Take your pick: adrenaline packed or slow and contemplative?
Updated on Jul 14, 2023
Our cities and towns all have something unique to offer you. Whether it’s a place, a product, a landscape, an attraction or an event, you’ll always have at least five good reasons for visiting them!
By Carolyne Parent
The story of this town, among Quebec’s most beautiful, brings to mind a true Far West epic!
Flashback! We’re towards the end of the 18th century. Rich farmlands are becoming more and more scarce in New England. Farmers from these newly established United States have started to make their way north in search of land parcels to cultivate. Their quest has taken them to the territory that is now known as Stanstead. Established at the limits of the state of Vermont, here they would quietly go about their lives … if it weren’t for all the smugglers. In fact, they’d have to wait until 1821 for the first customs office to curb, somewhat, all the illicit traffic carried out by this “lawless population,” according to the town annals!
Throughout the 19th century, the village would grow and become a true hub for the transportation of goods. Notably, stagecoaches, and later the railways, linking Quebec and Montreal to Boston, would make a stop here. Inns and businesses flourished. At the same time, the mighty current of the Tomifobia River first made the wheels of saw mills and grain mills turn, and then power the area’s factories as well. It was indeed quite a prosperous period.
What a heritage … and what stories you’ll discover as you walk through the streets of this village!
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