including the motto
Vestigia nulla retrorsum Before European settlement Dresden lies within what was, in succession, the province of
Quebec (from 1763),
Upper Canada (1791), the
Canada West division of
United Canada (1841), and after
Confederation,
Ontario (1867). In the late 18th century, the future site of the community lay in
Kent County in the
Western District. The region was covered with a largely unbroken, mainly hardwood forest. Deer, bears, wolves, foxes, and wild turkeys roamed in abundance.
First Nations peoples used fire in order to make clearings for camps, improve the habitat of game animals, and prepare ground for cultivation. A network of foot and
portage trails was well established, often running parallel to or between major waterways and along lake shorelines. Forest cover is estimated to have been over 80%.
Treaties In 1790, leaders of the
Odawa,
Potawatomi, and
Chippewa First Nations, together with leaders of the
Huron Nations of Detroit, signed a treaty with the British
Crown. Known as Treaty No. 2 or the McKee Purchase, it ceded a large tract of land lying between
Lake Erie and the
Thames River, including the area currently known as
Chatham-Kent. Subsequently, Treaty No. 25, the Longwoods Treaty, was signed in 1822 between leaders of the
Chippewa First Nation and the
Crown. It confirmed provisional agreements, reached in earlier years, for the Chippewa to cede an area to the north that adjoined much of the upper boundary of the McKee Purchase. These treaty boundaries have largely not been surveyed. A map produced by Ontario's
Ministry of Indigenous Affairs shows present-day Dresden inside the area ceded by the 1790 McKee Purchase, with the northern outskirts close to the area demarcated by the 1822 Longwoods Treaty. Today's community may lie partially in both:
Camden Gore, which became part of the site of Dresden, was excluded from the scope of the 1790 treaty, while included in the 1822 one.
Settlement The first settler recorded on the present-day site of Dresden, in 1825, was Gerard Lindsley, who moved there from the
Thames River Settlement. In 1846, Daniel VanAllen, a
Chatham merchant, bought the Lindsley farm and laid out a town plot.
Underground Railroad The
Dawn Settlement was a community composed of refugees from
slavery and
freedmen and women, and an important end-point of the
Underground Railroad's overland and maritime
routes. Dawn developed around the
British-American Institute, a vocational school whose principal founder, in 1842, was
Josiah Henson. The grounds of the Settlement are now the site of the
Josiah Henson Museum of African-Canadian History (formerly ''Uncle Tom's Cabin Historic Site''). The Museum lies just outside modern Dresden's borders at the corner of Park St. and Freedom Road (formerly Uncle Tom's Road).
Growth and founding Dresden's post-office opened in 1854, and the first permanent crossing over the Sydenham, a wooden swing-bridge, was erected in 1864. its principal business was the shipping of squared-up timber,
staves, and
cordwood. Logs were also
driven or
rafted downriver to other sawmills.
Development In the 1880s, clearing the Sydenham of hardwood logs that had sunk during their
driving and
rafting, together with improvements to Dresden's
turning-basin, gave a boost to the shipbuilding industry and the shipping trade. However, railways began to out-compete the Sydenham's
schooners,
barges,
brigs and
packet freighters when a spur from the extension of the
Erie & Huron Railway from
Chatham to
Wallaceburg reached Dresden in 1883. The main sewer was laid in 1887. As the forest was
clear-cut and thinned, the 1900s saw the waning of logging and lumbering, and a move into other industries. Several involved the processing of the crops, fruit, and vegetables harvested from the farms now rapidly expanding in the region: enterprises included a
flax mill, A vegetable-canning factory was more successful: it was bought by the upcoming Canadian Canners company. A 1913
Goad fire insurance map, updated from 1889, details the physical characteristics of the town's buildings, streets and infrastructure, and notes the availability of a steam-propelled fire engine. Domestically, wood gave way to coal for cooking and heating, with coal supplanted by natural gas from the 1910s on. St. George and North Streets were paved in 1922, The 20 acre ( 8 ha)
industrial park, set up in 1964 in the southeast of the town to help diversify Dresden's economy, had a slow start; though by 1975, after an expansion and utilities upgrade in 1974, occupiers included Dresden Produce (a
turkey-meat packager), Parking
Structural Foam, Canadian Canners, and National Hardware Specialities. The latter, which had moved from
Wallaceburg to Dresden in 1951, became Canada's largest producer of zinc
die-cast pulleys, and also made
sanitary hardware and automotive castings. Employing 120 people at its peak, it closed down in 1991. made by the local chapter (formed in 1914) of
IODE. Dresden arranged "welcome home" meetings for returnees from overseas, giving each a gold ring in remembrance of their service. The returned men soon revived the original branch of the
veterans' organization the
Royal Canadian Legion, and constructed a
Legion Hall near the bridge over the Sydenham. Extensive
tile-draining of the cleared land also contributed to higher, faster river inflows. Another in 1968 was also very destructive. How to tackle the problem was debated in Dresden and other affected communities for several years, and involved discussions with the Sydenham Valley (later St. Clair Region) Conservation Authority. Options considered included eliminating the oxbow
meander, building a
dyke, and
rezoning flood-prone areas. The approach chosen, the Dresden
Floodplain Acquisition Program, is a buy-out scheme, initiated in the 1970s, that aims to reduce flood damage by restricting development in high-risk areas and flood-proofing vulnerable properties. After several years of landscaping and tree-planting by the
Conservation Authority, the first conservation area in the town, along the bank of the Sydenham, opened as a public park in 1979. A further property acquisition and parkland development program, with a 20-year time horizon, started in the early 1980s.
Trillium Trail Following the flood of 1968 and the intervention of the
Conservation Authority, community organizations (including the Horticultural Society, Rotary, and IODE) worked to enhance Dresden's amenities. The floodplain acquired additional landscaped parks, an
arboretum featuring the area's
Carolinian forest flora, and in 2003, a 5.8 km Trillium Trail with a historical walk section. The
trailhead and interpretive centre are on St. George Street, near the bridge over the Sydenham. The historical walk has plaques describing over 50 sites connected to people and industries that shaped the town. In addition, a variety of commemorative
barn quilts are displayed around Dresden, forming part of a barn quilt trail covering sites in
Oil Springs,
Tupperville,
Shetland, Croton and
Bothwell. As well as
Josiah Henson, other prominent figures linked to the
Underground Railroad once called Dresden home. Research carried out when preparing the Trillium Trail's historical walk (in conjunction with the Promised Land Project) revealed that from 1853 to 1873, large sections of the town's original site were owned by
William Whipper, a successful African-American businessman and leading member of
William Still's
Underground Railroad network. Several houses from this period survive. Various plaques around the town, installed by the
Ontario Heritage Trust, commemorate important events in the community's history. In 2022, the Trust produced a series of short documentaries about Dresden and the
Dawn Settlement.
The North Star: Finding Black Mecca, an award-winning
indie film about the history of
Chatham-Kent's Black communities, including Dresden's, was broadcast in September 2021 by
CBC/Radio-Canada.
Celebrations and commemorations The first recorded Old Boys' Reunion took place in 1902, when several hundred former residents attended, followed by ones in 1904 In 1954, Dresden celebrated and commemorated the centennial of establishing its post office; in 1982, the centennial of its incorporation as a town; in 1967, the
Confederation Centennial; Annual, three-day "Civic Fests" in the late 1970s and early 1980s raised funds for repairing and maintaining what is now the Ken Houston Memorial Agricultural Centre. In 1998, when Dresden became part of the new municipality of
Chatham-Kent, it lost its town status. In 2007, Dresden marked 125 years since it became a town. The founding of Dresden is commemorated by a plaque.
Landmarks Many of Dresden's landmark buildings are regarded as
cultural heritage assets, and are
legally protected to ensure their
conservation.
Designated properties Six have been entered in the official heritage register as designated properties, which means they can neither be altered nor demolished: • Dresden Library, housed at 187 Brown Street in an original
Carnegie library building constructed in 1913 and refurbished in 2000; • Switzer house at 220 Hughes Street, built ca. 1905; • Watson house, 480 Hughes Street, ca. 1870; • McVean house, 788 North Street, ca. 1901; • Dresden Creamery Building, 303 St. George Street, ca. 1880; • Dresden Municipal Centre, 485 St. George Street, ca. 1912.
Listed properties Another 18 buildings are registered as listed properties. The owner of such a property cannot alter or demolish it without first giving the
municipality the opportunity to designate it. Dresden's listed properties include several houses on Hughes Street and Metcalfe Avenue; St. James Presbyterian Church and Christ Church Anglican; and the entirety of the main commercial block on St. George Street.
Further landmarks Further landmarks include several churches and the North Dresden
Baptist Church; the Dresden Cenotaph, the Rotary
Bandshell in Dresden Rotary Memorial Gardens; and, just outside Dresden, the Josiah Henson House (a designated property) in the grounds of the
Josiah Henson Museum of African-Canadian History. ==Transport links==