It is the seat of Wellington County , but is politically independent of it. Guelph began as a settlement in the s, established by John Galt , who was in Upper Canada as the first superintendent of the Canada Company. He based the headquarters, and his home, in the community.
For many years, Guelph ranked at or near the bottom of Canada's crime severity list. The national rate at the time was 5. First Nations peoples inhabited present-day Guelph as early as 11, years ago. According to the University of Guelph , "the area was home to a First Nations community called the Attawandaron who lived in longhouses surrounded by fields of corn".
Galt was a popular Scottish poet and novelist who also designed the town to attract settlers and farmers to the surrounding countryside. The founding was symbolized by the felling of a tree by Galt and William "Tiger" Dunlop , who would be significant in the history of Goderich, Ontario , on April 23, George's Day , the feast day of the patron saint of England.
It is a reference to the House of Welf , and was chosen to honour King George IV βthe reigning British monarch at the time of the city's foundingβwhose family, the Hanoverians , descended from the Welfs.
Galt constructed what was one of the first buildings in the community to house early settlers and the Canada Company office; "The Priory" built β By the fall of , 70 houses had been built, though some were primitive. In , there were nine breweries serving the people living in Guelph.
