Jason Chanyi

When we sat down to establish a name for our business, we thought about what was important to us; the common background we held; the enterprise and the perseverance in our families' history. Both of the McConnell and Hodgins families were part of a wave of Scotch and Irish settlers to arrive in Canada during the past 200 years.The McConnells were one of the original five families to settle the Ottawa valley in March 1800, establishing their farms in the Deschenes district of Lower Canada in what is now Aylmer, Quebec. The English translation for Deschenes is 'of the oaks'.Mapledene is the name of the Hodgins family farm in Lucan, Ontario and it has been in the same family since the land was purchased in 1835. It is one of the oldest century farms in Ontario in the same family and it still exists today as a working farm. The Old English translation for Mapledene is 'valley of the maples'.