The walk continues, returning up Queen Street and taking a right on Centennial Drive. The building supply store on the corner was built in 1830 by Thomas Spurr, a local merchant and the first post master. It housed the first post office when stagecoaches started to run through the Valley to Annapolis Royal. The local newspaper was located here for a few years.

 

This street, Centennial Drive, was originally known as Revere Street after the Revere House, an early Inn. The houses along the street are of more recent construction, as this area of Bridgetown was opened up somewhat later than the ones you’ve already seen. Post Office Street originally extended south across Centennial to reach the Mud House Tavern, said to have been converted from one of the original Acadian dwellings.

Continue along Centennial Drive to the stop sign and turn right, you’re now on Washington Street (named after Washington Chesley, a local merchant, rather than the American president). No. 29, on your right, is a Queen Anne style home built in 1898. It has fortunately recovered from having a large elm fall on it in the middle of the night.

The large brick house across the street on your left, No. 32, was originally built about 1881, on the site planned for the Presbyterian Manse (later located in the brick house on the river by the Masonic Lodge). It was built by John H. Fisher.

Continue up Washington Street past the Elementary School (the first school on this site was built in 1867). Remain to your left along Victoria Street. The houses across from the school were all built about the turn of the century. The occupants of No. 5 and No. 7 were partners, and once ran a barrel factory behind the houses.

Continue straight ahead past the houses and you will find yourself at the Anglican Cemetery. Many of Bridgetown's former leading citizens are buried here. Please feel free to wonder around. In the far left corner of the cemetery you will find a clutch of very early stones that predate most of the cemetery, including that of Dr. Silas Piper, Bridgetown's first doctor.

Proceed through the cemetery to Riverside Drive and turn left. Follow Riverside Drive to Rectory Street. The Riverside Drive area has recently been opened to development. Formerly it was the site of cider, vinegar and bottling works, particularly the Annapolis Valley Cider Company (later sold to M. W. Graves and Company).

Continue across Rectory Street along Riverside Drive to Riverside Cemetery. Riverside Cemetery is the other Protestant Cemetery in Bridgetown. It started as a burying plot back on the corner of the Chipman Farm adjoining a similar family plot to the rear of the Frances Gidney Crosskill (second wife of Captain John Crosskill, the town's founder) farm. Here we can find tombstones for Crosskills, Richard and Angie James, Joshua de St. Croix and many other notables from the Town's past. After William Chipman stopped selling gravesites himself, he sold the whole cemetery to the Bridgetown Baptist and Wesleyan Cemetery, which eventually became the non-sectarian Riverside Cemetery Company. The Cemetery has acquired substantial additional lands over the years. Please wander around. When you’re ready, exit the cemetery to your left through the gates.

As you leave the cemetery, you will be on a street known as either Chipman Avenue or Cemetery Lane, since (like most of the cemetery) it was originally part of the William Chipman Farm. The houses are newer in this area.

Continue along Chipman Avenue and cross Centennial Drive (named for Canada's centenary in 1967). You can see the wider street representing more modern traffic flows than the streets laid out in 1821.

 

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