Happy Simcoe Day

Today is a Civic Holiday in most of Ontario. It is a beautiful day here in my part of Ontario. After this quick posting, I am headed out doors.

It is only in recent years that this holiday has become to be known as Simcoe Day. Having a holiday on the first Monday in August is not a new scheme to have a summer holiday. According to the Ontario Archives web site article, Toronto city council declared the first Monday of August as a holiday back in 1875. In 1969, they renamed it Simcoe Day. This naming seems to have been picked up by other communities.

John Graves Simcoe was Lieutenant Governor of Upper Canada from 1792 to 1796. My Germanic ancestors Johan Niclaus Stőber [later Stiver] and his family arrived in Canada during this time in 1794. Under the leadership of William Berczy, my ancestors along with about 60 other families received free land promised by Simcoe in Markham Township.

So as I celebrate Simcoe Day, I remember my ancestors who came to Canada when this province was just being settled north east of Toronto in Markham Township. I think of the hardships they endured during those early years. How that area has changed!