The Name Game: Questions – and a Few Answers

Source: The RTHS newsletter, April, 2008

THE NAME GAME Can you locate these Rideau communities? What is the origin of their names?

Five places had two names. Which ones? (Answers at the end.)

Mahogany Harbour is part of the west channel of the Rideau south of Manotick Village and was called Wattersons’ Bay for many years. Mr. and Mrs. Johnny Watterson lived where C & N is now. They kept a tourist home (B & B) during the summer months and often boarded teachers during the school year. The house, barn and property were very attractive and well maintained.

Who chose the name Mahogany harbour? Was it John Johnston or his wife Joan? What year? Why? Members of the Manotick Classic Boat Club should ace these questions! What are your recollections of the Harbour? We’d like to know.

John Carson, Ballimene, County Tyrone, Ireland, arrived in Lower Canada in the 1820’s. He and his wife Mary Cummings pioneered in Gloucester in the Montreal Road – Carson Road area. In the 1840’s the family, including Robert, Charles and James Carson and a sister who married William Craig, purchased land in North Gower Township. Take a wild guess and tell us the name chosen for the post office and community after they settled here. Note: Car Canada is at Todds’ Corners. Is this part of Carsonby?

Like many locations in eastern Canada, Malakoff and Kars were named as a patriotic colonial gesture in honour of British and French victories over the Russians during the Crimean War, 1853 – 1856. Sir William Fenwick Williams, a Canadian, led the British troops into the City of Kars and rescued the people. Where is that walled city? In what Canadian museum is Sir William recognized as the Hero of Kars? Malakoff and Kars (in Rideau) each had another name. What were they? 6

Beckett’s Landing was named for Thomas A. Beckett of Kemptville when he and his family moved here and established wharves on both Rideau shores for his ferry. The landmark, St. Paul’s Anglican Church and Cemetery. 1872, stand on a high knoll on the north shore overlooking this flourishing hamlet. When did the Becketts settle here and give their name to the community?

Except, perhaps, for the Ottawa Locks which enter the Ottawa River, Colonel By’s surveyors and engineers did not use aboriginal names for any of the locks along the Rideau Canal.

The Ojibway “Manotick” was therefore translated to “Long Island” since “ Island in a River” was too cumbersome for Colonel By and his men either in their reports or for the lockstation at the northern tip of the Island.

When Dickinson, Currier and partners required an identification for their subdivision, Long Island Village was already established so they made an obvious choice, i.e. Manotick. The Ojibway were still travelling through the Lower Rideau and camping on the Island and the mainland so “Manotick” would have been familiar to the settlers living here since the 1830’s What is your theory on the naming of Manotick?

THINK ABUT IT: Communities have social boundaries that differ from municipal or parish boundaries. One of our new life members lives in the Yukon, a descendent of a Long Island lockmaster. And where is Heart’s Desire anyway? Or Maple Hill? or Echo Drive?

DID YOU KNOW? The City of Ottawa Ward 21 now includes the former Rideau Township as well as parts of Nepean and Goulbourn.

Five places had 2 names. Kars properties were registered on Adam Johnston Eastman’s plan as Wellington and remain thus. The post office, 1856, was always Kars. Malakoff was known as the Windfall because a tornado felled a number of old growth trees and the pioneers considered that a blessing.

Reeve Craig was nicknamed Puddle Alley because of poor drainage and the Periwinkle was the name given to an ice-cream parlour and store at Wattersons’ Corners. North Gower Village began as North Gower Corners.