Everything about Walden Ontario totally explained
Walden (1996 census population 10,292) was a town in the
Canadian province of
Ontario, which existed from 1973 to 2000. Created as part of the
Regional Municipality of Sudbury when
regional government was introduced, the town was dissolved when the city of
Greater Sudbury was incorporated on
January 1,
2001. The name Walden continues to be informally used to designate the area.
The town was created by amalgamating the
township municipalities of Waters and Drury, Dennison & Graham with the unincorporated geographic townships of Lorne, Louise and Dieppe and parts of the unincorporated townships of Hyman, Trill, Fairbank, Creighton, Snider and Eden. The name "Walden" was chosen as an acronym of the geographic townships of
Waters,
Louise and
Dennison. Other names were suggested, but the final selection process had narrowed the naming options to Walden or Makada, an
Ojibwe name for the town's Black Lake (
makade in
contemporary spelling).
Prior to the municipal amalgamation, Walden, in regards to land area, was considered the largest town in
Canada.
Walden now constitutes most of Ward 2 on
Greater Sudbury City Council, and is represented by councillor Jacques Barbeau. The entirety of Walden was also redistricted into the federal
Sudbury electoral district as of the
2004 election, although it remains in the provincial constituency of
Nickel Belt.
Communities
Lively
The administrative and commercial centre of Walden, Lively was established in the
1950s as a company townsite for employees of
INCO's
Creighton Mine facilities. It was named for an early settler, Charles Lively. Prior to the community's establishment, a few family farms were located in the area. The most notable of these, the
Anderson Farm, is now a community
museum. Lively's postal delivery and telephone exchange also include the Mikkola subdivision, located at the eastern terminus of
Highway 17's freeway segment, and the Waters area.
From the intersection of
Municipal Roads 24 and 55, Lively refers to the area extending north along MR 24, Mikkola refers to the area extending eastward along MR 55 toward the Highway 17 interchange, and Waters refers to the area extending westward along MR 55 toward Naughton.
Lively was the first area hit by the
Sudbury tornado on
August 20,
1970.
Lively is also home to the Walden area's branch of the
Greater Sudbury Public Library.
Naughton
Originally established as McNaughtonville, Naughton is the birthplace of
Boston Bruins legend
Art Ross. In
1941, Ross donated the
NHL trophy bearing his name awarded to the player scoring the most points during the season. Ross was also inducted into the
Hockey Hall of Fame in
1945.
Naughton is also home to a historical plaque commemorating
Salter's Meridian, a survey line which resulted in the first known evidence of the Sudbury area's massive
mineral deposits.
Whitefish
Whitefish is located approximately 14 kilometres west of Lively, near the western terminus of the Highway 17 freeway route. Whitefish's postal delivery and telephone exchange also include the community of Den-Lou and the
Lake Panache area. Currently, the
Ontario Ministry of Transportation is undergoing discussion in regards to extending the freeway through Den-Lou. If this plan is implemented, community sites such as the Den-Lou School, today known as the Den-Lou playground, will be in jeopardy.
Beaver Lake
The name "Beaver Lake" refers, generally, to the westernmost end of the former Town of Walden, along
Highway 17 in the
geographic township of Lorne, west of Whitefish. Like many communities in Northern Ontario, the modern history of Beaver Lake started with the building of the
Canadian Pacific Railway through the area in the late
1880s. With the discovery of nickel deposits bringing jobs and settlers to the Sudbury area,
Finnish immigrants in particular settled in the Beaver Lake area, south of the CPR line between Sudbury and
Sault Ste. Marie. Many roads in the area have Finnish names to this day.
Worthington
Incorporated as a mining community in
1892, the original Worthington existed until
October 4,
1927. At 5:50 a.m. that morning, a ground fault gave way, causing the mine and part of the town to collapse into a large chasm. Nobody died in the incident, however, as a mine foreman evacuated the town the previous evening after noticing abnormal rock shifts in the mine.
With the mine no longer operational, the residents of Worthington moved to other mining communities in the area.
In the
1960s, the name Worthington was applied to a newer townsite nearby. The original townsite is now under water.
Ghost towns
Creighton Mine
Creighton Mine, also known as simply Creighton, is a
ghost town located near the intersection of Municipal Road 24 and
Highway 144. The community, established in 1900 as an
Inco company town, took its name from the geographic township in which it's located, which was named by the province of Ontario in the 1880s for
MPP David Creighton.
In
1986, the town was closed down. INCO deemed the cost of service upgrades (water, sewer, etc.) to be prohibitive, and all of the town's homes and businesses were torn down or moved to Lively. The historic
paymaster's cabin from Creighton was moved to the Anderson Farm Museum. A few streets, sidewalks and building foundations can still be found in the area. A monument, shown at right, was also placed in the community.
Creighton Mine is the largest Ontario community to have become a ghost town, although the
mine itself is still operational. The mine is also the site of the
Sudbury Neutrino Observatory.
High Falls
High Falls is a
ghost town located near the junction of the
Spanish River with
Agnew Lake, at the very westernmost boundary of the city.
The town was incorporated in
1904, when a
hydroelectric dam and power plant were built on the Spanish River. This power plant, owned and operated by a subsidiary of
Inco, supplied electric power to many of the area's mining towns, and is still operational today.
The town was closely connected to the nearby community of Turbine. However, in the 1960s, many families began to move away from the community for economic reasons, and by
1975 the community was virtually abandoned. Homes were demolished or relocated, and by the mid-
1980s the power plant was the only remaining vestige of the community.
Victoria Mines
Prospected heavily in the 1880s and 1890s, a mine was established by the
Mond Nickel Company in 1900. A smelter was also built on the site to the north of the
Canadian Pacific Railway line, and a company town that housed anywhere from 300 to 600 people during its lifetime sprang up rapidly.
In the early 1910s, Mond Nickel moved its operations to the fledgling community of
Coniston, east of Sudbury. Many of the buildings of Victoria Mines were moved to Coniston via the CP Rail line, including a Presbyterian church that remains standing. Only two buildings remain intact on the site, the town mostly left abandoned after the mine's closure in 1913. During its lifetime, the mine produced almost 620,000 tons of ore.
Victoria Mines is the birthplace of
Hockey Hall of Famer,
Hector "Toe" Blake.
Education
Lively is home to the Walden area's only public
high school,
Lively District Secondary School. Catholic school students in the Lively area are bused into schools in the city's urban core, primarily to
St. Benedict Catholic Secondary School for anglophones and
Collège Notre-Dame for francophones.
Anglophone elementary school students are served by George Vanier Public School in Lively and R. H. Murray Public School in Whitefish, and the Catholic St. James Elementary School in Lively. Francophone elementary students attend École Saint-Paul in Lively.
Media
Walden has a weekly community newspaper, the
Walden Observer.
Notable people
France Gélinas, the current
Member of Provincial Parliament for
Nickel Belt, is a resident of Naughton.
Further Information
Get more info on 'Walden Ontario'.
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