Huntingdon is a small town in

Huntingdon County Huntingdon is a market town in the Huntingdonshire district of Cambridgeshire, England. The town was given its town charter by King John in 1205. It was the county town of the historic county of Huntingdonshire. Oliver Cromwell was born there ...

in the Haut-Saint-Laurent Regional County Municipality, and the

Montérégie Montérégie () is an administrative region in the southwest part of Quebec. It includes the cities of Boucherville, Brossard, Châteauguay, Longueuil, Saint-Hyacinthe, Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Salaberry-de-Valleyfield and Vaudreuil-Dorion. ...

region of the province of

Quebec Quebec is Canada's List of Canadian provinces and territories by area, largest province by area. Located in Central Canada, the province shares borders with the provinces of Ontario to the west, Newfoundland and Labrador to the northeast, ...

, Canada. The population as of the

2021 Canadian census The 2021 Canadian census was a detailed enumeration of the Canada, Canadian population with a reference date of May 11, 2021. It follows the 2016 Canadian census, which recorded a population of 35,151,728. The overall response rate was 98%, whic ...

was 2,556. The town is southwest of

Montreal Montreal is the List of towns in Quebec, largest city in the Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Quebec, the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, second-largest in Canada, and the List of North American cit ...

, and from the border with

New York State New York, also called New York State, is a state in the northeastern United States. Bordered by New England to the east, Canada to the north, and Pennsylvania and New Jersey to the south, its territory extends into both the Atlantic Ocean and ...

History

The town was settled by British soldiers after the

War of 1812 The War of 1812 was fought by the United States and its allies against the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, United Kingdom and its allies in North America. It began when the United States United States declaration of war on the Uni ...

and the fertile land in the area led to a successful farming economy. Once the fear of attack from the Americans was gone, in the 1820s businessmen established lumber and grist mills on the banks of the

Châteauguay River The Châteauguay River (or Chateaugay River in the United States) is a tributary of the South Shore of the St. Lawrence River, flowing in: * Clinton County, New York, Clinton County and Franklin County, New York, Franklin County, in the Adironda ...

. During the first few decades of the 20th century, when transport from major urban centers to the outlying rural areas became economically feasible, the textile industry began expanding at a rapid rate in various towns throughout the province of Quebec. By the 1930s, Huntingdon was home to a small but thriving textile industry founded by Alex Fawcett & Hiram Leach as Leach Textiles. After

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

, entrepreneurs François Cleyn and Alec Tinker acquired the textile businesses in Huntingdon and built their company, Cleyn & Tinker Limited, into one of the most successful woolen mills in all of Canada. In Huntingdon, the business expanded to five interconnected operations around the town. The decades of the 1950s through to the early part of the 1970s saw the town prosper and the company acquire subsidiaries in

Sherbrooke, Quebec Sherbrooke ( , ) is a city in southern Quebec, Canada. It is at the confluence of the Saint-François and Magog rivers in the heart of the Estrie administrative region. Sherbrooke is also the name of a territory equivalent to a regional count ...

and in

Castlecomer, Kilkenny Castlecomer (,Castlecomer/Caisleán an Chomair

Greensboro, North Carolina Greensboro (; ) is a city in Guilford County, North Carolina, United States, and its county seat. At the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, its population was 299,035; it was estimated to be 307,381 in 2024. It is the List of municipalitie ...

–based International Textile Group, Inc. who have a partnership with

China Ting Group China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...

, a textile manufacturer based in

Kabul Kabul is the capital and largest city of Afghanistan. Located in the eastern half of the country, it is also a municipality, forming part of the Kabul Province. The city is divided for administration into #Districts, 22 municipal districts. A ...

, Afghanistan. On January 28, 2005, Mayor

Stéphane Gendron Stéphane Gendron (born December 22, 1967) was the mayor of Huntingdon, Quebec, Canada, from 2003 to 2013 and a radio host, a television host and a political analyst for several media outlets. Early life and education He was born in Saint-Jean- ...

announced that the town was purchasing the five textile plants that were closing with the expectation that they could be sold to new businesses. The small town had to deal with a substantial increase in teen vandalism. In August 2004 a controversial municipal bylaw went into effect that placed a 10:30 p.m. to 6:00 a.m. curfew on unsupervised children aged 15 and under. The controversial bylaw held parents responsible for their children's activities through fines if a child was caught in violation of the curfew. After parents filed a legal action to have the bylaw overturned, the Council suspended application of the bylaw.

Demographics

In the

2021 Census of Population The 2021 Canadian census was a detailed enumeration of the Canadian population with a reference date of May 11, 2021. It follows the 2016 Canadian census, which recorded a population of 35,151,728. The overall response rate was 98%, which is sli ...

conducted by

Statistics Canada Statistics Canada (StatCan; ), formed in 1971, is the agency of the Government of Canada commissioned with producing statistics to help better understand Canada, its population, resources, economy, society, and culture. It is headquartered in ...

, Huntingdon had a population of living in of its total private dwellings, a change of from its 2016 population of . With a land area of , it had a population density of in 2021.

Sport

Huntingdon was the midway point of the Boston–Montreal–Boston cycling event.

Government

Huntingdon's mayor is Andre Brunette. At the federal level, Huntingdon is part of the Salaberry—Suroît riding and is represented by Claude DeBellefeuille of the

Bloc Québécois The Bloc Québécois (, , BQ) is a centre-left politics, centre-left and list of federal political parties in Canada, federal political party in Canada devoted to Quebec nationalism, Quebecois nationalism, social democracy, and the promotion o ...

. Provincially, it is part of the electoral district of

Huntingdon Huntingdon is a market town in the Huntingdonshire district of Cambridgeshire, England. The town was given its town charter by John, King of England, King John in 1205. It was the county town of the historic county of Huntingdonshire. Oliver C ...

and is represented by Claire IsaBelle of the

Coalition Avenir Québec The Coalition Avenir Québec (, , CAQ) is a Quebec nationalism, Quebec nationalist, Autonomism in Quebec, autonomist and conservatism, conservative

. List of former mayors: * Robert Brown Somerville (1848–1852) * John Morrisson (1852–1858) * Alexander Anderson (1858–1864) * Sitt Schuyler (1864–1866) * James Fortune (1866–1870) * Daniel Shanks (1870–1872) * Alexander Cameron (1872–1887, 1895–1898) * Daniel Boyd (1887–1893) * F. H. Henderson (1893–1895) * R. N. Walsh (1898–) * Andrew Philps (1904–1910) * Robert Crawford (1910–1913) * Thomas B. Pringle (1913–1922) *

Dennis James O'Connor Dennis James O'Connor (January 27, 1880 – November 26, 1946) was a Quebec politician. An Irish Quebecer, O'Connor was born in Godmanchester, Quebec to farmer Andrew O'Connor and his wife, Mary Walsh. He studied agriculture at Macdonald C ...

(1922–1931) * Walter Brown (1931–1933) * Gilbert Daniel Faubert (1933–1943) * Stanford Mc Nair (1943–1947) * Achille Picard (1947–1949) * Léo Capiello (1949–1959, 1965–1971) * Paul Lefebvre (1959–1965) * Claude Pilon (1971–1979) * Gérald Brisebois (1979–1995) * André Brunette (1995–2003) *

(2003–2013) * André Brunette (2013–present)

Infrastructure

Transportation

The CIT du Haut-Saint-Laurent formerly provided commuter and local

bus service Public transport bus services are generally based on regular operation of transit buses along a route calling at agreed bus stops according to a published public transport timetable. History of buses Origins While there are indications o ...

, until it was cut back to Ormstown and Sainte-Martine. Current service is provided by the Haut-Saint-Laurent regional county municipality.

Media

The town is served by a fortnightly English newspaper, ''The Gleaner,'' with a French section called, ''Le Gleaner.'' It was founded in 1863 by

Robert Sellar Robert Sellar (1828 in Scotland – 1900 in Melbourne, Australia) emigrated from Scotland in 1853 and became a prominent merchant in Melbourne, Australia where he was the business partner of James McCulloch who went on to become a Premier of ...

(1841-1919) under the banner ''Canadian Gleaner'', changing its name to the ''Huntington Gleaner'' in 1912. The Huntingdon Gleaner was owned by various family businesses for most of its history. Even though it was technically a private business, local ownership conveyed the title of ‘community newspaper’ as is typical across Canada. Eventually, the Huntingdon Gleaner added a French language section in 1993 called La Source (back-to-back format) and became known as ''The Gleaner/La Source''. As consolidation in the print media began at the turn of this century, The Gleaner/La Source was sold by the local owner to what became a series of re-sales to various media chains: Les Hebdos Montérégiens in 1985, Quebecor in 2011 and finally Transcontinental in 2013. In 2015, The Gleaner/La Source ceased publication as a standalone newspaper, with The Gleaner becoming an 8-page insert in the regional free-distribution weekly Le Journal St-Francois (Valleyfield), and La Source being closed completely. In 2017, Transcontinental sold Le Journal St-Francois (including The Gleaner) to a regional media company, Gravité Média. In 2018, Gravité Média reached out to the English-speaking community in the Châteauguay Valley to see if there was any interest in acquiring the title. Rather than simply close The Gleaner, Gravité Média wanted to respect the heritage integral to the publication and provide the opportunity for the English-speaking community to continue to be served by a community newspaper. In November 2018, a public meeting was held in Ormstown, along with representatives from Gravité Média, to discuss the possibilities surrounding the community acquiring the rights to continue publishing The Gleaner. From that meeting, a “Future of the Gleaner” steering committee was formed, followed shortly by the establishment of a non-profit organization the Chateauguay Valley Community Information Services and discussions were held with Gravité Media to acquire the assets of ''The Gleaner'' (title, web domain, etc.) and a transfer agreement was signed in May 2019. In June 2019, The Gleaner was re-launched with a souvenir print version and a new website, followed by monthly editions in August, September, October and November 2019 and a fortnightly edition stating in January 2020.

References

External links

Huntingdon official websiteCommission de la toponymie du Québec. Ville de Huntingdon
{{Authority control Cities and towns in Quebec Bilingual cities and towns in Quebec Incorporated places in Le Haut-Saint-Laurent Regional County Municipality