Travel Brantford: The Bodega
Inn, the Bell Homestead and the Mohawk Chapel
My second day in Brantford, was an absolutely action-packed
day. I got going early at about 8 am when I headed
downstairs and requested Jennifer, the manager at
The Bodega Inn, to give me a tour of this unique
boutique hotel. Before we started the tour of the
hotel, Jennifer took me right outside to Harmony
Square, Brantford’s favourite gathering spot.
All sorts of events and programs happen here: during
the winter there is free family skating while the
summer months offer lots of diverse entertainment:
the Brantford Jazz Festival, Yoga in the Square,
Chess in the Square as well as Movies in the Square
where the locals can gather to watch free movies
outdoors under the stars. There is always something
happening on Harmony Square.
Brantford's Harmony Square, just after the rain
stopped
Across the street from The Bodega Inn is the historic
Sanderson Centre for the Performing Arts, Brantford’s
beautifully restored 1125 seat heritage theatre.
The Brantford Arts Block, a community arts centre
housed in the historic Victorian-era Temple Building
is next door to the theatre, followed by the Beaux-Arts
style sandstone Federal Building. The Bodega Inn
is embedded right in the middle of these outstanding
heritage buildings. On the main floor of the hotel
is a stylish Coffee Culture café that also
serves as the breakfast venue for the hotel guests.
Downtown Brantford, with the Bodega Inn on the left
Jennifer then took me into the lobby of the hotel
where I studied a photo book that talked about the
history of this area. A historic inn from the late
1800s had been located here, but it burnt down in
1962 and had to be demolished. The current building
is about two years old, but the architectural style
was inspired by the Victorian area.
The cool lobby of the Bodega Inn
Today’s Bodega Inn features eighteen very
large hotel rooms, all equipped with a full kitchen
and dining area. Eleven long-stay apartments are
available as well. Every hotel room has a unique
décor: all rooms on the second floor of the
hotel are decorated in an African theme, the third
floor rooms are Asian inspired, while the fourth
floor features a series of European-inspired rooms.
The mural of the Tower Bridge in the British Room
Leaving the lobby behind, we took the elevator
to see some of the hotel rooms. Jennifer showed
me two rooms on the hotel’s European-themed
third floor: the British Room and the Italian Room.
The highlight of the British Room was a giant mural
of the Tower Bridge in London. Other European inspired
rooms are titled Germany, France, Italy, Greece
and Spain. Like all the other rooms at the Bodega
Inn, every single room is unique.
The huge colourful mural in the conference room
of the Bodega Inn
Our next stop was a large meeting room that was
flooded with natural daylight and enhanced by colourful
murals that cover two large walls and depict the
heritage buildings of Brantford. The view over Harmony
Square from the meeting room’s four large
windows is spectacular. Finally, I also got to see
a spacious attractive room on the African-themed
second floor.
Getting ready for breakfast at Coffee Culture
Now it was time for breakfast and my friend and
I headed next door to the Coffee Culture café
where I enjoyed an egg and cheese bagel. Melissa,
our local tourism expert, came to pick us up right
on time at 9:30 for our whirlwind tour of some of
Brantford’s major sights. We started with
the Bell Homestead, a National Historic Site. It
is the home of Alexander Graham Bell and played
an important role in the invention of the telephone.
The Bell Homestead, one of Brantford's most important
historic sites
The Bell Homestead is located on the banks of the
Grand River in the attractive Tutela Heights neighbourhood
of Brantford. It consists of the actual home of
the Bell family who settled in this farmhouse when
they came to Canada from Scotland in 1870; they
lived here until 1881. This house provided the inspirational
background for Alexander Graham Bell’s invention
of the telephone. Next door is the Henderson Home,
the house of Reverend Thomas Henderson, a good friend
of the Bell family, which happens to be the location
of the first business office of the Bell Telephone
Company of Canada.
Living and dining room at the Bell Homestead
Our guide showed us through all the rooms and explained
important milestones in the personal history of
Alexander Graham Bell and his family. This working
10-acre farm also illustrates life in the second
half of the nineteenth century, with its finely
decorated cast-iron stoves, its surprisingly modern
looking bathroom, its authentic Victorian-era kitchen
and the associated manual washing machine and other
household equipment.
"Happy Thought" - detail of cast iron
stove at the Bell Homestead
When the Bell family moved here, they had to look
after 60 to 70 farm animals as well as a garden
and orchard. Various versions of Alexander Graham
Bell’s telephones are displayed in different
rooms, including a replica of the telephone that
was used for the first long-distance phone call
between Brantford and Paris, Ontario, in August
of 1876.
Some of the telephone equipment that Alexander Graham
Bell invented
The Henderson Home was Canada’s first telephone
business office. Originally located in downtown
Brantford it was moved to this location in 1969.
Various rooms document the evolution of the telephone:
an 1890 long distance telephone, a wall phone from
1907, a 1924 dial telephone, as well as transatlantic
phone cables from the early 20th century. Another
room in the Henderson Home features an 1890s telephone
exchange; visitors can also inspect a telephone
booth from the early 1900s. A payphone from 1961
moves us up in the chronological history of telephone
technology.
Replica of an 1890s telephone exchange
Circling back through the leafy environs of Tutela
Heights, with its old stately houses that front
the Grand River, we continued our drive to Her Majesty’s
Royal Chapel of the Mohawks, better known as the
Mohawk Chapel. Ontario’s oldest church played
an important role in the native history of this
area. The church was built in 1785 by the British
Crown and given to the Mohawk Indians in appreciation
of their support during the American Revolution.
Mohawk leader Joseph Brant, whose native name was
Thayendanegea, had led Mohawk and colonial Loyalists
against American revolutionaries on the New York
frontier. After the war was finished, Brant relocated
from the Mohawk Valley to establish a reserve on
the Grand River in 1784.
The Mohawk Chapel
The Mohawk Chapel is one of only two royal chapels
in Canada and was built in 1785. The original entrance
of the church faced east, towards a canoe landing
site on the Grand River, but was later relocated
to the west side of the building. The building itself
is a simple wood structure covered with white wooden
cladding. The interior of the church is covered
in pine and features eight stained glass windows
that were installed between 1959 and 1962 and depict
scenes of the Six Nation’s native history.
Tomb of Joseph Brant and his son John Brant
Audrey, the curator of the church, gave us an introduction
to Brantford’s native history and pointed
out the graves of important native personalities
such as Susan Hardy, the grand-daughter of Joseph
Brant’s sister Molly. Joseph Brant himself
and his son John are also entombed in the churchyard
of the Mohawk Chapel. Next to this tomb there is
a boulder, a memorial to native poetess Pauline
Johnson. Many of the gravestones in the cemetery
surrounding the church commemorate people who passed
away in the first half of the 19th cemetery. Audrey
explained that archeologists have been studying
the history of the cemetery.
Memorial to native poetess Pauline Johson
East of the church is a pathway to an observation
deck that overlooks the ox-bow in the Grand River,
the historic disembarking site of the native people
when they came to attend church services in their
canoes. An elevated flood control dyke now stands
where the Grand River used to flow. By 1788 there
was a Mohawk community of about 400 people, founded
by Joseph Brant, which later evolved into Brantford.
The Mohawk Chapel is the only remains of this Mohawk
village.
It was getting close to mid-day now, so we moved
on to our next destination: the Brantford Farmers’
Market whose history goes all the way back to 1848.
