The Founding of Springfield
About 1850, some ten years after this area was settled, a school and a Methodist meeting house were erected here on the town line between the Townships of South Dorchester and Malahide. Shortly afterwards a post-office named Clunas was opened, with Archibald Clunas as postmaster. Although a village plot called Springfield was surveyed in 1857, its growth was slow until the Canada Southern Railway, completed in 1873, selected Springfield as a station site. The community quickly became the commercial centre for the surrounding fertile agricultural area and attracted a number of industries, including a flax-mill and several grist-mills. The population numbered about 800 in 1877 when Elgin County Council passed the by-law incorporating Springfield as a Village.
Plaque via Alan L. Brown's site Ontario Plaques. Full page here.