Working from the premise that the culture of a community is made up of people interacting in and with their environment, this paper attempts to uncover the spirit of the Haliburton area through community stories, a combination of oral history and storytelling. The concepts of oral history and storytelling and their validity in shedding light on events is explored leading up to the relating of stories collected by the author in interviews with five long-time residents of Haliburton County. These stories are presented as both informative and entertaining as they reveal life in the past.
Prefacing a look at the Bobcaygeon Colonization Road and its impact on the opening up of the areas of Haliburton and Minden, the paper presents background on the settlement and colonization of the areas looking at the way both the native population and the settlers considered the land and its use.
Colonization roads were those built during the fifteen years preceding Confederation and intended to be links from the lakefront areas to the interior parts of the province. The paper outlines the progression of settlement as the Bobcaygeon Road was begun in 1855-56 and as it expanded, stressing the social and economic changes that went along with expansion. Finally, the paper looks at Haliburton today focusing on the importance of tourism and the need to protect the natural beauty of the area.
The paper outlines the history of the Dorset Tower from its conception in 1922 through its 1997 season. Beginning with a look at the causes of forest fires and the means of fighting them in the late 19th century and the organization of Ontario into districts to handle these events, the paper moves to a history of the construction of the Dorset Tower network in particular. Personal memories of the Dorset Tower and some of the towermen are included. With the erection of a new tower in 1967, a new age of tourism was begun but when control of the tower was moved to the MNR office in Bracebridge, problems surfaced. Some of these contemporary issues such as vandalism and financing are discussed as well as the work of the community to address and handle them. With the transfer of land to the township in 1997 and plans for the future, a new era was begun for the Tower.