Step back in time to one of the most intriguing periods in Canadian history. Niagara was a battlefield from Fort Erie to Niagara-on-the-Lake as the British attempted to maintain sovereignty from the invading American army. History lives in Niagara. Battlefields, museums, monuments and graveyards all tell the story of Niagara’s history.

Costumed interpreters at many of Niagara’s historical landmarks bring the past to life in the recounting of tales of bravery and loyalty and pioneer life. Distinctly Ontario architecture is prevalent throughout Niagara’s many small towns, many of which were founded over two hundred years ago.

In May 1535, Jacques Cartier left France to explore the New World. Although he never saw Niagara Falls, the Indians he met along the St. Lawrence River told him about it. Samuel de Champlain visited Canada in 1608. He, too, heard stories of the mighty cataract, but never visited it.

 Etienne Brule, the first European to see Lakes Ontario, Erie Huron and Superior, may also have been the first to behold the Falls, in 1615.

 That same year, the Recollet missionary explorers arrived in Ontario. They were followed a decade later by the Jesuits. It was a Jesuit father, Gabriel Lalemant, who first recorded the Iroquios name for the river- Onguiaahra, meaning "the Strait".

"Niagara" is a simplification of the original.
In 1651, during the fur- trade rivalry between the Huron and Iroquois that was first precipitated by the French, the Iroquois wiped out the Neutrals. Until the American Revolution, they managed to keep white settlers out of Niagara almost completely.

In December 1678, Recollet priest Louis Hennepin visited Niagara Falls.

Nineteen years later, he published the first engraving of the Falls in his book Nouvelle Decouverte. The Falls obviously made a great impression on Hennepin, for he estimated their height to be 183 metres, more than three times what it really is.

 In 1812, by request of President James Madison, the United States congress declared war on Canada. Artifacts from that war dot the riverside, as do monuments erected later, such as the one to Sir Isaac Brock. The skeletons of members of the U.S. Army were found near Old Fort Erie.