The Exchange Location
Before work began on the lot that now houses the Exchange, an important part of the process was an archaeological survey and resource assessment to determine the material culture of the site.
Nine archaeological sites are registered within a 1km radius of the Exchange, and while it is unlikely that there are any in situ indigenous materials from pre-settlement occupation because of how heavy settler and urban activity has been here, there was a higher likelihood of Euro-Canadian materials existing under the modern asphalt and grass.
The land that the Sylvia Place lot is situated on has been part of the traditional territory of various Indigenous peoples since 9000 BCE, most recently the Haudenosaunee and Anishinaabe peoples. It is covered by the Upper Canada Treaties and is within the land protected by the Dish With One Spoon Wampum agreement. The whole area was part of the first land purchase made by the British Crown in Ontario in 1764 as part of the Treaty of Fort Niagara – this treaty granted the British control over several miles of land on either side of the Niagara River for easier movement of troops over water. The treaty was signed by Sir William Johnson and 24 Nations from the Six Nations, Wyandot, Menominee, Algonquin, Nipissing, Ojibwa, Mississaugas, and others who were part of the Seven Nations of Canada and the Western Lakes Confederacy.
The land has been occupied by European settlers for 230 years, being renamed Stamford Township by Governor Simcoe in 1792. It was part of the battle of Lundy’s Lane, which in bulk occurred on the nearby site of the Drummond Hill. Being at the time cleared farmland, troops from both the American and British sides crossed over this space at various times in retreat or attack.
The site is set along Main Street, which was historically part of Niagara Falls’ Portage Road. The Portage Road was used to transport boat-delivered goods over land through the region to circumvent the Falls. It began at Chippewa and wound through the escarpment to end at Queenston where they could be brought to Lake Ontario, or vice-versa to Lake Erie. The intersection of Lundy’s Lane and Main Street/Portage Road where the new Exchange site is located was a popular place for farmers to rest while transporting goods, and this led to a myriad of human activity growing out of the need for an official stopping-point for rest at the intersection with Lundy’s Lane, which was the central road for much of the region’s farmland. Many people with deep roots in the community have lived and worked on the lot over its settler occupation, including the Milliard, Forsyth, Buckner, Misener, and Bain families.
One of the more recent histories on the site is that of the Kick’s Hotel and the Princess Theatre, two staples of the Drummondville area in the 19th and 20th century. The Kick’s Hotel was opened by Michael (Mikel) Kick, a German immigrant to Niagara, in 1860 and continued by his family into the 1900s. Various additions to the building were added over time, and it was known to have been both one of the most attractive hotels in the area and the site of one of local daredevil Stephen Peer’s performances, where he strung a tightrope between the roofs of the Kick’s and the Prospect House on the opposite side of Main Street. However around 1920 it burnt down, and the site became a Theatre.
The Theatre changed names many times – the Webb, the Hollywood, and the Princess being the most well-known - but it remained until 1978, when it became a Serbian Cultural centre. It was demolished in 2012.