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14 THE NEW TANNER THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2004 (che viILLAGEs OF hALTON Hills ) Flour, personalities highlight Norval's story The following i is the fourth article in a series on the his- tory of villages and hamlets which make up the Town of Halton Hills and is published irregularly in the New Tanner during the summer months. Much of the material comes from the Halton Atlas which was first published in 1877 and from a number of other sources including family his- tories and local historians such as Mark Rowe. This week's article is on the village of Norval which was a favour- ite of A.J. Casson, a Group of Seven's artist, who recorded many of Norval's streets in his painting. Norval nestles in a valley watered by the main Credit River where it is joined by the West Branch of the river which has its main source around Acton. Such luminaries as Lucy Maud Montgomery, author of Anne of Green Gables, 19th Centry portrait painter J.W.L Foster; Jack Russell, former Canadian ambassador to the United Soviet Socialist Re- publics (USSR) have all called the village of Norval home at one time or another as well as William Gooderham and George Worts, two well known 19% century merchants (Gooderham and Worts, of course.) Norval is also the home of local politicians such as former Liberal MP Julian Reed, former Halton Hills Mayor Kathy Gastle and former Halton Chairman Pe- ter Pomeroy. Norval was founded in 1820 on the arrival of James McNab, a lieutenant who fought at the Battle of Queenston Heights in the War of 1812. McNab, attracted by the Credit River which flows through the valley on which he settled, built a water-pow- ered sawmill, adding a grist mill and cotton mill in 1828 and did a thriving business until 1830 when he leased the flour and grist mill to John Barnhart. Barnhart carried the busi- - ness for some years until McNab again took charge. In 1838 it was purchased by General Sir Peter Adamson who operated it until 1845 when he leased it to Gooderham and Worts who ran it for 14 years before it fell into the hands of Robert No- ble who demolished the old mills and built a three-storey brick bulding 35' x 100° and a storehouse 70' x 30' form- ing a capital L in shape. The mill could grind out 200 bar- rels of flour a day or 60,000 a year which would take an es- timated 200,000 bushels of wheat. Needless to say the mill made the village now Locally, independently owned and operated, The New Tanner has its hand on the the pulse of your community. Norvar Fuour us. Ronenr Ne OnLe. Prorrieror FROM THE 1877 HALTON ATLAS called Norval from the origi- nal McNabsville, a centre of pioneer life. The name change came in 1840 when a post of- fice was established with Colonel Clay the postmaster. Halton's 1877 Atlas says: "A large gristing business is also done in connection with the mill. He (Noble) has a cooper shop which manu- factures from 200 to 250 bar- rels per day. The saw mill, which also belongs to him, last year manufactured 200,000 feet of lumber. He is also owner of the large mill known as the "Norval Wool- len and Cotton Batting Mills," at present leased by Messrs. Smith, Wilby & Co., of To- ronto, and formerly run on an extensive scale by Mr. John Ross. It is run by water hav- ing eleven feet head. The present residence of Mr. No- ble was rebuilt by General Adamison 15 years ago, and was purchased by Mr. Noble, together with the whole prop- erty, "mounting to 428 acres, in 1868. He keeps constantly employed 30 hands." The Atlas said "the prosper- ity of the village is largely due to the energy and persever- ance of Mr. Noble" and his mill produced flour which had no equal in the Dominion of Canada. A landmark on the Credit for almost a century the flour mills were destroyed by fire in the winter of 1930 but the grist mill continued to operate un- til Hurricane Hazel struck in 1954. The grist mill's founda- tion was beyond repair in the wild water rampage caused by the hurricane. No trace of the mills remains today. The re- maining buildings were de- molished for the widening of Highway 7 in 1961. Only the homes of the pros- perous merchants remain to remind us of the days when Norval was a centre of activ- ity, the Gooderham homestead, (circa 1850) on Guelph St. an example. The Atlas says the village was home to a good brick school with two teachers, three churches, an Orange Lodge and hall, a band, a Vol- unteer Company and a drill shed. The Grand Trunk Rail- way followed a line a few miles north of Norval. Nev- ertheless it had a station built but Georgetown became the main railway centre and its station was almost as close as the wooden village stop. Nowadays it is difficult to tell where the community of Georgetown stops and Norval begins but the village still re- tains many of the unique characteristics which made it a favourite of A.J. Casson's brush. Like several other Halton Hills villages Norval is on a border..The Credit River passes under Highway 7 and marks the beginning of Peel Region and Brampton. The magnitude of the housing de- velopment in Brampton suggest that both Norval and Georgetown will one day be swallowed by the larger cen- tre. It's a far cry from the 1940s when revellers from a "dry" Brampton journeyed across the "border" to the "Hollywood House" hotel in Norval to slake their thirst. But that's another story. RESIDENCE oF Rosgert Nose, MORVAL ONT: FROM THE 1877 HALTON ATLAS