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Mention Brighton, Ontario, and apples come to mind. This small community on the eastern shore of Lake Ontario, just 8 miles west of Trenton, is quite renowned for its apple industry.

The cultivation of apple trees for harvesting can be traced back to Italy some 200 years ago. Thirty known varieties were grown and eventually introduced into other countries. The seeds of European apples were brought to Ontario by French settlers in the early 17th century.

Have you ever heard of Johnny Appleseed?

The main character in this story was John Chapman, a farm lad, who attended a term or two at Harvard College and then headed west. As early as 1801, Johnny saw settlers crossing the Ohio River and constructing cabins in a fertile wilderness; fertile, maybe, but devoid of fruit trees. Legend says that he carried the word of the Bible and also carried apple seeds. Johnny planted nurseries by streams for the benefit of the settlers who would follow. Frontiersmen carried seed pouches he had given them, and with those seeds they planted orchards as far west as Iowa.

Shortly after 1776, United Empire Loyalists arrived in Upper Canada with seeds and seedlings already acclimatized in North America. It was a Scottish immigrant, John McIntosh, who introduced a superior apple to Ontario. McIntosh had left New York State to settle in Dundela, Ontario, where he transplanted 20 wild-apple seedlings. His wife, Hannah, tended to the orchard with loving care, especially one particular tree. The grandchildren noticed this and called the fruit of this special tree “Granny’s apple.”

Many of the apple varieties that the pioneers grew no longer exist. It was reported that in 1892 one could choose from more than 878 varieties of apples. For example, the Alexander apple was introduced into England from Russia in 1817. The Fameuse or Snow apple was grown in the Province of Quebec with seeds from France. The Golden Russett came from New York State. The Ontario (a Wagner and Spy cross) came from Paris, Ontario, and the early Transparent from St. Petersburg.

In 1853, the average size of a farm in Brighton was 100 acres. Pioneer families raised cows and chickens and grew grain. Their apple orchards were usually located close to their buildings. Most of the yield from the orchard was used by the family. The apples that were dried over the kitchen stove were often taken to the general store and bartered for other goods.

Brighton’s first settler was a United Empire Loyalist by the name of Obediah Simpson, who arrived there in 1796. There were other Loyalist families who followed him and many immigrants from the British Isles. They called their community Singleton’s Corners.

When a road was built from York (Toronto) to Kingston in 1816, Singleton’s Corners began to grow. John Kemp opened the first store, and John Singleton took the job of postmaster for the locality. The name of the community was later changed to Brighton.

By 1850 the first doctor arrived to serve the population of 500. A small schoolhouse was opened on Main Street and the first newspaper, the Brighton Sentinel, was published on February 23, 1853, by Alexander Begg, a settler from Scotland. One of the early issues of the paper contained a feature article on how to restore an old orchard. The writer recommended putting lime and manure around the trees and growing corn and potatoes under them. It also described how to prune to open up the centre of the apple tree and how to graft new varieties on existing trees.

Two other papers would follow: the Brighton Weekly Flag in 1855 and the Brighton Ensign in 1870. Brighton was incorporated as a village on March 24, 1859.

In 1853 H. Ganetsee established a commercial nursery, which had apple, cherry, and other fruit trees for sale. The first apple orchard, 3.2 kilometres (two miles) east of Brighton, was established with seeds brought from New York State in the early 1830s by Mr. John F. Sherman.

John Sherman was a blacksmith by trade, and worked in the villages of Warkworth and Brighton until 1845, when he chose to settle on a farm east of Brighton and plant his first orchard. Frederick W. Sherman was the last member of that family to operate an orchard on the property. When he died in March 1964, the orchards were sold, and the land was used for other purposes.

In the early days, Brighton needed a lawyer to oversee commerce. John Eyre was that ambitious man. Eyre assisted in founding the Union Agricultural Joint Stock Company at Clark’s Hotel in 1873 and served one term as a member of Parliament. Circa 1880, he built a magnificent three-storey Georgian house, complete with a full basement, triple brick walls, open porches to the east and west sides, and turreted tower. This home, situated on Highway 2 just west of the village, would one day be called the Whitehouse.

When Eyre died in 1889, nine years after building his home, it seemed no one in the family wished to keep his pride and joy, and the house passed into the hands of a trust company until 1898, when Samuel Nesbitt, a grocer in Brighton, bought it.

Nesbitt was both industrious and highly imaginative. He founded the Brighton Bicycle Club on May 15, 1896, in the back of his dry goods store.

On April 24, 1896, he wrote the column “Bicycle” for the Brighton Ensign newspaper. Partly a sales announcement, it stated, “Ladies and gentlemen, I carry the largest stock of wheels in the country. I have selected these wheels that have given the best satisfaction in Canada and the United States.” He later mentioned the names of people to whom he had sold wheels. On the list was Eleanor Bibby, a young lady who was soon to become his wife.

Nellie, as she was called, was described as a being a very proper Victorian lady, somewhat severe in appearance but motherly by nature. Samuel and Nellie raised two daughters, Frances and Edith, and two sons, Edwin and Ernest. In the 1920s Samuel renovated the Whitehouse, putting stucco on the outside of the building and constructing a tower with windows to overlook his 53 acres. It was said that Samuel enjoyed playing a game or two of cards in that tower. Between games he would watch his work hands in the field with the aid of binoculars.

Samuel’s greatest contribution to Brighton and the country was a canning factory, which he established in 1894 under the auspices of Dominion Canneries. Being a progressive man, he also established a laboratory for the development of better quality fruits and of finer methods of canning. This included some experimental work concerning the preservation of foods. An article appeared in the paper on December 2, 1898, regarding apples stored in Brighton. It read, “Nearly 70,000 barrels of apples have been stored in Brighton to be repacked for shipment, principally to Liverpool, England and Glasgow, Scotland. During the last of October and November, 266 rail cars have been unloaded and stored in Mr. Sam Nesbitt’s storehouses alone, and nearly 135 in other places in the town. There has been paid, for freight on apples inward here, the sum of $17,300. It has been stated that Mr. S. Nesbitt’s facilities for storing apples in frost-proof storehouses exceeds that of any other town between Toronto and Montreal.”

Nellie died in 1929 and Samuel, aged 69, married her younger sister, Maria, a French teacher at the teacher’s college in Toronto. Samuel died in 1938 and the Whitehouse, known then as Grandfather’s House, became Rene’s Whitehouse Hotel. Rene was Irene Dickson’s nickname. She managed the Nesbitt estate for the next 34 years, serving many celebrities at the hotel, among them Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King, Mr. and Mrs. Walt Disney, and Irene Castle, the famous ballroom dancer. Today, the Whitehouse has been converted back to a residential home.

Anyone who has ever picked apples knows something about exercise and fresh air. In the early days, apple pickers would rise at 6:00 a.m. to have breakfast and then assemble at the farm before going out to the orchard. Pickers were expected to climb the first tree by 7:00 a.m., while it was still a bit dark and possibly cold. Everyone would stop at noon for a cold lunch and then return to work until 6:00 p.m. The grower would supply the picker with a ladder and a basket. Keep in mind that some of these trees were 80 years old and 40 feet high. In 1933 pickers were paid $1.50 a day.

There was a fair amount of rivalry among the picking gangs to see who could ship the most barrels per day. Around 1908, eight men working for Mr. Bradd picked and packed 109 barrels of Wagners in a 10-hour day. George DeLong and his gang of five men picked and packed 120 barrels of Starks in one day.

In the 1880s Brighton’s industrial centre featured a carriage and sleigh factory and some farm equipment factories. Mr. Robinson operated an apple evaporator, while William Butler operated a sawmill. A harness shop was run by Robert Marshall. Brighton had its own cheese factory located on Cedar Street. The village was also known for the Brighton Nightwear Company, which manufactured pyjamas.

Every village, town, or city has had its occasional setback, and Brighton is no exception. The harsh winter of 1933–34 caused tremendous damage to Brighton’s apple orchards. Brighton experienced 20 degrees of frost on October 24. This was followed by temperatures as low as -35 degrees Fahrenheit in December and January, 1934. The apples were frozen on the trees. An extremely dry summer was followed by a wet fall that prevented the apple tree wood from hardening properly. The leaves remained on the trees throughout the winter. Those trees which had borne heavily died, while those without a crop survived. The older varieties such as Cooper’s market, Gano, Ben Davis, and Stark disappeared. The farmers were now faced with replanting and many growers chose the Melba, Lobo, McIntosh, and Cortland varieties. Other farmers decided to end their apple business entirely. Brighton then saw houses where the old orchards had once stood.

In July 1975 the Downtown Business Association made the decision to hold a fall festival. They called it Brighton’s Applefest. Their first Applefest hosted a street fair for one day. When the coffee and baked goods ran out, the fair was over. The next year a few booths appeared. By 1977 the Lions, Legion, and Kinsmen Clubs assisted in Applefest. Today, Applefest is a four-day event attended by tourists from all over the province.

The success of Brighton as a community and a tourist destination is in part due to their long-standing heritage and traditions, much of which involves the growing of apples. Perhaps Brighton was able to get by without a doctor for as long as it did, until it had 500 residents, because, as the saying goes, “An apple a day ...”