The Welland River (originally called the Chippawa Creek) is a river in the

Golden Horseshoe The Golden Horseshoe is a secondary region of Southern Ontario, Canada, which lies at the western end of Lake Ontario, with outer boundaries stretching south to Lake Erie and north to Lake Scugog, Lake Simcoe and Georgian Bay of Lake Huron. The r ...

that passes through the

Southern Ontario Southern Ontario is a primary region of the province of Ontario, Canada, the other primary region being Northern Ontario. It is the most densely populated and southernmost region in Canada. The exact northern boundary of Southern Ontario is disp ...

cities of

Welland Welland is a city in the Regional Municipality of Niagara in Southern Ontario, Canada. As of 2021, it had a population of 55,750. The city is in the centre of Niagara and located within a half-hour driving distance to Niagara Falls, Niagara-o ...

and

Niagara Falls Niagara Falls () is a group of three waterfalls at the southern end of Niagara Gorge, spanning the border between the province of Ontario in Canada and the state of New York in the United States. The largest of the three is Horseshoe Falls, ...

. It flows from its

source Source may refer to: Research * Historical document * Historical source * Source (intelligence) or sub source, typically a confidential provider of non open-source intelligence * Source (journalism), a person, publication, publishing institute o ...

just south of

Hamilton, Ontario Hamilton is a port city in the Canadian province of Ontario. Hamilton has a population of 569,353, and its census metropolitan area, which includes Burlington and Grimsby, has a population of 785,184. The city is approximately southwest of T ...

to meet the

Niagara River The Niagara River () is a river that flows north from Lake Erie to Lake Ontario. It forms part of the border between the province of Ontario in Canada (on the west) and the state of New York (state), New York in the United States (on the east) ...

History

Niagara Frontier - 1818 from a collection at Brock U

The river was originally called the Chippawa Creek since it drained into the Niagara River at Chippawa. Like many other places in Niagara, it was renamed by

John Graves Simcoe John Graves Simcoe (25 February 1752 – 26 October 1806) was a British Army general and the first lieutenant governor of Upper Canada from 1791 until 1796 in southern Ontario and the Drainage basin, watersheds of Georgian Bay and Lake Superior. ...

, the first

lieutenant governor of Upper Canada The following is a list of lieutenant governors of Ontario and the lieutenant governors of the former colony of Upper Canada. The office of Lieutenant Governor of Ontario was created in 1867, when the Province of Ontario was created upon Confed ...

in 1792. The present name was taken from the river of the same name in

Lincolnshire Lincolnshire (abbreviated Lincs.) is a county in the East Midlands of England, with a long coastline on the North Sea to the east. It borders Norfolk to the south-east, Cambridgeshire to the south, Rutland to the south-west, Leicestershire ...

, Eastern

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

. The Welland River is occasionally referred to as Chippawa Creek, especially by those in the Chippawa area itself. The

Welland Canal The Welland Canal is a ship canal in Ontario, Canada, connecting Lake Ontario and Lake Erie. It forms a key section of the St. Lawrence Seaway and Great Lakes Waterway. Traversing the Niagara Peninsula from Port Weller in St. Catharines t ...

was named after the river since it originally was planned to link

Lake Ontario Lake Ontario is one of the five Great Lakes of North America. It is bounded on the north, west, and southwest by the Canadian province of Ontario, and on the south and east by the U.S. state of New York. The Canada–United States border sp ...

to Welland River. The city of

was later named after both waterways which crossed in the city.

O'Reilly's Bridge

The oldest structure spanning the Welland River was O'Reilly's Bridge, which was built in and crossed the river between the townships of Pelham and Wainfleet. The settler, Patrick O'Reilly, son of Sgt. John Reilly, of

Stamford Township Stamford Township is a former incorporated and now geographic township in Upper Canada, later Ontario, on the Niagara Peninsula. It was originally designated Township #2 in the Home District of the Quebec Colony in Canada. Following the creat ...

(present-day

), settled in Wainfleet in 1806. After meeting Sarah, the daughter of John Brown of Pelham Township, Patrick O'Reilly felled a couple of very tall trees across the River to shorten his journey to see her. A better bridge was built after they married and Patrick realized Sarah was frightened of walking along the logs. John Brown O'Reilly was their son who acted as Clerk of Wainfleet Township for many years. Over the years O'Reilly's Bridge saw many upgrades and improvements until it finally became the responsibility of the municipality. That is about the time O'Reilly's Bridge became a single-lane iron truss bridge, the only of its kind on the entire river, and one of the oldest iron truss bridges in Southern Ontario. O'Reilly's Bridge was demolished in and was replaced with a more modern, wider span.

Geography

The river flows under two

navigable aqueduct Navigable aqueducts (sometimes called water bridges) are bridge structures that carry navigable waterway canals over other rivers, valleys, railways or roads. They are primarily distinguished by their size, carrying a larger cross-section of wa ...

s: the

Welland Recreational Waterway The Welland Recreational Waterway is a water channel in the city of Welland, Ontario, Canada. It is an old alignment of the Welland Ship Canal that was abandoned after the construction of the Welland By-Pass in the 1970s. The Waterway is now man ...

and the new alignment of the Welland Canal. An important tributary of the river is

Coyle Creek Coyle Creek is a small creek in the municipalities of Welland, Pelham, and West Lincoln in Ontario, Canada, that forms an important component of the Welland River watershed. The last section of the creek constitutes an oasis of wild habitat in ...

, a picturesque and thickly forested creek that flows into the river on the north bank. A stream of the river branches off shortly before its

mouth In animal anatomy, the mouth, also known as the oral cavity, or in Latin cavum oris, is the opening through which many animals take in food and issue vocal sounds. It is also the cavity lying at the upper end of the alimentary canal, bounded on ...

. This canal quickly turns an open-cut

hydropower Hydropower (from el, ὕδωρ, "water"), also known as water power, is the use of falling or fast-running water to Electricity generation, produce electricity or to power machines. This is achieved by energy transformation, converting the Pot ...

channel through the city of

on its way to the

Sir Adam Beck Hydroelectric Generating Stations Sir Adam Beck Hydroelectric Generating Stations are two hydroelectric generating stations in Niagara Falls, Ontario, Canada. Sir Adam Beck Generating Station I, Sir Adam Beck Generating Station II and the Sir Adam Beck Pump Generating Station are ...

Queenston Queenston is a compact rural community and unincorporated place north of Niagara Falls in the Town of Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario, Canada. It is bordered by Highway 405 to the south and the Niagara River to the east; its location at the eponymo ...

. It drains an area of . The

International Control Dam The International Control Dam, also known as the International Control Structure, operated by Ontario Power Generation, is a weir that controls the water diversions from the Niagara River and dispatches the water between the New York Power Author ...

, a

weir A weir or low head dam is a barrier across the width of a river that alters the flow characteristics of water and usually results in a change in the height of the river level. Weirs are also used to control the flow of water for outlets of l ...

in the Niagara River, causes the Welland River to reverse its direction twice a day when the flow of water over the

is reduced overnight and the water heads back up the river as far back as Wellandport. When the water flow is restored, the water direction of the Welland River changes once again to flow towards the Niagara River.

References

External links

Niagara Peninsula Conservation Authority
*{{webarchive , url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161009035511/http://wellandriverkeepers.ca/ , date=9 October 2016 , title=Welland River Keepers Rivers of the Regional Municipality of Niagara Welland

History

O'Reilly's Bridge

Geography

See also

References

External links