Tag Archives: Ottawa Heritage

Lime Kiln and Chipmunk Trail

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July 27, 2024

On a recent business trip to Ottawa I had a few hours of off time so I Googled to see what the top trails in the area were. One of them caught my attention because of the name. So, I decided to go investigate the Lime Kiln and Chipmunk Trail. This is just one of the trails that are part of the Greenbelt Trail Network.

There is a wide trail that leads away from the parking lot and this set of trails would be considered easy to moderate in difficulty. There is little change in elevation and no rough ground to be covered.

There are a few swampy sections that have been made accessible through the addition of some boardwalks.

After a short hike you will come to the ruins of the Flood Lime Kiln. The former industrial site was comprised of several buildings. There were five buildings that surrounded the circular kiln. There was also a separate building where the finished lime was stored before being taken to market. An additional building was the powder magazine where the black powder was stored that was used to blast the limestone that would be made into the lime. The first set of foundations that you will see are those of the powder magazine.

Francis Flood built this lime kiln in the late 1800s and operated it until around 1906. The lime was used to make mortar to chink log houses as well as to make whitewash, plaster and many other household products. By the early 1900s larger industrial kilns were being run and Portland cement began to replace lime as a building material. Most of these small kiln operators went out of business. The Flood kiln was abandoned and left to deteriorate.

The Flood Kiln was known as a pot kiln or a set kiln. Limestone and wood were loaded into the kiln and left to burn for several days. The lime and ash were then removed through this opening and stored to be taken to market. The Flood kiln was rediscovered in the 1970s and eventually restored to prevent further deterioration in 1999. Today it has several information boards around the site to educate those who come to explore.

The view from the top of the kiln looking down inside.

The trail continues past the kiln and leads to an area that is largely devoid of trees. This is the result of a forest fire that spread through the area on July 12, 2012. Forest fires in the greenbelt are dealt with quickly because of the homes and schools that are adjacent to the area. Ottawa Fire Services sent 55 fire fighters, 15 vehicles and several helicopters to try to get the fire under control. It took two weeks to get it extinguished and one of the tools that they used was known as a firebreak. This is a wide stretch cut through the forest that the fire can’t cross because it has no fuel. This limits the spread of the fire. Portions of this firebreak have been converted into the trail system that people enjoy today.

This trail system is very well marked with coloured blazes on the trees along the way. There’s also a series of waypoints that are marked with metal signs pointing out the various trail options. There’s also a map on each post. The waypoint below is at the kiln site.

I saw a couple of chipmunks and several birds but not a lot of other wildlife, unless you consider deer flies and mosquitoes to be wildlife. In which case there was more than enough. On reading the reviews for the trail two comments kept coming up. “There’s a lot of bugs and the trail is very muddy”. I didn’t find the bugs to be too bad and never had to stop to apply bug spray. The trails are quite well maintained and there isn’t any mud on the main trails in spite of the heavy rain the night before. If you find muddy trails it’s a sign that you are no longer on a main trail. The secondary trails are sometimes muddy but also not marked with trail markers or waypoints.

This trail has a small but free parking lot at the trailhead. There are plenty of little parking lots at each access point to the extensive trail system around Ottawa.

Related stories featuring kilns: Limehouse, Balls Falls, Kelso’s Kilns, Devils Pulpit.

Google Maps Link: Lime Kiln Trail

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Watson’s Mill – Manotick

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October 30, 2022

My job as self-employed inspector under contract to various government inspection agencies gives me the opportunity to travel all over the province of Ontario. This past week, I spent 3 days working in the Ottawa area. During my travels I drove past the Watson Mill in Manotick and stopped to check it out. This mill continues to operate at select times and can be seen grinding grain which it sells as flour, along with baked bread. It wasn’t open when I was there, but you can take a virtual tour of the inside by clicking here.

Following the War of 1812 there was a general fear that the Americans would invade Canada again and so plans were put in place to create an inland military transportation route to supplement the St. Lawrence River. The construction of the canal brought many labourers and stone masons into the area and for the next few years most immigrants also came to the area via the canal. Moss Dickinson was 10 when the canal opened in 1832 and he saw the opportunity to commercialize the river and canal system. In 1858 a wooden dam was constructed at the future mill site using wood beams that were fastened to the rock with steel pins. The original dam can be seen in the archive image below.

In the late 1850s, Moss K. Dickinson and Joseph M. Currier owned a sawmill on the Rideau River, and they contracted Thomas Langell of Ottawa to build a grist mill to add to their growing industrial operations. It opened in 1860 with four runs of grinding stones which were powered by turbines that had been manufactured in Ottawa. In 1862 they added a woolen mill to the complex and the need for labour drew people to the area and the town of Manotick began to grow around the mills. In 1863 Dickinson bought out his partner and the mills remained in the family until 1929, operating under the name of The Long Island Mill. The Rideau Valley Conservation Authority purchased the mill in 1972 and restored it along with the Dickinson house and drive shed.

The construction of a sawmill, grist mill and carding or woolen mill provided the locals with the three basic necessities of life without the manual labour that had previously been required. The sawmill provided cut lumber for the construction of shelter, the grist mill provided flour for food and the woolen mill provided clothing. Alexander Spratt owned the mills after the Dickinson family and his family operated them until after the Second World War. Harry Watson bought the mill in 1946 and promptly changed the name to Watson’s Mill. He rebuilt the dam out of concrete in 1956 and today you can walk across the top of the mill to Long Island. A crane on wheels and rails was installed to raise and lower the stop logs that control the water level behind the dam.

Milling operations would cease in 1963 but the mill and dam remained as the most recognizable feature in the town of Manotick. From the middle of the dam the view upstream shows the slow-moving water behind the dam. Most of the fall colours had disappeared from the Ottawa region by this late in October but the scenery was still very beautiful.

In 1963 the National Capital Commission entered into an agreement with Watson to restore the mill and keep it as a functioning water-powered grist mill. In 1972 Watson sold his interests in the mill to the Rideau Valley Conservation Authority on condition that the mill remain known as Watson’s Mill. They completed the restoration and opened the mill as a tourist attraction in 1974.

Looking downstream you can see the cut-stone foundations from an earlier bridge across the Rideau River.

The view from the river side of the mill shows the Georgian symmetry of its three floor, five-bay construction.

Watson’s Mill in Manotick is one of only a few water-powered mills that still produce flour in all of Ontario and it is worth stopping for a visit if you are in the Ottawa area.

Google maps link: Watson’s Mill Manotick

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