Template:Wp-Ajax, Ontario-History

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Before the Second World War, the territory in which Ajax is situated was a rural part of the township of Pickering. The town did not originate as a typical rural village, but is a 20th Century planned community that was first established in 1941 when Pickering Works, a Defence Industries Limited (D.I.L.) shell plant, was constructed and a townsite grew around the plant. By 1945 the plant had filled 40 million shells and employed over 9,000 people at peak production. It had its own water and sewage treatment plants, a school population of over 600, and of railroad and of roads. The entire D.I.L. plant site included some . People came from all over Canada to work at D.I.L.

The burgeoning community received its name in honour of the first significant British naval victory of the war. From December 13 to December 19, 1939, a flotilla of British warships — HMS Ajax, and HMS Achilles — commanded by Commodore Henry Harwood — engaged and routed the powerful German pocket battleship Admiral Graf Spee at the Battle of the River Plate, near the Uruguayan port of Montevideo in South America. Ajax was chosen as the name of this war-born community.

After the war, the University of Toronto leased much of the D.I.L. plant to house the flood of newly discharged soldiers who had enrolled as engineering students. War machines were moved out and the buildings were converted to classrooms and laboratories. By 1949, the last year of the University of Toronto Ajax Division, some 7,000 engineering students had received their basic training there.

Following the departure of the University of Toronto, the town's growth was largely due to the vision of George W. Finley of Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation, and Ajax became a planned modern community using the wartime base for its post-war foundation.

From 1941 to 1950, Ajax had no local municipal government of its own. In 1950, as a result of a petition, the community became the Corporation of the Improvement District of Ajax with three trustees appointed by the Lieutenant-Governor in Council. By 1953, the desire for full and active participation by its citizens in an elected council and school board was strong. The Ajax Citizens' Association, formed by many civic-minded persons, presented a brief to the Ontario Municipal Board urging that the Improvement District of Ajax become the Corporation of the Town of Ajax. The Municipal Board approved this step, and on December 13, 1954, the people elected the first Town Council and the first Public School Board.

On June 22, 1973, the Ontario Legislature enacted Bill 162 to amalgamate the Town of Ajax and the Village of Pickering and annex certain portions of the Township of Pickering to the Town of Ajax, as part of the creation of the new Durham Region; this also included the remote lakeside Town of Pickering Beach. The Region and Town both officially came into being on January 1, 1974.