Introduction

Dr. William (Tiger) Dunlop, the Canada Company's warden of the woods and forests, was the man on the spot when and where Stratford was founded. A literary man, he probably had a lot to do with the naming of Stratford's streets. The first Canada Company superintendent was the Scottish novelist John Galt, whose successor was Thomas Mercer Jones. They may also have had something to do with the naming of Stratford. Both are commemorated by Stratford street names today. But no one deserves more credit for the founding of Stratford than Dr. Dunlop whose name appears on a street connecting Lorne Avenue East with Griffith Road West in the most southerly corner of the city. Not only did Tiger Dunlop blaze the trail for the Huron Road through Stratford, but he was one of the most fascinating and influential characters in the early history of the Huron Tract. While several books have been written about Dunlop, an author himself, the stories of his exploits would fill several more.

Many street names in Stratford flow from the original naming of the city. While not all of them have equal significance, many do reflect our heritage. This exploration of our street names, their origins and meanings, is by no means a definitive work, but rather a beginning towards a greater understanding and appreciation of this heritage.

Stanford H. Dingman

Stan Dingman was a member of the fourth generation of his family involved in publishing a newspaper in Stratford. The era began with William Smith Dingman buying the Stratford Herald in 1886. It ended in 1999 when Stan and his brother Charles sold the Beacon Herald to Sun Media Corp. Stan Dingman was born on May 5, 1932. He would later recall how interested in local history may have come to him naturally from his father, Charles.

 "When I was a kid and we would go for a walk, he would see a street name and he would say, 'Do you know where that name comes from? " His dad would then tell him the story behind the name. "Most people live on a street all their life and don't know how it got its name," said Stan. That revelation stayed with him for about four decades before he turned it into a major personal project. By the 1980s, he was the editor and co-publisher of the Beacon Herald. As such, it fell to him to assist with the editorial

page. He soon learned that filling that page for the Saturday edition could be a challenge. The solution he found most appealing was a series of articles dedicated to the stories behind the city's street names.

He sought the advice and enlisted the help of  Jim Anderson, the Stratford-Perth archivist, who embraced the idea. "Jim would put ideas in my head, and I would start to tell stories," said Dingman. "There were lots (of streets) to work on. There was always another one. I just went alphabetically." At the time, there were about 260 stories to tell, running from Abbey Court to Youngs Street. Today, that number is north of 300. In each story, he presented the historical significance of the name of a street, whether local, regional, national or international. Initially, the stories were not long, but they grew as Dingman and Anderson unearthed more source material. As well, longer stories could fill bigger holes on the editorial page.