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a great agrarian tradition
It’s unfortunate that after the last municipal election, Uxbridge suddenly had a council with no representation from the farming community. Probably for the first time in its two centuries. For most of those years, the mayor’s chair was occupied by a farmer. In the previous council to this one, we had two farmers: organic vegetable grower Ted Eng and dairyman Howie Herrema. Mr. Herrema, who probably would have won if he’d gone for the mayoralty, instead chose to rededicate himself to farm and family, at least for now. Mr. Eng, after many long years battling in Ward 2, gave up that seat after only one term to try for Regional Councillor. He lost to Jack Ballinger, and we lost our rural contingent on council. Heck, even Pat Mikuse lives in the middle of beautiful downtown Roseville.
It was probably inevitable. After all, Uxbridge has been urbanizing ever since Joseph Gould came down from Quaker Hill and built his first mill in the valley. Before that, Uxbridge was all farmers (at least, there’s no concrete evidence that First Nations people did anything but camp in these parts on their way through). But despite the fact that the vast majority of the township’s population lives in the hamlets, villages and the bustling capital town, Uxbridge’s farmers (as demonstrated by our cover picture and the accompanying story on page 6) are as good at what they do as they’ve ever been.
Many times in the brief history of this newspaper, we’ve reported that, like Paul and Kelly Brooks, Uxbridge farmers have been selected as top-of-class by their peers across Ontario and Canada. Only a couple of years ago, Lisa and Steve Cooper, who live just a ways down Ashworth Road from the Brooks family, were named the top young farmers in Canada. Ashworth Road obviously has some of the best soil in the country.
In fact, as we delve back into the Cosmos archives, we’re reminded that our first two issues, in September of ‘05, had horticulturalists on the cover, and they lived almost next door in Udora - Cosmos Queen Sharon Bognar and Garlic King Bryan Mailey.
Since then, we’ve talked about just every possible farm product you can imagine - from asparagus to apples to strawberries, from horses to emus to alpacas. There’s even a farmer west of Sandford who raises exotic birds. Uxbridge farmers have tried, and continue to succeed, in growing or raising everything except pineapples or kangaroos, and if global warming continues, we might even see those.
What makes the Brooks’ and Coopers special is that they revel in telling people about how wonderful farming is, and proving it through the marvellous things they sell in their farm markets. Through the marvels of social media, hundreds, even thousands of urbanites across Ontario are being attracted to Uxbridge because of its farms. The initial pull might be something like the Cooper’s corn maze or the famous pumpkin cannon at Brooks Farms, but what stays with them is the quality of our honey, or maple syrup, or apple cider.
And as much as our historic attractions, or our artistic community, or our trails, are important cogs in our future as a tourist destination, the foundation is Uxbridge’s first and proudest industry - agriculture.
November 22, 2012
July 14, 2011
