Settlement of Wright's Town
Feeling the strain of overpopulation in Massachusetts, Wright first came to see the isolated and unsettled area of the Ottawa Valley in 1796, returned again in 1798, and once more in 1799. He finally decided that the best location for a new settlement would be next to the Chaudière Falls, near the intersection of the Tenàgàtino-sibi or Gatineau and Kitchi-sibi or Ottawa rivers, where he found thousands of acres of good soil and vast amounts of timber. He applied for the lands of the Township of Hull under the "leader and associates" regime and after swearing allegiance to the Crown, received the grant.
Wright used his natural leadership abilities to convince a group of Massachusetts settlers to come north with him. He sold his holdings in Woburn and led a group of 4 other families and 33 labouring men to the area, leaving on February 2, 1800, at the age of 39. With the help of a native Algonquin scout, who volunteered to help the group negotiate the treacherous voyage over ice from Kinodjiwan or Long-Sault at Carillon to the Akikodjiwan or Chaudière Falls, the group arrived on the western shore of the Gatineau River where it meets the Ottawa on March 7, 1800, and began to clear land. At first, their objective was to clear what was needed for homes and farmland for their survival. Two farms, the "Gateno Farm" (1800), as he named it, and the "Columbia Falls Farm" (1801) were the first to be cleared. Then, in 1801, at the foot of the Chaudière Falls, construction began on other enterprises. Wright preferred to call the falls the Columbia Falls, but the name never stuck. The name Columbia, however, was repeatedly used throughout the new settlement: Columbia Pond (now, Leamy Lake), the Columbia farm, the Columbia hotel, and Columbia road (now, St. Joseph blvd.).
Wright's settlement quickly became Wright's Town with the shops, mills and other enterprises that were built so that the small community would not be dependent on the expensive practice of importing goods from Montreal. Wright built a lumber mill, a hemp and grist mill and a smithy to fulfill their needs. When a fire burned down the smithy, he rebuilt it in stone, adding a trip hammer mill, four forges and four bellows operated hydraulically. He built a large bakehouse, shops for a shoemaker, a tailor, a bark grinding mill, as well as a tannery for curing leather. Always the opportunist, he also saw to it that a brewery and distillery were operating to slake the thirsts of the many employees he employed. Before long, he and his wife Abigail also saw to it that there was a teacher to teach all of the children in the community.
The process was long and difficult and by 1806 Wright had nearly exhausted his original capital of $20,000. In an effort to earn money and in order to keep his workers busy in the wintertime, he began the cutting of timber. Then, he attempted what was then thought impossible: to build a raft of timber and float it all the way to Quebec City. There, it would be sold for export to Britain. He built the first raft at the mouth of the Gatineau River. Then, on June 11, 1806, he, his 17 yr-old son Tiberius and just 3 other men (London Oxford, a free black man & friend/associate of Philemon, Martin Ebert, and John Turner) began the treacherous journey down the Grand (Ottawa) River. Despite taking two months and encountering many hurdles he reached Quebec on August 12, and sold his 700 logs and 6000 barrel staves. The timber trade on the Ottawa River had begun.
He founded several companies, among them a limestone quarry for building-stone and producing cement, The Hull Mining Company and P. Wright & Sons which, in particular, made him a great deal of money exporting timber, during the Napoleonic Wars when Britain was cut off from its traditional Baltic region suppliers.
As a pioneer and an entrepreneur, Wright had few equals. He was the point man for every builder, land speculator and government project in the region. According to John Mactaggart, the Royal Engineer in charge of the construction of the Rideau Canal and a contemporary of Philemon Wright, Wright should also be credited with having been the person who first suggested the building of the Rideau Canal, and once the canal's construction was under way, Wright secured most of the contracts for supplies, materials and craftsmen.
Despite his many achievements, he and his community faced near bankruptcy on several occasions, especially because of fluctuating tariffs in the timber industry, later on. His earliest efforts to establish his settlement almost exhausted his entire capital and then, when his town was ravaged by a disastrous fire in May 1808, the village was practically wiped out. A despondent Wright was ready to abandon the venture and possibly would have, if not for the encouragement he received from his sons Philemon Jr. and Tiberius to rebuild. They rebuilt the grist, hemp, sawmills, and a larger foundry within 6 months.
In 1819, Wright established the first passenger ship service on the Ottawa River. The first ship he used was the Packet, a four-ton vessel propelled by “sail and oars”. That same year, he and his son Philemon Jr. contracted Thomas Mears to construct a steamboat, which resulted in the Union of the Ottawa, which first set sail in 1823. The Union is described as “...measuring 125 feet on the deck, by 23 feet beam, drawing but little water, carrying 150 tons, and propelled by a 28-horsepower engine.”
Wright's son Ruggles Wright traveled to Europe to learn Scandinavian timber methods, and armed with this knowledge, returned home and constructed the first ever timber slide in Canada on the north side of the Chaudière Falls in 1829, which allowed logs to be transported over the falls without having to use the previous method of waiting for calm water, which could take weeks.
By 1820, Wright's Town was properly established. The population was 703, all either native New Englanders or first-generation Canadians. There were five mills, four stores, three schools, two hotels, two distilleries, and a brewery. For livestock, the count was 123 horses, 418 oxen, 503 cows, 505 pigs, and 558 sheep.
