Writer: Andrew Hind
Bala is known as the Cranberry Capital of Ontario. The small Muskoka village is home to Ontario’s only commercial cranberry farm, Muskoka Lake Farm and Winery, and welcomes tens of thousands every year during its signature Cranberry Festival.
Had fate been kinder, MacTier might today boast this title. Indeed, the story of Bala’s current love affair with cranberries begins in MacTier and a little-remembered visionary named George Mollard.
In 1933, former gasoline salesman George Mollard launched a business gathering Osmunda fiber moss, or orchid peat, from wetlands across Muskoka to sell to florists. The business took off, with product being shipped across Ontario and into the United States.
In the process of collecting moss, Mollard would often come across wild cranberry patches. This discovery turned his fertile mind in another direction. Why not harvest and market wild cranberries, as well? He was excited about the prospects and got as far as exploring markets when his First Nation pickers informed him that there would be no cranberries that year. Mollard wasn’t easily deterred. He decided to grow the berries himself.
In 1936 Mollard bought 127 acres in MacTier but World War Two erupted in 1939 and he was called away for military service before his plan could proceed.
The years did nothing to dim Mollard’s enthusiasm for growing cranberries. He began by visiting growers in Massachusetts and Wisconsin to study their operations, learning a great deal from farms that had been perfecting the cultivation of cranberries for over a century.
More tangibly, Mollard cleared his marshland of trees, raised 14-foot-tall dykes between each field, dug irrigation canals, and painstakingly planted hundreds of cranberry seedlings. Most of the work had to be done by hand because tractors would sink up to their axles in the soft marsh.
Because his cranberry fields would require a ready, year-round supply of water Mollard expanded his holdings by leasing another 100 acres of land, dominated by swamp, from the Ontario Departments of Forest. Mollard dammed this swamp to form a reservoir that he could open whenever his cranberry marshes downstream needed further water.
In 1950 Mollard harvested a mere 5 bushels of berries. A year later, a more impressive 300 bushels were harvested, enough to supply local demand and provide a small profit. 1952 saw another modest increase, and by 1953 the harvest was enough to sell to shops across Muskoka and several specialty stores in Toronto under the label “Muskoka Brand Cranberries.” Mollard was on the cusp of realizing his dream. He could almost taste success.
1954 promised to be the best year yet, and the first in which he would be able to fulfill large-scale Toronto orders and make a handsome profit. But nature cruelly intervened.
On October 15 Hurricane Hazel swept through central Ontario and laid waste to Mollard’s farm. That year’s crop was destroyed and there was major damage to ditches and dykes. Now 58 years old and despondent, Mollard couldn’t bring himself to start over again. His dream of Ontario’s first commercial cranberry farm had been shattered. A dejected Mollard went into a quiet retirement.
And yet, the failure of Mollard’s farm did not truly represent the failure of his dream for a thriving cranberry farm in Muskoka. A young man named Orville Johnston had been employed on Mollard’s short-lived farm, where he soaked up Mollard’s hard-earned knowledge and expertise. Johnston became passionate about cranberries, and when he decided to try his hand at establishing his own cranberry farm in Bala Mollard generously lent him a helping hand.
The Johnston farm, seventy years on, is Muskoka Lakes Farm and Winery. Its success proved Mollard had been correct in his belief that cranberries could indeed be grown commercially in Muskoka.
You can read more about George Mollard and his efforts to cultivate cranberries in my book “Vintage Muskoka” available on Amazon.
For more on the Bala Cranberry Festival 2025, check out our story!
