Ontario Directories

Online
Directories of heads of households can help in locating individuals in a certain place, especially when their names do not appear in the censuses. Many city and county directories from the 1840s to the present are available. For example, the Family History Library has directories for:
 * Province of Ontario gazetteer and directory... : containing an alphabetically arranged list of post offices... a classified list of patrons -- 1910-11, ebook
 * Internet Archives, Directories of Toronto, ebooks, several years
 * Olive Tree City and Farmer's Directories of Ontario

Hamilton
The Family History Library also has microfilm copies of:


 * The Canada Directory for 1857-1858. Montréal, Quebec: John Lovell, 1857. (Family History Library .) This lists tradesmen in cities in what is now Ontario and Quebec. For an alphabetical index to the Ontario portion, see:


 * Wilson, Thomas B. and Emily S. Wilson. Directory of the Province of Ontario 1857 with a Gazeteer [sic]. Lambertville, New Jersey, USA: Hunterdon House, 1987. (Family History Library .)

Many Ontario directories up to and including 1900 are available on microfiche:


 * Pre-1900 Canadian Directories. Ottawa, Ontario: Canadian Institute for Historical Micro-reproductions, 1988. (On 4219 Family History Librry fiche beginning with .) Fiche do not circulate to Family History Centers.

Some Ontario directories are included in the material indexed in People of Ontario and Central Canadians described in Ontario Genealogy.

Websites

 * http://olivetreegenealogy.com/can/ont/dir.shtml
 * http://www.torontopubliclibrary.ca/digital-archive/
 * Internet Archive Search: directories toronto
 * http://www.bac-lac.gc.ca/eng/discover/directories-collection/Pages/directories-collection.aspx