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The Conrad Misener House at Westfield Heritage Village is an important artefact that represents of the migration of a family to Canada, and has been adopted by a community that recognizes the value of preserving our heritage. The Misener family, after a tortuous journey through three wars, Germany, Holland, the United States and Upper Canada, they finally came to rest in Troy Ontario. What they found here in Beverly Township was peace and prosperity. Their family grew and grew and spread across Canada and down into the United States. In 1904 they began a tradition of a summer time family reunion, and though the location has changed, the reunion has continued uninterrupted to this day. In August 2012 the 108th Misener Family Reunion will be held in Welland County.
The house itself is a simple, humble, post and beam building from 1832. It was made with local lumber sawn in the Misener’s own mill on Fairchild’s Creek. It was inhabited for more than a hundred years by three generations of the family before it began to fall into ruin. Myrtle Scroggie, Arthur Misener’s daughter, donated the house to Westfield, the nascent living history museum, just then being opened seven kilometres away. Westfield’s founders restored the house as best they could and it proudly represented the rural heritage of southern Ontario for a generation.
In the 1980s the recession and high interest rates put the Region of Hamilton Wentworth – the new owner – in a financial bind. They temporarily closed Westfield at precisely the time that the house needed a second wave maintenance. Five years of relative neglect saw the house begin to fail and fall to ruin a second time. Volunteers who had worked at Westfield were quite distressed and lobbied for the reopening of the Village. They succeeded in time to intervene on the Misener House’s behalf and a second restoration stabilized the house for another quarter century.
Now, as the house approaches its 180th anniversary, a third wave of renovation has replaced the foundation, squared the frame and re-clad the exterior with custom-cut siding that reproduces the original material. Rock-solid and weather tight, the Conrad Misener House is once again ready to educate and entertain the people of the Hamilton region with stories of their own past. A real debt of gratitude is owed to the many volunteers, Misener family members and community leaders who gave of their time and finances to keep the old house alive.
