The area was originally settled by Acadians who were expelled in 1755 during the Acadian Expulsion. After the Acadians, Canning - first called Apple Tree Landing and later Habitant Corner - was settled in 1760 by New England Planters and by the Dutch following World War II. The present name was adopted in honour of British prime minister George Canning.[2]
Canning was also the home of country singer Wilf Carter. He was made an honorary citizen of Canning, Nova Scotia in 1978. Carter was born in Port Hilford, Nova Scotia, but spend a great deal of his childhood working in and visiting the village and its surrounding farmland.
The village is home to Glooscap Elementary School, with a student population of over 200, and Northeast Kings Education Centre (NKEC), a middle school/high school with a student population of around 1000 students and 80 staff. NKEC is the first AP Capstone designated school in Nova Scotia and the first in the world to offer the virtual AP Capstone Program.
The Canning Lighthouse was built in 1904 to serve the port at Borden's Wharf.[5] It was restored in the 1990s, after more than 50 years of disuse and abandonment, and was used by the village as a tourist information centre.[5] It was moved in 2003 to a new waterfront site on the Habitant River behind the village's small museum, where its top section was rebuilt by NKEC students.[5] Canning is on the rise but is facing gentrification of the once affordable village.
Demographics
In the 2021 Census of Population conducted by Statistics Canada, Canning had a population of 716 living in 311 of its 327 total private dwellings, a change of -2.1% from its 2016 population of 731. With a land area of 1.86 km2 (0.72 sq mi), it had a population density of 384.9/km2 (997.0/sq mi) in 2021.[6]
