Port Perry, Ontario
Encyclopedia
Port Perry is a community located in Scugog Township, Durham Region, Ontario
, Canada
. The town is located east of Uxbridge
and southwest of Peterborough
. Many residents commute to Toronto on a daily basis. Port Perry's municipal website reported a population of just over 9,500 in 2010.
Port Perry serves as the administrative and commercial centre for the Township of Scugog. The town is home to a 24-bed hospital, Scugog Township's municipal offices and many retail establishments. Port Perry serves as a hub for many small communities in the Scugog area, such as Greenbank, Raglan, Caesarea, Blackstock and Nestleton/Nestleton Station. The Great Blue Heron Charitable Casino is a major employer. Located at the basin of the Trent-Severn Waterway
s is Lake Scugog, one of Ontario's largest man-made lakes.
Settler Peter Perry
laid out village lots on the shore of Lake Scugog
in 1848 on the site of a former native village known as Scugog Village. The townsite was named Port Perry in 1852 and its first Postmaster was Joseph Bigelow. It was incorporated as a village in 1871. At the time there was an intense rivalry between Port Perry and two nearby towns, Prince Albert and Manchester. Expecting great things for "his" town, Peter Perry predicted that goats would eat grass off of Prince Albert's main street.
At the time, Prince Albert sat astride a planked toll road running south to Whitby
. Grain and lumber from areas throughout the area south-east of Lake Simcoe
fed through Prince Albert, which was a major grain trading area. Perry and others in Port Perry felt a railway was a much better option, and Perry's prediction would eventually come true.
A group of local businessmen started the process of bringing the railway to the town in 1867, and the first train on the Port Whitby and Port Perry Railway
reached the terminus in Port Perry in 1872. Cargo from all over northern Ontario was shipped via the Trent-Severn Waterway
to Port Perry via Lake Scugog
, and then via the railway to Whitby, where it could be loaded onto the CP
or CN
mainlines running along the shore of Lake Ontario
, or onto ships in Port Whitby. Businesses quickly moved out of Prince Albert and moved to Port Perry, leaving Prince Albert effectively a suburb of Port Perry today.
The village was amalgamated with Cartwright, Reach and Scugog Townships to form the Township of Scugog in 1974 upon the creation of the Regional Municipality of Durham.
An Ontario Historical Plaque was erected at the Scugog Shores Museum by the province to commemorate Jimmy Frise
's role in Ontario's heritage.
Pow Wow, the Highland Games, the Dragon Boat Races and StreetFest. Its annual fair, held every Labour Day
weekend, has been running for over 150 years. There are also numerous golf courses, both public and private. Other attractions in Port Perry and surrounding area include the Great Blue Heron Charity Casino
, Scugog Memorial Library (featuring the Kent Farndale Art Gallery), the Scugog Shores Historical Museum and the Town Hall 1873 Centre for the Performing Arts. At many local farms, visitors may pick their own seasonal fruit (strawberries, raspberries, apples). In the summer, bass tournaments and lakeside activities are also featured. The Lake Scugog shoreline offers two popular lakeside parks, Palmer and Birdseye. There are active fishing seasons, both winter and summer. In the winter months, Lake Scugog is dotted with ice-fishing huts and is a popular destination for both ice fishermen and snowmobilers.
Port Perry hosts many tourists throughout the year, and is home to many charming B&B's, as well as traditional hotels.
and television
; it doubled as the Maine
town of Mooseport in the 2004 film Welcome to Mooseport
and was used briefly as a small town in New Hampshire
during the sixth season of The West Wing
. Port Perry was briefly shown in the movie Killshot (film)
, filmed as a small town in Missouri
, USA.
The town was the primary production location for the 1996 film, Fly Away Home
, based on local inventor Bill Lishman
's experiments in the 1980s and 1990s imprinting geese in order to alter and preserve migration routes. The film fictionalized Lishman's personal life, but used him as a consultant for its aerial and technical production. The town was also featured in a 2010 Burger King
commercial.
Ontario
Ontario is a province of Canada, located in east-central Canada. It is Canada's most populous province and second largest in total area. It is home to the nation's most populous city, Toronto, and the nation's capital, Ottawa....
, Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
. The town is located east of Uxbridge
Uxbridge, Ontario
Uxbridge is a township in south-central Ontario, Canada, in the Regional Municipality of Durham, in the Greater Toronto Area.The main centre in the township is the namesake community of Uxbridge...
and southwest of Peterborough
Peterborough, Ontario
Peterborough is a city on the Otonabee River in southern Ontario, Canada, 125 kilometres northeast of Toronto. The population of the City of Peterborough was 74,898 as of the 2006 census, while the census metropolitan area has a population of 121,428 as of a 2009 estimate. It presently ranks...
. Many residents commute to Toronto on a daily basis. Port Perry's municipal website reported a population of just over 9,500 in 2010.
Port Perry serves as the administrative and commercial centre for the Township of Scugog. The town is home to a 24-bed hospital, Scugog Township's municipal offices and many retail establishments. Port Perry serves as a hub for many small communities in the Scugog area, such as Greenbank, Raglan, Caesarea, Blackstock and Nestleton/Nestleton Station. The Great Blue Heron Charitable Casino is a major employer. Located at the basin of the Trent-Severn Waterway
Trent-Severn Waterway
The Trent–Severn Waterway is a Canadian canal system formerly used for industrial and transportation purposes and now for recreational and tourism purposes, connecting Lake Ontario at Trenton to the Georgian Bay portion of Lake Huron at Port Severn...
s is Lake Scugog, one of Ontario's largest man-made lakes.
History
The area around Port Perry was first surveyed as part of Reach Township by Major S. Wilmot in 1809. The first settler in the area was Reuben Crandell, a United Empire Loyalist who built a homestead with his wife in May 1821. Their original home is still in use and can be seen on King Street between Prince Albert and Manchester. In November 1821, Lucy Ann Crandell became the first child of European descent born in the area. In 1831, Crandell and his family moved to a homestead at what became Crandell's Corners (later called Borelia). It had its own Post Office, near the present-day junction of Queen Street and Highway 7A.Settler Peter Perry
Peter Perry
Peter Perry was a businessman and political figure in Upper Canada.He was born in Ernestown, Ontario in 1792, the son of Robert Perry and Jemima Gary Washburn. His father was a United Empire Loyalist from Vermont who had served with the Queen's Rangers and Edward Jessup's Loyal Rangers during the...
laid out village lots on the shore of Lake Scugog
Lake Scugog
Lake Scugog is an artificially flooded lake in Scugog Township between the town of Port Perry, Ontario and the town of Lindsay. The lake has been raised and lowered several times over its history. Though not technically part of the Kawarthas due to its shallow depths, it is often geographically...
in 1848 on the site of a former native village known as Scugog Village. The townsite was named Port Perry in 1852 and its first Postmaster was Joseph Bigelow. It was incorporated as a village in 1871. At the time there was an intense rivalry between Port Perry and two nearby towns, Prince Albert and Manchester. Expecting great things for "his" town, Peter Perry predicted that goats would eat grass off of Prince Albert's main street.
At the time, Prince Albert sat astride a planked toll road running south to Whitby
Whitby, Ontario
Whitby is a town in Durham Region. Whitby is located in Southern Ontario east of Toronto on the north shore of Lake Ontario, and is home to the headquarters of Durham Region...
. Grain and lumber from areas throughout the area south-east of Lake Simcoe
Lake Simcoe
Lake Simcoe is a lake in Southern Ontario, Canada, the fourth-largest lake wholly in the province, after Lake Nipigon, Lac Seul, and Lake Nipissing. At the time of the first European contact in the 17th century the lake was called Ouentironk by the Huron natives...
fed through Prince Albert, which was a major grain trading area. Perry and others in Port Perry felt a railway was a much better option, and Perry's prediction would eventually come true.
A group of local businessmen started the process of bringing the railway to the town in 1867, and the first train on the Port Whitby and Port Perry Railway
Port Whitby and Port Perry Railway
The Port Whitby and Port Perry Railway was a former railway running north from Whitby to Port Perry, about 50 km east of Toronto. It was built to connect local grain and logging interests with the railway mainlines on the shores of Lake Ontario...
reached the terminus in Port Perry in 1872. Cargo from all over northern Ontario was shipped via the Trent-Severn Waterway
Trent-Severn Waterway
The Trent–Severn Waterway is a Canadian canal system formerly used for industrial and transportation purposes and now for recreational and tourism purposes, connecting Lake Ontario at Trenton to the Georgian Bay portion of Lake Huron at Port Severn...
to Port Perry via Lake Scugog
Lake Scugog
Lake Scugog is an artificially flooded lake in Scugog Township between the town of Port Perry, Ontario and the town of Lindsay. The lake has been raised and lowered several times over its history. Though not technically part of the Kawarthas due to its shallow depths, it is often geographically...
, and then via the railway to Whitby, where it could be loaded onto the CP
Canadian Pacific Railway
The Canadian Pacific Railway , formerly also known as CP Rail between 1968 and 1996, is a historic Canadian Class I railway founded in 1881 and now operated by Canadian Pacific Railway Limited, which began operations as legal owner in a corporate restructuring in 2001...
or CN
Canadian National Railway
The Canadian National Railway Company is a Canadian Class I railway headquartered in Montreal, Quebec. CN's slogan is "North America's Railroad"....
mainlines running along the shore of Lake Ontario
Lake Ontario
Lake Ontario is one of the five Great Lakes of North America. It is bounded on the north and southwest by the Canadian province of Ontario, and on the south by the American state of New York. Ontario, Canada's most populous province, was named for the lake. In the Wyandot language, ontarío means...
, or onto ships in Port Whitby. Businesses quickly moved out of Prince Albert and moved to Port Perry, leaving Prince Albert effectively a suburb of Port Perry today.
The village was amalgamated with Cartwright, Reach and Scugog Townships to form the Township of Scugog in 1974 upon the creation of the Regional Municipality of Durham.
An Ontario Historical Plaque was erected at the Scugog Shores Museum by the province to commemorate Jimmy Frise
Jimmy Frise
Canadian cartoonist Jimmy Frise was born James Llewellyn Frise on Scugog Island, Ontario. It was a stroke of fate that Frise would endure in cartooning as long as he did, after maiming his left hand in a munitions accident during the Battle of Vimy Ridge in World War I.His career began during a...
's role in Ontario's heritage.
Culture and recreation
Port Perry is known as a tourist destination in the area for its picturesque, Victorian-era downtown, with many clothing stores, restaurants, cafés, bookstores, galleries and antique shops. In the summer, the town features a number of festivals, including the Mississauga First NationMississaugas
The Mississaugas are a subtribe of the Anishinaabe-speaking First Nations people located in southern Ontario, Canada. They are closely related to the Ojibwa...
Pow Wow, the Highland Games, the Dragon Boat Races and StreetFest. Its annual fair, held every Labour Day
Labour Day
Labour Day or Labor Day is an annual holiday to celebrate the economic and social achievements of workers. Labour Day has its origins in the labour union movement, specifically the eight-hour day movement, which advocated eight hours for work, eight hours for recreation, and eight hours for...
weekend, has been running for over 150 years. There are also numerous golf courses, both public and private. Other attractions in Port Perry and surrounding area include the Great Blue Heron Charity Casino
Great Blue Heron Casino
The Great Blue Heron Casino is located on Scugog Island, just east of the town of Port Perry, Ontario, and northeast of Toronto. Both the Casino and the land on which it is built are owned by the Mississaugas of Scugog Island First Nation...
, Scugog Memorial Library (featuring the Kent Farndale Art Gallery), the Scugog Shores Historical Museum and the Town Hall 1873 Centre for the Performing Arts. At many local farms, visitors may pick their own seasonal fruit (strawberries, raspberries, apples). In the summer, bass tournaments and lakeside activities are also featured. The Lake Scugog shoreline offers two popular lakeside parks, Palmer and Birdseye. There are active fishing seasons, both winter and summer. In the winter months, Lake Scugog is dotted with ice-fishing huts and is a popular destination for both ice fishermen and snowmobilers.
Port Perry hosts many tourists throughout the year, and is home to many charming B&B's, as well as traditional hotels.
Residents of note
- Kate BeirnessKate BeirnessKate Beirness is a Canadian television sportscaster, currently working as a host for SportsCentre on TSN. Since March 2011, Beirness has filled in for Jennifer Hedger, who went on maternity leave...
, sports broadcaster - Bill LishmanBill LishmanBill Lishman is a Canadian inventor, artist, and ultralight aircraft enthusiast.-Gliders and ultralights:Lishman started out by flying a motorized ultralight fixed-wing glider called the UFM Easy Riser, a bi-wing craft designed in California by Larry Mauro as a hang glider...
, artist, inventor - Jayde NicoleJayde NicoleJayde Nicole is a Canadian model. She was Playboy′s Playmate of the Month for January 2007 and was named the 2008 Playmate of the Year in the June issue of the men's magazine...
, actress and Playboy model - Daniel David PalmerDaniel David PalmerDaniel David Palmer or D.D. Palmer was the founder of chiropractic. Palmer was born in Pickering, near Toronto, Canada. While working as a magnetic healer in Davenport, Iowa, United States he encountered a janitor, Harvey Lillard, whose hearing was impaired...
, the founder of chiropracticChiropracticChiropractic is a health care profession concerned with the diagnosis, treatment and prevention of disorders of the neuromusculoskeletal system and the effects of these disorders on general health. It is generally categorized as complementary and alternative medicine...
, spent his childhood in Port Perry. - John Ross RoachJohn Ross RoachJohn Ross Roach was a Canadian ice hockey goaltender in the National Hockey League. Roach was known for his acrobatic style of goaltending. He was a First Team All-Star during the 1932–33 NHL season. He won a Stanley Cup in 1922...
, NHL goalie of the 1930s - Craig RussellCraig Russell (actor)Russell Craig Eadie , better known by his stage name Craig Russell, was a Canadian female impersonator and actor.-Early life and career:...
, female impersonator, best known for his lead role in the movie, Outrageous!Outrageous!Outrageous! is a Canadian comedy film, released in 1977. The film was directed and written by Richard Benner, and based on a short story by Margaret Gibson. The film stars Craig Russell as Robin Turner, a drag queen, and Hollis McLaren as Liza Conners, Turner's schizophrenic roommate...
, was born in Port Perry, living there until he left high school. He is buried in a local cemetery under his birth name, Russell Craig Edie. - Emily VanCampEmily VanCampEmily Irene VanCamp is a Canadian actress. She is best known for her roles on the WB series Everwood as Amy Abbott and on the ABC series Brothers & Sisters as Rebecca Harper...
, actress - Frederick WhitcroftFrederick WhitcroftFrederick John "Fred" Whitcroft was a Canadian ice hockey forward who played for several notable amateur and early professional hockey squads, including the Renfrew Creamery Kings and the Kenora Thistles.Early in his career, Whitcroft made a name for himself in hockey circles with his outstanding...
, NHL Hall of Fame
In film
Port Perry has attracted many film crews over the years, both for feature filmFeature film
In the film industry, a feature film is a film production made for initial distribution in theaters and being the main attraction of the screening, rather than a short film screened before it; a full length movie...
and television
Television
Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...
; it doubled as the Maine
Maine
Maine is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States, bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the east and south, New Hampshire to the west, and the Canadian provinces of Quebec to the northwest and New Brunswick to the northeast. Maine is both the northernmost and easternmost...
town of Mooseport in the 2004 film Welcome to Mooseport
Welcome to Mooseport
Welcome to Mooseport is a 2004 American comedy film directed by Donald Petrie and starring Ray Romano and Gene Hackman in his final film before retiring from acting...
and was used briefly as a small town in New Hampshire
New Hampshire
New Hampshire is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. The state was named after the southern English county of Hampshire. It is bordered by Massachusetts to the south, Vermont to the west, Maine and the Atlantic Ocean to the east, and the Canadian...
during the sixth season of The West Wing
The West Wing (TV series)
The West Wing is an American television serial drama created by Aaron Sorkin that was originally broadcast on NBC from September 22, 1999 to May 14, 2006...
. Port Perry was briefly shown in the movie Killshot (film)
Killshot (film)
Killshot is a 2009 thriller film based on the 1989 novel of the same name by Elmore Leonard. The film is directed by John Madden and stars Diane Lane and Thomas Jane as a couple who, despite being in a witness protection program, are confronted by the criminal they outed, portrayed by Mickey...
, filmed as a small town in Missouri
Missouri
Missouri is a US state located in the Midwestern United States, bordered by Iowa, Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Kansas and Nebraska. With a 2010 population of 5,988,927, Missouri is the 18th most populous state in the nation and the fifth most populous in the Midwest. It...
, USA.
The town was the primary production location for the 1996 film, Fly Away Home
Fly Away Home
Fly Away Home is a 1996 drama and comedy film directed by Carroll Ballard, the director of The Black Stallion . The film stars Anna Paquin, Jeff Daniels and Dana Delany. The story follows a young girl from New Zealand who survives a car crash that results in the death of her mother...
, based on local inventor Bill Lishman
Bill Lishman
Bill Lishman is a Canadian inventor, artist, and ultralight aircraft enthusiast.-Gliders and ultralights:Lishman started out by flying a motorized ultralight fixed-wing glider called the UFM Easy Riser, a bi-wing craft designed in California by Larry Mauro as a hang glider...
's experiments in the 1980s and 1990s imprinting geese in order to alter and preserve migration routes. The film fictionalized Lishman's personal life, but used him as a consultant for its aerial and technical production. The town was also featured in a 2010 Burger King
Burger King
Burger King, often abbreviated as BK, is a global chain of hamburger fast food restaurants headquartered in unincorporated Miami-Dade County, Florida, United States. The company began in 1953 as Insta-Burger King, a Jacksonville, Florida-based restaurant chain...
commercial.
External links
- Discover Downtown Port Perry
- TownHall 1873
- Port Perry at Geographical Names of Canada