Meadowvale & Churchville: A History

Meadowvale & Churchville: A History by William E. Cook was a short booklet from the Boston Mills Press Credit Valley Series of 1975. Over the years I have had many pleasurable bike rides up to the original Meadowvale and then on up to Churchville in Brampton. The last time I rode up there was over the Victoria Day weekend in 2020, when Mark and I continued our northern Mississauga bike trek even after I had my accident where I broke my wrist just south of Derry on Old Creditview Road.

The author talked about the original settlers and the milling industries along the Credit River. The construction of the Grand Trunk Railway through Malton in 1855 (it slices old Malton at a diagonal) marked the end of the villages’ prosperity as railway stations attracted business and thus employment.

I have long been interested in what we now call Meadowvale Village, and I knew that one of the large buildings on (now) Old Derry Road used to be a hotel. There is even a photo of it in this book. Thus I was puzzled by the author’s omission of the hotel from a chart of buildings. The hotel was built in 1852 and the chart was dated 1856, yet next to Hotels, the author assigned two to Churchville yet none to Meadowvale.

The book was illustrated with many maps and historical photos and it was a pleasure to plot some locations on Google Maps, yet as I realized three years ago during my crippled bike ride through the area, the original village has been lost in a swamp of new housing.

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