Robert Jackett Installed Water Service in Fenelon Falls, 1894
In the nineteenth century, most farmers relied on dug wells (which literally meant dug by hand!), while village residents often took their drinking water from the waterway. However, the waterway was also used for the disposal of human, household and industrial waste (especially from wooden manufacturing). Contaminated water led to many serious medical conditions, such as cholera and typhoid. Where spring water was available, it was much better than drinking lake water.
Fenelon Falls had the good fortune to have springs located on the hill on the north side of town. Village council spent its first 20 years debating what to do about a water system. Then, in April 1894, it approved Robert Jackett’s proposal to take water from a spring in Ann Ellis’ field at the head of Colborne Street, to feed a fountain in front of the Mansion House (Cow & Sow) at the corner of Colborne and Francis Streets. Samuel Brokenshire (a well-known Fenelon Falls pump maker) supplied tamarack logs that had been hollowed out to form pipes, and Jackett had the water supply working by July.
At the time it was built, it had been planned as a private venture. Subscribers would purchase keys to operate taps. However, this proved controversial as many village residents thought that the water system should have been free and public, and did not purchase keys. The next year, Jackett connected private properties to the water line, and even provided service south of the waterway by laying pipes on the bottom of the river.
To resolve the controversy over whether the utility should be public or private, village council gave Jackett a grant of $50 for the public use of the tap, then granted another $20 the following year. By the fall of 1898, the village was leasing the water system, and gradually the municipality took over its management. Before long, it became a service that practically everyone took for granted. In time, the tamarack logs were replaced by steel pipes, and Jackett’s system supplied the Fenelon Falls with water for nearly 70 years.
