardware store.
Jack is a Brougham newcomer compared to Merv; he's only been here since 1933.
The building is somewhat older. It had its orgins as a Temperance Hall,
though local legend has it its operators weren't so temperate. While meetings were
going on upstairs, a cider press was running full-tilt in the basement.
See Tour…Page C3
Dr. Lafayette Bentley lived in this red-brick home in the early 20th Century.
His family came to Brougham - then Bentley's Corners - in 1929 and built this house 24
years later.
Isabel and Merv Annis, long-time residents of Brougham.
Jack Mairs' hardware store, formerly a temperance hall.
This federal office building in Brougham stands as a reminder of the land
expropriation in the early 1970's."
"Tour through historic Brougham
FROM PAGE C1
We turn around and head south along James Street (Brock Road North).
Merv shows me the original Pickering Township hall, an old white frame building,
and talks of the old Christian Church, now long-gone.
Up the road, at the four corners, the United Church still stands.
Once, it had a burgeoning congregation; today, Isabel tells me,
it's ""down to about a dozen people.""
As we pull back into the Annis' drive, it hits me. Community spirit is not dead here,
it's just dormant., waiting for a shove to make it spring into action. The burning of Thistle
Ha' this year was just such an event. The century-old farmhouse of the Hugh Miller family
burned to the ground, but the reconstruction fun d continues at a steady, healthy pace.
Like the Miller house, the community of Brougham refuses to die.
It's Brougham Community Hall now but it once was the first Pickering Township hall."