We have historic walks during the summer months. May 1st  to October 31st, weather permitting. $10 fee for a family of four for a half hour walk around the downtown core.

Lakefield Heritage Research was formed to bring to residents and visitors the rich heritage of the Village of Lakefield Ontario. Lakefield Heritage Research firmly believes that history is just simply a date in time…while heritage tries to explain why that point in time occurred. Further, we believe that history is a point in time, but, heritage is the quilt of time. Thus we have formed to provide the history and the rich heritage of the buildings in the downtown core of the Village of Lakefield Ontario, by walking tours that are basically year round, and endeavor to accommodate bus tours as well…most of which come in the summer. Nevertheless, if you have a bus tour after our Canadian Thanksgiving and by the May 24th weekend we will endeavor to take you around the village. We have two walking tours. The one covers the downtown core. It explains where the industry was in the village along the river's edge (no building exists from that era), the powerhouse in the river, the origin and story behind the cenotaph. We will explain to you the problems that developed during the construction of the "Memorial Hall" (the current municipal building) and tell you about the buildings that line the north side of Bridge Street from the river to the old Post Office building (now a "store-front office" for the Peterborough-Lakefield Police). In the tour that continues north on Queen Street, we will highlight some of the history and heritage of the stores that line Queen Street, including the two identical stores that are called the "book-end stores". The tour will take you past several of the oldest structures still standing in Lakefield that date back to about 1860. Then there is "Christ Church" with its fabled history, and the churchyard (cemetery) where Samuel Strickland and his three wives are buried. We will take you past famed Canadian writer Margaret Laurence's home that she had while she was here with Trent University. The walk will then take you down to Lakefield Baptist Church which has as part of its structure the oldest known combination schoolhouse-chapel in southern Ontario that still exists as part of a church and has not gone into a residence. Tour ends at the Village I.G.A. where you will be told of the lumber industry that once stood in this general area. This tour takes about a half to one hour in duration walking. An extended tour is available upon request. This will require a car, for there are heritage areas in Lakefield that are as equally important in the village's heritage, but, are longer in distance for a comfortable walk. Included in the longer walk are: Catharine Parr Traill's house, Roland Strickland's house at the top of the village, the Lakefield College School also at the top of the village, the "Hillside Cemetery" where many of the pioneer families are buried and other historical homes on the lane that goes into the cemetery, and finally, if not least, the Lakefield Portland Cement Co. buildings that are still standing.

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