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Cottam is a small unincorporated community within the town of Kingsville, Ontario in Canada. The community's population is around 300, and has a branch of the Essex County Library and a United Church[1].
Neighborhoods
Despite its tiny size, Cottam has three distinct neighborhoods.
The first, is known simply as the core. It's here where the Essex County Library branch, Kingsville Fire Department (North Station), Gosfield North Communications Co-Op offices and Cottam Rotary Park are all located. The core is the hub of all activity that takes place in the hamlet. From kids sitting in trees eating mulberries to the tractor pull to games of strikeout against the municipal building to the tomfoolery of the youth, it all happens here.
The second is known as the South Side. This consists of anyone living south of County Road 34 (formerly Talbot Trail). There is but a gas station, grain elevator and a few struggling businesses on the South Side. It is also worth noting that those from the South Side actually have distinctively different accents than those from the Core and the Back of Cottam.
Lastly, there is Back of Cottam, simply referred to as BC by the locals. BC consists of Gosfield North Public Elementary School, home of the Cougars. It's also the far flung home Belleview Golf Course, and the quickest, most unpatrolled route to neighboring Essex. Many locals speed across the tar-and-chipped road known as South Talbot Road to avoid Ontario Provincial Police. Venturing West past town are more significant parts of Cottam. The Produce Stands are located just outside of the inner town on the main road. There is Murray's Market and Pretlis' Green Acre Farm. This part of town is also home to the Fillion family which has been living there many years.
Industry
Cottam's staple store Cottam Cold Storage & Meat Market has been in business for over 50 years with the same family at the helm for all of them. Generations of families have and still do rely on the consistent quality that the "Cold Storage" continues to serve up. Known far and wide, drawing regular customers from as far as Toronto and Northern Michigan.
Cottam youth, for years, relied heavily on Funk Seeds, an expansive corn grow op[Clarification needed] that had fields all across Essex County. Funk's employed hundreds - almost thousands - of youth during the summer months, paying them seasonal farm wage, which is far below minimum wage, to de-tassel their crop of corn.
Cottam also has very popular youth leagues for soccer and baseball.
History
A previously long-standing joke among the locals revolves around how the tiny hamlet got its name.
A favourite told to visitors during the annual Rotary Horse Show and Tractor Pull, held in July each humid summer, is told as follows: When early settlers moved east and inland from Windsor, they came across farmland and bush inhabited by native Canadians. A settler asked one friendly Indian "What do you call this village of yours." Just then, a cotton-tail rabbit, extremely common in the countryside, ran by and the native reached down with his quick and skilled hand, grabbing the rabbit by his hind legs. He held the rabbit up to the settler and said, in slow broken English, "Caught him!"
This joke is no longer considered humorous amongst those in Cottam, especially those in the South, and as a result of this, is rarely told.
See also
Coordinates: 42°07'59?N 82°45'00?W? / ?42.133, -82.75
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