Creemore Springs Brewery

In 1845, Irish entrepreneur Edward Webster founded this small village and named it Croí Mór – Irish for “big heart.” True to form, he named every street after someone in his family: Elizabeth for his wife and daughter, Francis and Wellington for his sons, and Alice and William for his parents.

More than a century later, another outsized personality arrived.

John Wiggins was born in Vancouver in 1931 and, according to his memoir, once came face-to-face with a man-eating tiger during a cross-country move in the Depression – pulled toward its cage, an encounter that left him scarred for life. He later built a successful advertising career in Toronto, designing logos for Canadian chains like Harvey’s and Dixie Lee.

But Wiggins was not the retiring type. When arthritis forced him to leave advertising, he tried watercolours and training performance horses. Neither stuck.

So at 57, he opened a brewery in a former hardware store in this tiny village Webster had founded generations earlier. Wiggins hauled in 10,000 liters of spring water from his own property for every batch. The gamble worked. Molson bought the brewery in 2005 for around $25 million.

The village still claims to have North America’s smallest jail – though Coboconk and Tweed dispute that title.

Wiggins, however, was harder to dispute. A man who believed any dream could come true, he was known for helping anyone with an idea and the determination to try it.