Western Elgin County includes the Municipality of Dutton-Dunwich and the Municipality of West Elgin.
Dutton-Dunwich was settled on the shores of Lake Erie by Colonel Thomas Talbot in 1803 followed by families of Irish descent from the United States. These first settlers were placed near the Talbot Creek and the former fishing village of Tyrconnell. In the following decades many Scottish immigrants arrived and were given land grants further north within Dunwich and also into Aldborough Township which is now the Municipality of West Elgin. Many of their descendents still farm in the area today. Their wheat and corn crops were eventually joined by tobacco in the 1920s.
Colonel Thomas Talbot is buried at St. Peter’s Anglican Church Cemetery near Tyrconnell. Several homes dating back to the early Talbot Settlement are still in existence including the 1850s Georgian style residence that is now the Backus-Page House Museum.
The communities of Wallacetown and Eagle were built along the original Talbot Road. Later the village of Dutton and the twin railway towns of West Lorne and Rodney flourished due to the presence of railway stations in their communities.
John E. Pearce Provincial Park & Monument
29551 Lakeview Line, Wallacetown
John E. Pearce gave a woodlot on a high bluff, overlooking Lake Erie, to the province for use as a provincial park in 1955. The park’s Spicer Trail, part of the Trans Canada Trail, is free to those wanting to explore the 1.26 km undemanding walk.
The Pearce Monument depicts a settler uprooting a stump. It commemorates the settling of the area by Pearce’s ancestors.
The first to settle in the area was Thomas Talbot, who in 1803 founded the Talbot Settlement. Many other reminders of this period in history can still be seen at nearby attractions, and the many homes along Lakeview Line that were built by the early settlers.
Ye Olde Jail
135 Queen Street, Rodney
Built in 1890, this tiny Rodney Jail is North America’s oldest and smallest jail measuring at 15ft x 18ft. The building still bares its original steel cell doors, stove, and yellow brick exterior. Visitors can visit the jail from the May long weekend to Labour Day.
The Arts and Cookery Bank
242 Graham Road, West Lorne
Two buildings - a 1914 Bank of Montreal and an 1883 timber frame barn - offer an intriguing marriage of bricks and barn board. This stunning venue is the home of The Arts & Cookery Bank, a regional cultural destination.
Seeing the value in preserving its local heritage by creating a living legacy for generations to come, The Bank is unleashing the potential of rural southwestern Ontario and is a testament to what volunteers can do for their community.
Port Glasgow Memorial Park
8650 Furnival Road, Port Glasgow
The former Soldiers’ and Pioneers’ Memorial Park was opened in 1920 and was for many years the scene of an annual reunion of residents of what was the Township of Aldborough.
The site was near the landing point of the earliest of the settlers to this area, called Cnoc Nealliadh(Gaelic for Nelly’s Hill)by the highlanders who arrived here first starting in 1818. Today the entrance to the former park is marked by the original gates and a cairn as well as two mill stones that survived from the first mill built by Col. Talbot at Port Talbot in 1805 and burned by the Americans during the War of 1812.
John Kenneth Galbraith Monument
Thompson Line, Dutton-Dunwich
The inuksuk, a truly Canadian icon, is traditionally a pile of rocks built by the Inuit people to resemble many things. This particular inuksuk which stands over eight feet in height, was built here on Thomson Line in Dunwich, not far from Iona Station, to honour a great Canadian, and to frame the view of the field that Galbraith once plowed.
During WWII he administered price controls for the U.S. and afterwards he became the most celebrated economist—statesman of the age, whose classic works include The Great Crash, The Affluent Society, and The New Industrial State. An advisor for peace, Galbraith served as U.S. Ambassador to India under John F. Kennedy. He holds the Medal of Freedom and the Order of Canada.