Wolfville

Wolfville is a town of 4,200 people (2016) in the region of Annapolis Valley, Nova Scotia. It lies on the Bay of Fundy. It is home to Acadia University.

Understand
Wolfville is home to Acadia University and therefore is a "university town", which means its population changes dramatically in summer and school seasons. It also seems to attract "grass roots" kind of people.

History
From ancient times the area of Wolfville was a hunting ground for many First Nations (Aboriginal) peoples. They were attracted by the salmon in the Gaspereau River and the agate stone at Cape Blomidon, with which they could make stone tools. Many centuries before European contact, Mi'kmaq people, related to the Algonquin and Ojibwe peoples, migrated into Nova Scotia. The Mi'kmaq were seasonal hunters, using dogs and travelling on webbed snowshoes to hunt deer. They used the various semi-precious stones (including jasper, quartz, and even amethyst) from the Blomidon area to make arrowheads.

French settlement in the Wolfville area began in about 1680. The Acadians prospered as farmers by enclosing the estuarine salt marshes with dykes, and converting the reclaimed lands into fertile fields for crops and pasturage. In 1713, Acadia was ceded to the British.

Until the establishment of Halifax in 1749, the British remained at Annapolis Royal and Canso. The French-speaking Catholic population grew over the intervening years to well over 10,000 and the Minas region (Wolfville and environs) quickly became the principal settlement. Acadia was a borderland region between two empires, and this caused a complex socio-political environment to develop for the Acadians. The British and the French coaxed and threatened the Acadians in attempts to secure their loyalty. This led many Acadians to attempt to maintain a neutral path; while others openly supported either the French or the British.

In 1755, the British deported approximately 2,000 Acadians from the area around Wolfville, and tens of thousands of others Acadians from the broader region. The villages lying beyond Grand-Pré were burned by the British forces, and still more buildings were destroyed by both sides during the guerilla war that took place until 1758. Around 1760, the British government in Nova Scotia made several township plots of land available in the Annapolis Valley for colonization by English settlers. Because of pressure on agricultural lands in New England, Anglophone farmers moved north in search of fertile land at a reasonable price. Between 1760 and 1789, more than 8,000 people known as New England Planters emigrated to the land around the Annapolis Valley.

The New England Planters set up a primarily agricultural economy, exporting cattle, potatoes, and grain, and later apples, as well as developing lumbering and shipbuilding. They settled and re-used the same dyke-lands as the Acadians had used before them, repairing and later expanding the agricultural dykes. They developed a major expansion in 1808, the three-mile-long Wickwire Dyke, which connected the Wolfville and Grand Pre dykes. This allowed the agricultural development of an additional 8,000 acres. The settlement became known as Mud Creek. In 1830, the town changed its name to Wolfville, in honour of Elisha DeWolf, the town's postmaster at the time.

The Windsor and Annapolis Railway arrived in 1868. Wolfville became a seaport devoted principally to the export of apples from the orchards of the fertile Annapolis Valley.

By car
Wolfville is an hour away from Halifax taking Highway 101 West and can be reached through exit 10 or 11.

By plane
The nearest, and most used, airport near Wolfville is Halifax International Airport in Halifax.

Get around


Most attractions in Wolfville lie on its Main Street which can be accessed most comfortably by walking along its sidewalks.

Kings Transit serves large portions of Annapolis Valley. Fares (2019): adult $4, student/senior $2.25, children 5-11 $2.25, children under 5 free. From Wolfville, there are buses to Greenwood and Kentville every hour M-F, every 2 hours on Saturday, and never, never on a Sunday.

Buy
Wolfville has a whole host of small shops along its Main Street; including gift shops, hiking apparel shops, clothing stores, movie stores, and book stores. For general needs, Wolfville has a Shopper's Drugmart and a Pharmasave along its Main Street.

Stay safe
The town's council has declared Wolfville to be a nuclear-free zone, so at least you're safe from nuclear attack as long as the council's resolution is respected by the nuclear powers.

Go next

 * Kentville
 * Windsor
 * Port Williams