Built Heritage Fund grants help preserve County history

Administrator | Aug 07, 2025 | Comments 0

The 2025 recipients of the Built Heritage Fund grants pictured above at the Al Purdy A-Frame building in Ameliasburgh, include Marilyn Lauer and Marilyn Kennedy (Christmas House Tour Committee), Sarah Dearing (Al Purdy A-Frame Association), Barbara Sweet and Liz Zylstra (PEC Public Library), Gabriele Cole (Baxter Arts Centre), and Gillian Armstrong (The County Foundation).

The 2025 Built Heritage Fund grant recipients gathered for a celebration photo at the Al Purdy-A-Frame this week, pleased to be assisted financially with ongoing projects.

The purpose of the grants is to offer interim funding to aid the preservation, protection, or restoration of a heritage structure within Prince Edward County deemed historically or culturally significant to the community.

The fund is supported by proceeds from the annual County Christmas House Tour, and in July, the fund also received a $1,500 donation from the Prince Edward County branch of the Architectural Conservancy of Ontario (ACO PEC).

“Four hundred people, from near and far, enjoyed the Prince Edward County Christmas House Tour,” said Peter Jepson, one of the organizers. The proceeds from ticket sales for the tour went into the Built Heritage Fund (as they do each year) and by means of the BHF grants, a little bit of County history is maintained and preserved. This year, the Al Purdy A-frame in Ameliasburgh, the Baxter Arts Centre in Bloomfield and the PEC Public Library’s Bloomfield branch. We, the organizers of the tour, thank the ticket-purchasers, the home-owners, the volunteers, the sponsors, and the County Foundation for making it happen!”

When poet Al Purdy (1918-2000) was in residence, – most summers from the late 1950s to when he died – the A-frame became a stop for many of Canada’s literary figures. Halfway between Montreal and Toronto, its callers included Margaret Laurence, Michael Ondaatje, Milton Acorn and dozens of others.

The Bloomfield Branch Library celebrates its 102nd birthday this year on land donated by Emily Fraleigh in her last will and testament. The library building was moved from 1 Stanley Street to its current space at 300 Bloomfield Main St., in 1923, opening its doors on Aug. 23, where it is believed Women’s Institute members became the librarians as they had been operating the library in the previous location purchased by the WI in the early 1920s.

Before being converted over the past decade into a creative place for the arts, the Don Baxter Memorial Building was built by J. Edwin Baxter as a cafeteria for employees of his Baxter Canning Company, across the street. It was also used as a village hall for events and became the centre of operation when the factory burned in 1964, while rebuilding was under way. It was also used as a warehouse for sale of discount cans and a bunkhouse for migrant workers. It closed in 1994 and named after his son, Don Baxter.

The Built Heritage Fund is administered by The County Foundation. Gillian Armstrong, Interim Executive Director, notes the foundation is “thrilled to celebrate the 2025 recipients of the fund, which was founded by a group of committed residents determined to explore innovative approaches to preserving heritage buildings. ”

The Built Heritage Fund was established after the Methodist Episcopal Church, a 135-year-old historical landmark on Picton’s Main Street, was suddenly demolished in 2010. A group of concerned citizens realized that without intervention many of the County’s buildings could be lost to current and to future generations.