Norwich Ontario in Colour Photos

The Township of Norwich is a located in Oxford County in southwestern Ontario. Oxford County Road 59 is the major north-south highway through much of the township. The local economy is largely agricultural, based on corn, soybean, and wheat production with dairy farming in the north part of the township and tobacco, vegetable, and ginseng farming to the south. Slowly, ginseng and traditional cash crops are replacing the former cash crop - tobacco, as demand shrinks. In 1799, the Township of Norwich was laid out by surveyor William Hambly into lines and concessions and 200-acre lots. The Bostwicks, Ingersolls and Canfields were New England families who had made their start in the New World in the 1600s, and frontier living had been second nature to them for generations. Settlement in the former Norwich Township came more than fifteen years after Oxford Township. The Norwich settlement was founded by two men: Peter Lossing and Peter De Long. Peter Lossing's house was the first one in Norwich. In 1809, Peter Lossing, a member of the Society of Friends from Dutchess County New York, visited Norwich Township. In June 1910, with his brother-in-law Peter de Long, purchased 15,000 acres of land in this area. That fall Lossing brought his family to Upper Canada. The de Long family and nine others soon joined them. By 1820 an additional group of about fifty had settled here. These resourceful pioneers founded one of the most successful Quaker communities in Upper Canada. The township was divided into North and South Norwich Townships in 1855. In 1975, Oxford County underwent countywide municipal restructuring. The Village of Norwich and the Townships of East Oxford, North Norwich and South Norwich were amalgamated to create the Township of Norwich. Norwich includes the communities of Beaconsfield, Bond's Corners, Brown's Corners, Burgessville, Cornell, Creditville, Curries, Eastwood, Hawtrey, Hink's Corners, Holbrook, Milldale, Muir, Newark, New Durham, Norwich, Oriel, Otterville, Oxford Centre, Rock's Mills, Rosanna, Springford, Summerville, Blows, and Vandecar. On August 7, 1979, Norwich was struck by a large tornado. The storm cut a path of destruction across Norwich Township from Blows to New Durham, leaving the community of Oxford Centre in a state of total destruction. On June 2, 1998, a tornado touched down in Holbrook and then Norwich, damaging trees, farm equipment, barns, and houses.