New Denmark is a rural community in Victoria County, New Brunswick, Canada. The community is situated in rolling hills east of the Saint John River valley several kilometres south of Drummond. Its main industry is potato farming and related industries. Once the site of several schools, they have all closed and students in New Denmark can choose to continue school in nearby Grand Falls or Tobique Valley. The community hosts Lutheran, Anglican, Roman Catholic, and Pentecostal churches. Its five major ancestries are: English (50.1%), French (36.4%), Danish (17.0%), Scottish (12.4%), Irish (11.9%). The population has remained at approximately 1,000 residents in recent history, with Denmark Parish reporting a population of 1,668 in 2006.

History

The community of Hellerup originally derived its name from Captain Sorensen S. Heller with several Danish settlers who sailed from Copenhagen to Halifax aboard the steam ship Caspian, then on to the city of Saint John aboard the Empress. Then they paddle-wheeled up the St. John River and the Salmon River to arrive at the gravel bank on the opposite, inhabitable side of Drummond. This concurred with the redrafting of the Free Grants Act and redistribution of land parcels away from the original agreement set in the 1872 Stymest Heller proposal. Eventually this settlement formed the largest and what would become the oldest Danish community in Canada, but in recent decades the Danish influence has diminished due to anglicization. In 1912, the National Transcontinental Railway constructed the massive Little Salmon River Trestle a large steel trestle across the Little Salmon River valley. Today, this bridge remains the second largest railway bridge in Canada and an important structure on the Montreal-Halifax mainline of the Canadian National Railway. Post office changed from Salmonhurst in 1962.

Trivia

Notable people