Lambeth, Middlesex County, Ontario
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Lambeth was a population centre in Westminster Township, Middlesex County, Ontario, Canada. It held the status of Police Village (lacking corporate status as a village, but administered by a board of trustees) until an effort was made by the local Reeve, David Murray to stop annexation by the City of London which brought about the creation of the Town of Westminster in 1988, which itself ceased to exist on December 31, 1992. On January 1, 1993, the Town of Westminster, including the village of Lambeth, became part of the City of London. To this day, long time residents refuse to call their village anything but Lambeth, Ontario.
Until 1960, Lambeth was served by the Byron Telephone Company. The Byron Telephone Company had installed its first automatic dial exchange in Lambeth in the late 1950s, the OLiver 2 exchange, which replaced the manual magneto phone system that continued to operate in the Byron area until September 1963. The Byron company was sold to Bell Canada in August 1960, and Byron itself, a population centre, was annexed to London on January 1, 1961. Immediately prior to the conversion to dial, the Byron operator was reached from London telephones by dialing 471, which became the exchange prefix upon conversion to dial.
The town comes together to celebrate its agricultural past each fall. This celebration is called Harvestfest and it usually takes place the first week after Labour Day, beginning on the Thursday and running until late Sunday. It features many events such as a baseball tournament, an adult dance, teen dance, and pre-teen dance, parade, occasional rides for kids, pancake breakfast for the town, auto show and shine, as well as two beer tents in different locations featuring a live band all day and night.
