Any Day Now! A Decade of Waiting for Lafarge Development to Start

It was interesting to see the Lafarge site come back into the news this month. For the most part, nothing has really been happening with it in a good long while, but even in the days before Guelph Politico I had my journalistic eye on it, and given recent developments, I thought a dip into the archives might be advised.

Celebrating Celebrations of Guelph (The Text Version)

Last week on the Guelph Politicast, I told a story of how the Royal City marked it’s 100th, 150th, and 175th anniversaries. For a half-hour podcast, it was a rather exhaustive trip down memory lane, reaching all the way back to Guelph’s founding in 1827 and coming back around to the 21st century. But if you’d rather take a more leisurely stroll through these remembrances, or maybe you just bristle at the sound of my voice, then you can now scroll freely though the text of that podcast.

How Guelph Marked 100 Years of Canada

One glance at the front page reminds you instantly of the tumultuousness of the 1960s, even if everything going on Guelph seemed as normal as it ever was. In the days before Canada's centennial,  page one of the Guelph Mercury was filled with stories of a world on the brink. From the death of screen legends, to Cold War posturing, to racial tensions in the United States, was it any wonder that the Mercury was asking if this would be the Queen's last State visit?

GUELPH POLITICAST #85 - Celebrating Celebrations of Guelph

This week's Guelph Politicast kind of shakes up the format. Typically these are interviews with people, or clips of speeches either partial or whole, but on this pod I wanted to tell you a story, and that story is a tale of Guelph as we start the countdown to the Royal City's 200th birthday in just 10 years time.

Sometimes It Floods in Guelph

"Speed River Flood Termed Worst in 20 Years." screamed the headline on the front of the Mercury on Saturday March 20, 1948. The last great flood of its kind happened in the Spring of 1929, but between the floods there was a World War and a Great Depression, so when the water under the Allan's Dam reached the six-foot level, there was definitely a sense of deja vu.

Let's Tour Doors Open Guelph!

It's time again for the annual celebration of local heritage by going behind the scenes in some of Guelph's many famous and historically relevant buildings with Doors Open Guelph. Guelph Politico is taking part by trying to see how many sites I can visit during the day with 15 different stops spread out across the City.

How the Guelph Mercury Covered Vimy Ridge

The attack began Easter Monday, April 9, 1917. By the time it was over, Canada had secured its place in history as an army, as a nation, and as a people, and we've come to understand that deeply in the last 100 years. But I wondered: how was the battle seen at the time, how was it read and understood by the people of Guelph through their daily newspaper? To the microfiche!