Havelock-Belmont-Methuen is a township in central-eastern Ontario, Canada, in Peterborough County. On January 1, 1998, Belmont and Methuen Township amalgamated with the Village of Havelock to form what is now Havelock-Belmont-Methuen.
History
The region's colonial history began with an influx of settlers after Belmont and Methuen Township was surveyed in 1823. The community of Havelock was incorporated as an independent village in 1892.
thumb|left|Railway station in Havelock
Later, in the nineteenth century and continuing to the present, mining became an important economic activity. Early businesses in Havelock included a post office, bakery, and a blacksmith were located south of the current village on high ground at the intersection of County Road 30 and Old Norwood Road. In 1881, the Canadian Pacific Railway surveyed a right-of-way through the area north of Havelock and a year later laid rails and surveyed and filled the swampy land to make room for a larger village.
Havelock was an important freight depot from the 1880s to the 1960s. The railway is now run by Canadian Pacific as Kawartha Lakes Railway and its activity today consists of transporting nepheline syenite and crushed basalt rock from two mines north of Havelock operated by Unimin.
Communities
The township comprises the communities of:
- Ashby Mill
- Belmont Lake
- Blairton (ghost town)
- Blairton Station
- Blue Mountain
- Chase Corners
- Cordova Mines
- Freeman Corners
- Jack Lake
- Havelock
- Kasshabog Lake
- MacDonald Bay
- Nephton (ghost town)
- Oak Lake
- Preneveau
- Rockdale
- Round Lake
- Rush Point
- Vansickle
Havelock is the site of an annual country music festival, the Havelock Country Jamboree, in August, which celebrated its 30th anniversary in the summer of 2019.
Demographics
In the 2021 Census of Population conducted by Statistics Canada, Havelock-Belmont-Methuen 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.
|1996| 4327
|2001| 4479
|2006| 4637
|2011| 4523
|2016| 4530
|2021| 5083
Mother tongue (2021):
- Mayor: Jim Martin
- Deputy Mayor: Hart Webb
- Councillors:
- At Large: Kathy Clement
- Township Ward: Jerry Doherty
- Village Ward: Beverly Flagler
See also
- List of townships in Ontario