The first settlers to the area were Irish soldiers, arriving in the 1820s. The town itself was born in the 1850s by Jackson Stitt, for whom the town is named; he was also the first postmaster in the area.[2]
The original town site, now known as "Old Stittsville", was at the present intersection of Carp Road and Hazeldean Road. It was a small crossroads, consisting of a few houses, a small inn, and a general store and post office, which was owned by Jackson Stitt.
By 1866, Stittsville was a post village with a population of 100, situated in the township of Goulborne. The village contained one general store, one common school, with an average attendance of seventeen pupils. The Loyal Orange Lodge, No. 210, met in Orange Hall, on the first Thursday in each month. The citizens included John S Argue, general merchant and postmaster.[3]
The Great Carleton Fire of 1870 devastated the community, destroying nearly everything. The Hartin House and a handful of other buildings were all that was left standing. This was an extremely large fire, encompassing over 250,000 acres (1,000 km2)[citation needed] from Ottawa to Smiths Falls to Carleton Place.[2]
The regrowth of Stittsville did not occur until the 1870s, when Canadian Pacific built a railway line connecting Ottawa to the booming lumber town of Carleton Place. The new town would be at the current intersection of Abbott Street and Main Street. A train station, grist mill, grain elevators, and several hotels were just some of the features of this sleepy outpost town. The hamlet of Ashton (12 km to the west) also attributes its beginning to the railway line. In 1989, the tracks were removed, and CP Rail donated the land to be used as part of the Trans-Canada Trail. [citation needed]
Stittsville was incorporated as a police village in 1956, and became a full village in 1961. In 1974 it was amalgamated into Goulbourn Township. In 2001 Goulbourn was amalgamated into the City of Ottawa.[citation needed]
Since the extension of the Queensway in the 1970s made travel from Ottawa quicker and easier, Stittsville has experienced rapid growth; it transformed from a quiet farming community of under 500 people to a suburb of 20,000, in just over 25 years. Many residents are employed in Ottawa's high-tech industry or the federal government. Further growth is expected in the near future with the development of neighborhoods such as Jackson Trails and Kanata West to its north, Fernbank to its east and south and West Ridge to its west. In the next 10 to 20 years, Stittsville's population is expected to exceed 30,000. [citation needed]
Stittsville Public School, an elementary school originally on Stittsville Main Street, has had a series of expansions to accommodate the growth in population. The school opened as a two-room, one-story building, and was eventually expanded to a two-story building with about fourteen classrooms. At the start of the 2005–2006 school year, Stittsville Public School, including staff and students, was moved to a new two-story building with over twenty classrooms and now 13 portables at 40 Granite Ridge Drive.
Stittsville is also home to seven other schools. Frederick Banting Secondary Alternate Program, Sacred Heart Catholic High School and École Secondaire Catholique Paul-Desmarais are the three secondary schools. Paul-Desmarais being a french school and Sacred Heart and Frederick Banting being English. The elementary schools are: A. Lorne Cassidy Elementary School, Holy Spirit Catholic School, Guardian Angels Catholic School, St. Stephen Catholic School and École Élémentaire Catholique Saint-Jean-Paul II, the latter four being in the Catholic school board.
Stittsville is also the home of the Stittsville Minor Hockey Rams, as well the Stittsville RAMS competitive hockey association.
Media
The Stittsville News is a weekly newspaper published by Metroland Media. Its 2015 circulation was about 13,446.[4]
Canada
Ontario
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