Tobermory is a small community located at the northern tip of the Bruce Peninsula, in the traditional territory of the Saugeen Ojibway Nation. Until European colonization in the mid-19th century, the Bruce Peninsula was home to the Saugeen Ojibway nations, with their earliest ancestors reaching the area as early as 7,500 years ago. It is part of the municipality of Northern Bruce Peninsula. It is northwest of Toronto. The closest city to Tobermory is Owen Sound, south of Tobermory and connected by Highway 6.
Naval surveyor Henry Bayfield originally named this Port Collins Harbour. Due to similar harbour conditions it was renamed after Tobermory (; ), the largest settlement in the Isle of Mull in the Scottish Inner Hebrides.
The community is known as the "freshwater SCUBA diving capital of the world" because of the numerous shipwrecks that lie in the surrounding waters, especially in Fathom Five National Marine Park. Tobermory and the surrounding area are popular vacation destinations. The town lies north of the Bruce Peninsula National Park.
The passenger-car ferry connects Tobermory to Manitoulin Island in Lake Huron. Tobermory is also the northern terminus of the Bruce Trail, and has twin harbours, known locally as "Big Tub" and "Little Tub". Big Tub Harbour is Canada's largest natural freshwater harbour.
Tobermory is typically a few degrees colder than Toronto. Many businesses in the town are open from May until the Thanksgiving long weekend in October, and are closed for the other seven months of the year.
Geography
The Government of Ontario has erected a plaque in Tobermory about the geography of the area. The first, at the tip of the peninsula, titled ESCARPMENT SUBMERGENCE, provides this information: "This shoreline marks the northern extremity of the Niagara Escarpment in southern Ontario. Stretching unbroken for 465 miles across southern Ontario from Niagara Falls. The escarpment was created by erosion of layered sedimentary rocks deposited in ancient seas of the Paleozoic Era over 400 million years ago. Portions of the escarpment form the islands between Tobermory and South Baymouth and the same Paleozoic rocks shape the geology of Manitoulin Island."
In 1857, A. G. Robinson, the chief engineer for Lake Huron lighthouse operations described the area as being “totally unfit for agricultural purposes." In 1869, Public Land Surveyor Charles Rankin arrived in the area to resurvey the proposed road that would run through the centre of St. Edmonds Township from the Lindsay town line to Tobermory Ontario Harbour. After six weeks of struggle to complete the task, Rankin and his crew returned to their base camp. He summarized in his report that the work had been “one of the most troublesome explorations and pieces of line running ... which I have ever met with." William Bull, a representative of the Indian Department, was sent in 1873 to explore the region to ascertain the amount of good agricultural lands and also the quality and quantity of timber resources. He reported that the town plot and some of the surrounding area was “nearly all burnt off, leaving the white rocky ridges quite bare”.
Despite such warnings, during the 1870s and 1880s the government sold tracts of land to prospective settlers under the guise of promoting them as agricultural lands. The result was chaotic. Some pioneers arrived and struggled to create farmland while others came and after battling the environment and the elements, abandoned the land. Some of these plots were taken over by others, while many tracts remained undeveloped for decades.
One major product taken from the Bruce Peninsula forests was the bark from hemlock trees. On average about 4,000 cords of hemlock were shipped to tanneries in Kitchener, Acton, Listowel and Toronto.
The first saw mill opened in Tobermory in 1881, and within 20 years most of the valuable timber was gone. Fires then charred the ravaged landscape, and by the 1920s, the region was nearly bare of forests. The decline of the industry forced settlers out and the peninsula experienced a steady population decline until the 1970s, when cottagers noticed the region and began to buy land.
Bruce Peninsula lumber is no longer a major economic force, but it provided the impetus to settle the region.
Climate
Tobermory has a humid continental climate (Koppen: Dfb) with four distinct seasons. Summers are mild to warm and winters are cold. Precipitation is well distributed year round.