(Map of Georgetown)

Georgetown is a town that grew in two distinct parts. The oldest section is around Main Street, Market Street, Church Street, and so on. When the railway arrived, another section grew around the railway station: King Street, Queen Street, and so on. The present-day Highway 7 goes between the two parts like a knife. There is now a third section, the Delrex subdivision, that has grown up around the "strip" that has itself grown along Highway 7.

Main Street is still a strong and picturesque shopping area, unusual in these days of dying town centres. Georgetown has a centre with lots of restaurants, clothing shops, banks, and medical buildings. The railway station is also still in constant use, now as a GO commuter station.

The founding family of Georgetown is the Kennedy family, who came from New Jersey to Niagara after the Revolutionary War. When Esquesing Township was surveyed, Charles Kennedy and his brothers did the actual work. As was the case in those days, the surveyors were paid in land and so the brothers came to own land in this area. George, the youngest brother, built a mill on Silver Creek in Hungry Hollow, between Guelph Street (Highway 7) and Main Street, and the town gradually grew around it.

Early settlers in the region might not have expected this; Stewarttown just to the southwest was a much bigger and busier place until the Grand Trunk Railway decided to go through Georgetown. Georgetown began to grow and Stewarttown began to shrink.

1840 was a pivotal year in the life of Georgetown. That was the year the Barber brothers came to town and brought a measure of prosperity with them. They bought land from George Kennedy and built mills just south of Kennedy's. The success of their mills attracted others. In 1840, John Sumpter opened the first store and Elijah Travis opened a planing mill. In 1844, James Young opened another general store, this one also selling furniture and located on the southwest corner of Mill and Main Streets. That year, John and Philo Dayfoot started a tannery and boot factory. Francis Barclay opened a dry goods store four years later across Main Street from James Young's store.

The boom started when the Grand Trunk Railway came to Georgetown in 1856. In 1864, the population was 1250 and on the following New Year's Day, Georgetown became an incorporated village. Now Georgetown is part of the Town of Halton Hills.

In the 1950s, Rex Heslop, the builder of Rexdale in Toronto, built the Delrex subdivision, promising a 60/40 division between residential and business use of the area. That never happened, but the strip it created along Highway 7 is still there, now busier than ever.

Origins of Georgetown street names:

William Street	William Barber
Charles Street	Charles Young, son of James Young
Joseph Street	Joseph Barber
John Street	John B Dayfoot
James Street	James Barber
George Street	George Kennedy

Places to see in Georgetown:

• Barber Paper Mill

  Barber Mills

  These are the ruins of the paper mill built by James Barber. He had previously helped to build a mill for David Forbes, who found he could not run it. So James Barber, the paper-miller of the Barber brothers, bought the mill. He staked his fortune on this mill, and his knowledge and business acumen made the mill a success. Soon he found that there was not enough water-power on Silver Creek so he replaced the Forbes mill with a mill on this site on the Credit River. There are plans for turning this suite into a condominium development, in which the restored mills will play a prominent part.

• Willowbank, Park Avenue

  Willowbank

  This was the home of Joseph Barber and his family. It was built about 1844 and may have been built by Joseph Barber or an earlier owner, Robert Kennedy. This house overlooked the original Barber Mill, which was located at the bottom of the hill, where Silver Creek once ran.

• Berwick Hall, Main Street and Park Avenue

  Berwick Hall

  Across Park Avenue, which here was once called Factory Street, was the home of Joseph's brother James. When this house burned down in 1881, James's son John rebuilt it and it became his family home. He named it Berwick Hall after his mother's birthplace and this grand name suited the grand house. It is now an apartment building.

• Knox Church, Main and Church Streets

  Old Knox Church

  This old Presbyterian church was built in 1867 and is still a church. There was an earlier church on this site but it was not considered fine enough, so it was replaced by this building. The Presbyterian congregation, true to its Scottish roots, kept the bricks, which were reused elsewhere.

• Denney Townhouses, Main Street

  Denney Townhouses

  Across Main Street from Know Church is a group of three townhouses. These Victorian Gothic buildings were built about 1860 by Hiram Denney.

• Congregational Church (now the Public Library), Church Street

  Old Congregational Church

  This old building, located next door to the Knox Church and dating from 1877, is no longer a church. It is now part of the Georgetown Public Library.

• John Freeman House, 22-24 Church Street

  John Freeman House

  On the other side of Church Street and a little further west is this pair of houses, which were built about 1865 by a farmer, John Freeman.

• William Joyce House, 26 Church Street

  William Joyce House

  Next door is this 1½ storey house, built by William Joyce, a farmer, about 1867.

• Francis Barclay House, 51 Edith Street

  Francis Barclay House

  Across the street, on the corner of Edith Street, is this square house with checkerboard-patterned brickwork. The house was built about 1857 by a dry-goods merchant named Francis Barclay, who opened his store in 1848. Business must have been good at his store at the corner of Mill and Main Streets. His daughter, Frances, married John R. Barber and lived in Berwick Hall.

• Pine Grove, 53 Charles Street

  Pine Grove

  On the corner of Charles Street and Park Avenue is this old Victorian house painted an attractive yellow. The house was built by John McDermid about 1887 but the bricks are much older. They were the bricks saved when the old Presbyterian church was knocked down and replaced by the present Knox Church.

• Walter McKay House, 45 Charles Street

  Walter McKay House

  Further south on Charles Street is this white L-shaped house built about 1859 by Walter McKay, a carpenter. From the front of the house, you might assume that the oldest part of the house faced Charles Street. But you would be wrong. The original house is the part aligned east-west, the leftmost part in the picture. It was a tiny, two-up-two-down, 1½ storey house. The first addition was the section that now houses the front door. This was the kitchen. The northernmost section of the house was added as a summer kitchen.

• William Austen House, 8 Park Avenue

  William Austen House

  Around the corner on Park Avenue is this classic Ontario house, a 1½ storey house with, in front, a central gable with a window. A shoemaker, William Austen, built this house about 1870.

• McGibbon Hotel, Main and Mill Streets

  McGibbon Hotel

  This old hotel started life in 1849 and was built by Robert James. He sold it to an Irishman, Thomas Clarke, about 1867 and it was known as Clarke's Hotel, although it may have been named the Exchange Hotel. Samuel Hopkins McGibbon leased the hotel from Clarke in 1895. Although it has seen better days, it is still going as the McGibbon Hotel.

• John Kennedy House, 16 James Street

  John Kennedy House

  This fine white cottage was built in 1871 as a retirement home by John Kennedy, the son of Charles Kennedy, one of the founding family of Georgetown. He subdivided his land in that year but kept this lot for himself. The family farmhouse was located just further north on what is now Cleaveholm Drive.

• Cleave House, Cleaveholm Drive

  Cleave House

  The land around here formerly belonged to Charles Kennedy, brother of George Kennedy, after whom the town is named. In 1845, Charles gave the land to his son John and John built a frame house here as the family home. It later belonged to the Cleave family, who added the brick veneer.

• Willsie-Kennedy House, 17 Ewing Street

  Willsie-Kennedy House (front)

  Willsie-Kennedy House (side and rear)

  This house is a 1½-storey house with a walkout basement in the rear. The front porch appears to be a later addition. The house was built about 1864 by Thomas Willsie (or Wilsey) and his wife, Martha, the daughter of Morris Kennedy, brother of George. The family later moved to Owen Sound.

• Dayfoot Factory, Dayfoot Drive and Mill Street

  Dayfoot Factory

  John and Philo Dayfoot built a tannery at Mill and John Street in 1844. This later became a shoe factory. This building, once the shoe factory, is now apartments.

• Exchange Hotel, King and Queen Streets

  Exchange Hotel

  The Exchange Hotel, across the parking lot from the railway station, opened in 1855, two years after the railway came to Georgetown, and only closed in 2003. The first person to run the hotel was John Higgins, whose wife, Harriet, was George Kennedy's daughter and the first white child born in Hungry Hollow. Harry Wright arrived in 1913 to run the hotel. He was born in Wales, and immigrated to Canada with his parents when he was eight years old. His descendents, the Hillocks, ran the hotel until recently and still live here. This hotel was the heart of early Georgetown, and often served meals for 200 people at 25 cents each. Guests would sometimes tether their horses to the wooden posts of the verandah.

• Goodenow House, 14 Guelph Street

  Goodenow House

  This house is one of several old houses at the north end of Guelph Street (Highway 7). The house was built before 1854 by Albert Goodenow, a descendent of one of Georgetown's founders, Marquis Goodenow or Goodenough. It is a Victorian 1½-storey house with board-and-batten walls.