Pickering Places
What is Nautical Village?
Nautical Village at Frenchman's Bay has a boardwalk, a playground, restaurants, shops and an art gallery by the water.
Source: Wikipedia, Pickering, Ontario
Durham Region trivia
Fun facts about Pickering
21 facts and quiz questions about Pickering, Ontario. Each one links to its source. A new fact of the day goes live every morning.
Fact of the day
Pickering Numbers
How much of Ontario's power came from Pickering in 2025?
As of 2025, the four units still running made about 11 percent of Ontario's power and employed 3,000 people. Ontario Power Generation is the city's largest single employer.
Pickering Quiz
How many reactors were built at the Pickering Nuclear Generating Station?
Eight CANDU reactors, which makes it one of the oldest nuclear stations in the world. The first, Pickering A, opened with four reactors in 1971.
Sources: Wikipedia, Pickering Nuclear Generating Station, Wikipedia, Pickering, Ontario
Pickering People
Which Pickering farmer was a leader in the 1837 Rebellion?
Peter Matthews, one of the most prominent people in the community, was a leader of the Mackenzie Rebellion of 1837.
Source: Wikipedia, Pickering, Ontario
Pickering Quiz
How many people lived in Pickering in the 2021 Census?
Pickering counted 99,186 people in the 2021 Census, up 8.1 percent from 2016. The city expects about 131,600 residents by 2031.
Sources: Statistics Canada, 2021 Census Profile, Pickering, Wikipedia, Pickering, Ontario
Pickering Numbers
How much of the planned Seaton community had been built by 2022?
Only 1,549 of the 20,989 homes planned for Seaton, in north Pickering, had been built by 2022. The land sat idle for years while the airport plan was uncertain.
Source: Wikipedia, Pickering, Ontario
Pickering History
Why is Squires Beach a ghost town?
The lakeside community was cleared from 1966 to make room for the Pickering Nuclear Generating Station.
Source: Wikipedia, Pickering, Ontario
Pickering Quiz
True or false: Pickering Village is in the City of Pickering.
Pickering Village, the township's old main centre, became part of the Town of Ajax in 1974. The rest of the township became Pickering, a city since 2000.
Source: Wikipedia, Pickering, Ontario
Pickering Numbers
Why did Pickering Township shrink in the late 1800s?
Demand for wheat fell, and the farming township lost more than 40 percent of its people in the second half of the 1800s.
Source: Wikipedia, Pickering, Ontario
Pickering Culture
Which TV series filmed in the hamlet of Whitevale?
Whitevale's old buildings and countryside have drawn film crews since the 1980s. Hannibal, Suits and American Gods all filmed there and elsewhere in Pickering.
Source: Wikipedia, Pickering, Ontario
Pickering Quiz
True or false: a second major Toronto airport was planned for Pickering.
Ottawa expropriated land in north Pickering in 1972 for an airport that was never built. The plan was formally cancelled in January 2025, and most of the land is going to Rouge National Urban Park.
Source: Wikipedia, Pickering, Ontario
Pickering History
Why is the hamlet of Brougham so small?
The federal government expropriated Brougham in 1972 for the planned airport. About 150 people live there now, and Highway 407 runs past it.
Source: Wikipedia, Brougham, Ontario
Pickering Quiz
When did the casino at Pickering Casino Resort open?
The casino, the first phase of the Durham Live complex, opened on July 26, 2021. Sixty percent of Pickering residents had voted for the project.
Pickering History
Where was Pickering Township's town hall before 1974?
In Claremont. Until regional government arrived in 1974, the Township of Pickering ran its municipal offices from the village in north Pickering.
Source: Wikipedia, Claremont, Ontario
Pickering Quiz
Which prime minister lived in Greenwood, in north Pickering?
John Diefenbaker lived for a number of years in Greenwood, a small community in rural north Pickering.
Source: Wikipedia, Pickering, Ontario
Pickering History
What is the Draper Site in Pickering?
It holds the remains of a large Wendat village from the 1400s. The Wendat later moved northwest to Georgian Bay, where French explorers met them in the early 1600s.
Source: Wikipedia, Pickering, Ontario
Pickering Quiz
When was the Pickering area first written about?
In 1669 French missionary François de Salignac de la Mothe-Fénelon wrote of reaching the village of Gandatsetiagon, on the shore of what is now Frenchman's Bay.
Source: Wikipedia, Pickering, Ontario
Pickering History
Who is Frenchman's Bay named after?
It is believed to be named for the missionary François de Salignac de la Mothe-Fénelon, although he likely never visited the bay itself. A canal was cut through its sandbar in 1843.
Source: Wikipedia, Frenchman's Bay
Pickering History
What was stored on Frenchman's Bay in the early 1900s?
Ice. From 1914 to the 1930s the Lake Simcoe Ice company ran icehouses on the bay. Earlier, in 1837, the Tripp family opened a sawmill there.
Source: Wikipedia, Frenchman's Bay
Pickering History
How did Kingston Road begin?
It started as a local trail and was turned into a road in 1799, which brought more settlers. Quakers led by Timothy Rogers arrived in 1807.
Source: Wikipedia, Pickering, Ontario
Pickering Quiz
Where does the name Pickering come from?
The township was first called Edinburgh. In 1792 it was renamed after the town of Pickering in North Yorkshire, England.
Source: Wikipedia, Pickering, Ontario