It’s time to learn about Milton street names!
Each week, we speak with Milton Historical Society President John Challinor II to gather information and details about the namesakes of our roads. If you weren’t aware, he and the late great historian, Jim Dills, wrote the book on Milton street names, writing Milton Streets back in 2007.
Recently, we covered Hemstreet Crescent and Marshall Crescent. This week, we’re focusing on Henderson Road and Matheson Gate. Starting with Henderson, Challinor says Henderson was a former councillor for Trafalgar Township before Halton became a region.
Henderson himself had no affiliation with the street prior to the renaming of it. The naming was purely an act of honouring a former councillor.
Our second street this week is Matheson Gate. It’s found in the Dempsey neighbourhood and was named for John Matheson back in 2000. Challinor says Matheson was once the Mayor of Milton and was the publish of the Canadian (Milton) Champion newspaper back in the 1800s. Matheson then left the country to become a judge in Montana.
He notes that while a newspaper publisher becoming the Mayor of Milton seems like a conflict of interest, he points out that there were other publications in Milton at the time that would have reported without bias.
If you’re looking to understand how Milton’s streets are named, you should check out the book written by Challinor and Dills. Published by the Milton Historical Society back in 2007, it sold out in about six weeks and has since been long out of print. That said, according to Challinor, you can still find a copy at the Milton Public Library. With nearly 15-years having passed since the initial publication, and the extensive town growth in that time, an updated book is likely to come.
You can also take a walk with the late Jim Dills down Milton’s Main Street in 2002.
If you have a suggestion on what you’d like to learn about next week, let us know! We’re currently working on names that we find interesting. You can message our Facebook page, Twitter account, Instagram page, or even email us at News1013@LocalRadio.ca. Otherwise, we’ll just continue asking about local street names that we find interesting.
If you have a news tip or story idea, you can now send us a heads up via email at News1013@LocalRadio.ca. If you’d like to get ahold of me personally, shoot me a message at Cameron.Wilkinson@LocalRadio.ca. We’re in the business of content creation, so no idea is a bad idea.
