Strathroy was first colonized in 1832 by
John Stewart Buchanan, accompanied by the explorer Sir Michael Jacques, at a location on the
Sydenham River with flow and fall sufficient to power a
gristmill. A general store opened in the settlement in 1840. Strathroy was incorporated as a village in 1860 and became a town in 1872 under the motto "We Advance". Buchanan named the settlement after his hometown of Strathroy in Ireland, now a suburb of
Omagh in
County Tyrone,
Northern Ireland. In 1866,
The Age newspaper was established to compete with the already-established
Western Dispatch newspaper. The
Western Dispatch was purchased by
The Age in 1923, which later became
The Age Dispatch. The newspaper is still published weekly. From 1867 to 1945 the
Mount Elgin Indian Residential School operated in Muncey. Sir
Arthur Currie, who would later become the commander of Canadian forces in Europe during World War I, was born here on December 5, 1875. In the fall of 1876,
Bixel Brewery opened in Strathroy, producing lager beer for a century before its closing. Other breweries in the town have included the "Western Steam Brewery", "Strathroy Brewing and Malting" and "West End Brewery". In 1896, the Strathroy Furniture Company opened its doors, and was renowned for nearly a century for making residential furniture. On July 15, 1992, the company declared bankruptcy and a liquidation sale was held in October 1992. On February 14, 1914, the first patients were admitted to what would become
Strathroy Middlesex General Hospital. At the time, the hospital was municipally owned. The current building opened on June 23, 1962, as a two-story structure with 82 beds. The hospital was the location at which
Native Canadian Dudley George succumbed to the gunshot wound he suffered at the
Ipperwash Standoff at nearby
Ipperwash Provincial Park on September 7, 1995. On January 13, 1954,
West Middlesex Memorial Arena opened in Strathroy. To commemorate the occasion, the
NHL's
Montreal Canadiens played an exhibition game at the arena, defeating the local
Junior 'B' team the
Strathroy Rockets 14–3 in front of 3,100 spectators. In 2001, Strathroy merged with the former Township of Caradoc, creating the town of Strathroy-Caradoc. On March 22, 2004, the town's 117-year-old train station was destroyed by a fire that took more than 35 firefighters to get under control. Adolescent boys were charged with starting the fire. In 2005, Strathroy was connected to the
Lake Huron Water Pipeline. This ended the town's existing reliance on groundwater and wells. On August 10, 2016, an
Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant supporter from Strathroy, Aaron Driver, was killed in a taxi outside his home, after being shot by
Royal Canadian Mounted Police and detonating one of two homemade bombs. The taxi driver was injured. Police suspected he intended to commit a suicide bombing in another public place. ==Demographics==