Nestled among the rolling hills of present-day Halton Hills, just southeast of Acton, was an industrial settlement that has since vanished off the map.
It would almost seem hard to believe when looking at the current terrain that the small community of Glen Lawson was once located between the Third and Fourth Lines.
The hamlet of Glen Lawson was situated at Lot 25, Concession 4, Esquesing Township, and named for Graham Lawson (1780-1861) who emigrated from Scotland, purchasing the land in 1836. The name ‘Glen’ comes from old English for a valley.
The Black Creek was what attracted Lawson to the property. Seeing the potential for water power, it was shortly after his arrival that Lawson established a grist mill and shingle factory - making the hamlet an important industrial site for the northern part of Esquesing.
Soon to follow the mills was the opening of a log-constructed school house to provide the local children with an education. It was here that John Newton, later to become Limehouse’s first postmaster, got a job as a teacher in 1842. In 1855, the school would be relocated a few kilometres west to serve the settlement of Little Dublin.
It was in 1856 when the Grand Trunk Railway, a railroad from Toronto to Guelph, cut through a portion of the hamlet. Despite the train not directly stopping in Glen Lawson, the idea of having tracks close by did attract more entrepreneurs to the area over the next 50 years, including the construction of lime kilns at Dolly Varden on Lot 24, Concession 4, in 1872.
In 1875, brothers George and Edward Tolton began operating a grist mill in Glen Lawson after purchasing a plot of land from John Scott for the price of $19. The mill was powered by a large water wheel, with water that flowed down a mill race from a nine-acre pond on the west side of the railway tracks.
After a fire at the Tolton’s grist mill in 1882, glove maker A.T. Arnold purchased a portion of the property for a small tannery, which operated there until he amalgamated operations at his Georgetown glove works in 1901.
By 1917, Glen Lawson finally received a station of its own, through a unique form of train service, when the Toronto Suburban Railway opened an electric radial railway line. This electric railway spanned from Toronto to Guelph, with a stop in Glen Lawson, offering passenger and freight service to travellers and businesses until its demise in August 1931.
From thereon in, the hamlet began to see a rapid decline in business dealings as industries moved to the larger communities of Acton and Georgetown, making Glen Lawson virtually non-existent.
To make matters worse, tragedy would strike the remnants of the hamlet in March 1946 when one of the dams at the Beardmore Tannery broke. A 30-foot high dam, holding back tanning effluent in a filter bed, broke and a wall of red-coloured fluid flowed down the Black Creek, completely flooding Glen Lawson in 15 feet of filth. The breaking of the tannery’s dam also caused a portion of the Third Line to wash out, as well as the undermining of a nearby railway bridge.
Today, the only evidence that remains of the historic community is a stone house, constructed by Graham Lawson in 1855, and the name of the road connecting the Third and Fourth Lines, serving as a reminder of the once-prosperous industrial settlement of Glen Lawson.
Article written by Scott Brooks, with information from Dills Collection/EHS/Halton’s Heritage: William Halton & Halton County.
