York Region trivia
21 facts and quiz questions about Newmarket, Ontario. Each one links to its source. A new fact of the day goes live every morning.
Fact of the day
Newmarket Quiz
In 1858 Robert Simpson opened a dry goods store on Main Street. It was the first store of what became the Simpsons department store chain.
Source: Wikipedia, Newmarket, Ontario
Newmarket Nature
The town sits on very deep glacial sand and gravel from the last ice age, known as Newmarket Till. The deposits are so thick that no rock outcrops show anywhere in town.
Source: Wikipedia, Newmarket, Ontario
Newmarket History
When the Davis Drive Rapidway was built between 2010 and 2015, the 1881 Union Hotel buildings at Main Street and Davis Drive were moved instead of torn down.
Source: Wikipedia, Newmarket, Ontario
Newmarket Quiz
Upper Canada Mall opened at Yonge Street and Davis Drive in 1974 with 55 stores. It pulled shopping west, away from the old Main Street downtown.
Sources: Wikipedia, Upper Canada Mall, Wikipedia, Newmarket, Ontario
Newmarket History
Resident William Roe hid the settlement's treasury from invading American troops. The war also helped the settlement grow, as the British army bought local food and goods.
Source: Wikipedia, Newmarket, Ontario
Newmarket Quiz
On August 3, 1837, Mackenzie spoke from the veranda of the North American Hotel in Newmarket to about 600 farmers. Later that year many of them marched down Yonge Street toward the capital.
Source: Wikipedia, Newmarket, Ontario
Newmarket Nature
Newmarket sits above the Algonquin Shoreline, the edge of an ancient glacial lake. Below it lies the flat, low land of the Holland Marsh.
Source: Wikipedia, Newmarket, Ontario
Newmarket History
They used the Toronto Carrying-Place Trail, one branch of which ran up the Holland River through the Newmarket area. Simcoe walked it in 1793 and later built Yonge Street along that route.
Source: Wikipedia, Newmarket, Ontario
Newmarket Numbers
In the 2021 Census Newmarket had about 2,284 people per square kilometre, one of the highest densities of any municipality in Ontario.
Source: Wikipedia, Newmarket, Ontario
Newmarket Quiz
Joseph Hill dammed the Holland River for his mill in the early 1800s, and the mill pond became Fairy Lake. It is part of Wesley Brooks Conservation Area.
Source: Wikipedia, Newmarket, Ontario
Newmarket Quiz
In June 1853 the first train arrived on the Toronto, Simcoe and Lake Huron Union Railroad, the first railway in Upper Canada. The line later reached Collingwood on Georgian Bay.
Source: Wikipedia, Newmarket, Ontario
Newmarket Quiz
Sir William Mulock wanted a canal down the Holland River to Lake Simcoe. It was almost done in 1912 when Robert Borden's new government cancelled it. Its locks are known as the Ghost Canal.
Source: Wikipedia, Newmarket, Ontario
Newmarket Places
In October 2013. The Main Street Heritage Conservation District protects many 1800s buildings, including the first Simpson's store at 226 Main Street South.
Source: Wikipedia, Newmarket, Ontario
Newmarket Quiz
Settlers saw it as a New Market, compared with York, the Old Market. Until 1890 the name was spelled as two words, New Market.
Source: Wikipedia, Newmarket, Ontario
Newmarket History
William Cane, Newmarket's first mayor, ran a sash and door factory in town. It later became the Dixon Pencil Company, the first Canadian maker of lead pencils.
Source: Wikipedia, Newmarket, Ontario
Newmarket Quiz
Newmarket counted 87,942 people in the 2021 Census, up 4.4 percent from 2016, on just 38.5 square kilometres of land.
Sources: Statistics Canada, 2021 Census Profile, Newmarket, Wikipedia, Newmarket, Ontario
Newmarket Numbers
In a suburban building boom, the population more than doubled between 1950 and 1970, from about 5,000 to about 11,000 people.
Source: Wikipedia, Newmarket, Ontario
Newmarket History
Quaker Timothy Rogers from Vermont scouted the Holland River in 1800. His group received 8,000 acres, and Quaker families from Vermont and Pennsylvania settled there from 1801 to 1803.
Source: Wikipedia, Newmarket, Ontario
Newmarket History
The Toronto and York Radial Railway arrived in 1899, running up Yonge Street and along Main Street, and later north to Sutton. It brought day-trippers until it closed in the early 1930s.
Source: Wikipedia, Newmarket, Ontario
Newmarket Quiz
Newmarket is the regional seat of York Region. Southlake Regional Health Centre and the Lake Simcoe Region Conservation Authority are also based there.
Source: Wikipedia, Newmarket, Ontario
Newmarket Places
Riverwalk Commons, an urban park east of Main Street South, opened in 2011 at a cost of 10 million dollars. The Newmarket Community Centre and Lions Hall stands beside it.
Source: Wikipedia, Newmarket, Ontario