The Schomberg and Aurora Railway ran for a quarter-century between Schomberg and Aurora and was nicknamed the "Annie Rooney", after a popular comic strip character of the time. 

 

The line connected Schomberg to the Metropolitan Line of the Toronto and York Radial Railway (T&YRR) tram service running along Yonge Street, and from there into Toronto. The line closed in 1927.

 

The Annie Rooney had four stations in total:  Aurora on the west side of Yonge Street north of Bond Crescent (which at the time was part of Aurora, now located in Oak Ridges);  Eversley Station on Dufferin Street;  Kettleby Station at the corner of Kettleby Road & Weston Road, and Schomberg Station in the middle of Schomberg's Main Street.  There were also four spurs, including one to Mary Lake to serve a private line to the summer estates of Henry Pellatt and the Eatons (Eaton Hall), and two smaller ones near Pottageville serving the Lloyd and Armstrong farms.

 

Portions of the former line remain visible in our community today:  The final few hundred yards of line actually became Dr. Kay Road in Schomberg, while other portions became the 19th Sideroad, Lloyd's Lane and Brule Trail in Pottageville, respectively.  

 

A home located at the corner of Dr. Kay and Main Street Schomberg was the original terminus station of the line and it is the only Annie Rooney building still left in existence today.

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A few decades prior to the railway, Schomberg was originally known as Brownsville in honour of John, Thomas, Garrett and Robert Brown, four Quaker brothers who emigrated to Canada from Pennsylvania in 1830. By 1836, Thomas had built the first mill around which the hamlet thrived and by 1885 Garrett, a keen businessman, had opened the first bank on Main Street.  John owned and farmed 300 acres of the nearby farmland.  In 1862, the village received its own post office.  There was only one problem - there already was a post office for a different village named Brownsville.  To have the post office recognized would necessitate a name change.  The name Schomberg was proposed by local Member of Parliament Thomas R. Ferguson after Frederick Schomberg, 1st Duke of Schomberg, a military general under King William III of England and a war hero who fell bravely at the Battle of the Boyne.   

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(With files from SchombergMainStreet.ca)

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