#93 DATING IN ELORA

March 16, 2025

#93 DATING IN ELORA

THE ELORA GORGE

It’s in Elora, Ontario that the Grand and Irvine Rivers meet and form a deep gorge with waterfalls, cliffs and rocky embankments. Thus, Elora’s terrain contrasts with the mainly flat terrain of Southern Ontario and has made the Gorge that town’s most definitive attribute.

The Elora Gorge has been a tourist destination since the 1870s, but it wasn’t always so beautiful. To early pioneers, trees were an obvious impediment to farming so thousands were logged and the land cleared for farming. The denuded gorge became a community dumping ground for all kinds of refuse, including animal carcasses. In 1868, the garbage in the gorge caught fire and burned for 10 days. The town’s Improvement Committee was formed to spearhead a reconstruction of the town’s natural beauty; trees were planted, a footbridge was built around the gorge, and wooden benches for resting and a water fountain complete with an iron drinking cup were added.

My Grandmother, Jean Werth (1892-1959), grew up in Elora. My Grandfather, Fred Homuth, (1889-1983) moved to Elora in 1910 as a telegraph operator and then apprenticed as a pharmacist. Grandpa kept a diary every day from 1908 to 1975. And were these diaries ever useful when I wrote his biography! While, they mainly noted the weather and that he “went to work”, they also gave hints of his social and professional life and town happenings. So when Grandpa started to date Grandma in Elora, there were often diary references about walks to The Gorge and The Rocks. Grandpa was an amateur photographer and developed his own photos, so pictures of these outings were found in his files.