MELANCTHON—When a tornado tore through Melancthon Township in 1985, it was a Friday.

Moments later, hundreds of people were out helping neighbours clear debris. By Sunday, one could hardly tell it had passed.

Melancthon is that kind of place.

The township north of Shelburne is rural. Scattered old buildings dot sprawling farmland cut through with county roads and rows of trees bent by the wind. It would seem a lonely place, perhaps, but for the people, the history.

Many have known one another all their lives. Everybody helped everybody out.

Families have farmed this land since before Canada was a country, holding the soil with a kind of reverence usually reserved for religious figures and sports heroes.

It changed, though, when a company with hedge fund backing started buying up farms with plans to build North America’s second-largest quarry.

The Highland Companies bought out about 30 families, on what many were later to call a false premise: creating Ontario’s largest potato farm. Later, it became clear Highland was after the limestone underneath, a much-needed material for infrastructure.

The company withdrew its application to turn 2,300 hectares of farmland into a quarry site this week. But the community victory was bittersweet. Damaged friendships may never heal; razed homesteads won’t ever come back. And many argue that unless high-level policy is changed, there’s nothing to stop it happening again.

“It’s just sad to see that something could come in and cause that much disruption in that short a time,” said Rick Wallace, a potato farmer and quarry opponent.

As old family homesteads were bulldozed, so, too, were divisions cut into this tight-knit community.

As a groundswell of opposition rose against the project, tensions grew between people who had sold their land and those who hadn’t, between those who worked for Highland and those who opposed the company.

“It just tore people apart, it tore friendships apart. People would say, ‘How can you sell what your forefathers worked for?’” said Rick Wallace, a potato farmer and quarry opponent.

“You’d see people at events who’d been together all their lives, played hockey together — they’d turn their backs on each other. Will they ever get back to shaking hands? I don’t think so.”

On Lyle Parsons’ wall are four framed photos. They show the same scene of his farm, in each season: looking down the driveway, lined by trees.

Parsons sold his farm to Highland believing it would be used for growing potatoes. Looking at those photos now makes him teary. The farm’s not there any more. It took two days for a backhoe to tear down the homestead where he was born and raised. No one expected all that history to be destroyed, he said. Parsons’ was one of about 30 places demolished.

He goes back to look at his old place sometimes, though it’s difficult.

“I miss it,” he said. “But we go on.”

Highland has maintained that it dealt honestly with farmers whose land it purchased, and that the quarry project would have benefited the community and province.

When asked whether the company had ruled out bidding for a quarry in the future, Highland’s John Scherer said: “We have made no other decisions. The only thing we’re focused on is farming.”

Dave Vander Zaag, a third-generation farmer with 800 acres of potatoes, is among many who want permanent policies put in place to protect Ontario’s agricultural lands.

Until that happens, the “door is wide open,” said Vander Zaag. Like many, he vowed to keep the pressure on.

“It’s not over. They’ll be back.”

Dale Rutledge, a fourth-generation farmer who led the quarry fight, said there were times it felt like “civil war.”

“It pitted people against people … it just escalated.”

But the battle also drew people together, he said, linking farmers with those who joined the fight — everyone from urban foodies to celebrities to cottage-country weekenders.

As for Melancthon, Rutledge hopes it can begin to heal itself.

“Hopefully now we can get back to the way it was.”

By Jessica McDiarmid

Published in "The Star", Nov. 23, 2012