Ontario, ca or Ontario, ca...
In looking for Thomas Albert Hersey and Elizabeth Evans (both born in Kingston, Frontenac, Ontario, Canada in the late 1800s) I am getting comfortable with the bizarre Canada West/Canada East compass. Kingston is not in England. Ontario is not just in California. Perth, Perth, Perth, Perth. All these people from Perth. I'm not looking for ancestors from Australia.
I live East of Interstate 5 in California. I have lived East of I-5 before there was an I-5. All my educational experiences trumpet the USA in 1950's Orange County, California. Finding Canadian locales, old regional vernaculars, and historical facts has been a huge cob-Web-site exploration. When I google terms listed on the old Canadian censuses I find very odd and entirely unrelated non-information. I have had to learn how to web-site search for these places.
I live East of Interstate 5 in California. I have lived East of I-5 before there was an I-5. All my educational experiences trumpet the USA in 1950's Orange County, California. Finding Canadian locales, old regional vernaculars, and historical facts has been a huge cob-Web-site exploration. When I google terms listed on the old Canadian censuses I find very odd and entirely unrelated non-information. I have had to learn how to web-site search for these places.
Let me go back and give you examples. For instance, the Thomas Herse in the 1851 Canadian Agricultural Census was from Verulam in the County of Victoria. Perhaps this Thomas may be the Thomas Albert Hersey I was looking for. I googled "Verulam" - got Virginia, USA and South Africa. I googled "County of Victoria" and got Texas. A simple Southern Californian would leave it there; guessing the Hersey family came from British Columbia before immigrating to Ontario, So Cal. So, why go further?
Another instance is related thus: I explained to my Yale Grad Husband "This research really makes me want to travel to Frontenac." "Where?" Up to that point he'd been hearing about Ontario and Kingston. Frontenac seems…Foreign-tenac. Canada East or West? Is it then, French and spelled Fronteneque? To us Ontario is simply the pathway to Palm Springs via Riverside California. So I decided it would be a interesting to give the history of Ontario, California a google.
Another instance is related thus: I explained to my Yale Grad Husband "This research really makes me want to travel to Frontenac." "Where?" Up to that point he'd been hearing about Ontario and Kingston. Frontenac seems…Foreign-tenac. Canada East or West? Is it then, French and spelled Fronteneque? To us Ontario is simply the pathway to Palm Springs via Riverside California. So I decided it would be a interesting to give the history of Ontario, California a google.
Ontario. Aha. I believed I found a huge Californian Misconception. There was nothing on the official Ontario City sites giving me the Canadian connection. I googled Ontario, California and Ontario California history.
The official City of Ontario, California page says:
"It was in the first week of August, 1881 when (founder) George Chaffey, a Canadian engineer, viewed the wastes known as the Cucamonga Desert and decided that this patch of land, if properly watered, could become productive and profitable."
The Ontario California Heritage page states:
"George Chaffey Jr. and his brother William founded Ontario, which means 'the City on the side of a mountain,' in September of 1881."
There was no connection that I could find to Ontario, Canada.
It was only after guess, assumption, viewing of old maps and discovering buried web sites that I connected the Chaffey family of the Chaffey Mill on the Rideau Canal in Ontario, Canada with the Chaffeys in Ontario California.
The official City of Ontario, California page says:
"It was in the first week of August, 1881 when (founder) George Chaffey, a Canadian engineer, viewed the wastes known as the Cucamonga Desert and decided that this patch of land, if properly watered, could become productive and profitable."
The Ontario California Heritage page states:
"George Chaffey Jr. and his brother William founded Ontario, which means 'the City on the side of a mountain,' in September of 1881."
There was no connection that I could find to Ontario, Canada.
It was only after guess, assumption, viewing of old maps and discovering buried web sites that I connected the Chaffey family of the Chaffey Mill on the Rideau Canal in Ontario, Canada with the Chaffeys in Ontario California.
I finally found a GREAT hidden page that gave me the connection. The Chaffe Family Tree. (I love how the Chaffe name spellings on the header morph). Read all the way to the bottom of the page to find the mother of bi-Ontarians "George Chaffey and William Benjamin Chaffey, C.M.G., celebrated irrigationists in California and Australia."
Eh!!! Jeez. I must be very thick. Now it is easy. Somehow I am using better search techniques. I can enter Veralum and find Canada. I can enter Ontario California and find that
"It takes its name from the Ontario Model Colony development established in 1882 by the Canadian engineer George Chaffey and his brothers William Chaffey and Charles Chaffey. They named the settlement after their home province of Ontario".
But of course, Thomas Hersey immigrated to Orange County, California, not Ontario, San Bernardino County, California. So all of this is really of no consequence...
"It takes its name from the Ontario Model Colony development established in 1882 by the Canadian engineer George Chaffey and his brothers William Chaffey and Charles Chaffey. They named the settlement after their home province of Ontario".
But of course, Thomas Hersey immigrated to Orange County, California, not Ontario, San Bernardino County, California. So all of this is really of no consequence...
Further Reading...
George Chaffey Cooper Museum (California)
Chaffey's Lock Mill (Canada) - Nature Notes
Chaffee Family Tree
Chaffeys Locks
Natural Recourses Canada: Name Origins
Canadian genealogy (Canada)
Ontario Historical Society (Canada)
Ontario Genealogy (Canada)
Canadian History
Ontario.ca (Canada)
Ontario Canada Travel
California Genealogy - History of Ontario
Ontario Heritage (California)
City of Ontario (California)
George Chaffey Cooper Museum (California)
Chaffey's Lock Mill (Canada) - Nature Notes
Chaffee Family Tree
Chaffeys Locks
Natural Recourses Canada: Name Origins
Canadian genealogy (Canada)
Ontario Historical Society (Canada)
Ontario Genealogy (Canada)
Canadian History
Ontario.ca (Canada)
Ontario Canada Travel
California Genealogy - History of Ontario
Ontario Heritage (California)
City of Ontario (California)
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