Before colonization, the area was considered by the surrounding indigenous communities to be a "neutral" zone. On selected dates members from these communities would meet and trade goods by the Speed River.
Guelph was selected as the headquarters of British development firm "the Canada Company" by its first superintendent John Galt, a popular Scottish novelist who designed the town to attract settlers to it and the surrounding countryside. Galt designed the town to resemble a European city centre, complete with squares, broad main streets and narrow side streets, resulting in a variety of block sizes and shapes which are still in place today. The street plan was laid out in a radial street and grid system that branches out from the down-town, a technique which was also employed in other planned towns of this era, such as Buffalo, New York.)
The Canada Company established Guelph in 1827 to serve as the company's headquarters during the development of the Huron Tract, although town later came into its own as a prosperous railway and industrial centre. Guelph was founded on St. George's Day, April 23, 1827, the feast day of the patron saint of England. The town was named to honour Britain's royal family, the Hanoverians, who were descended from the Gulfs, the ancestral family of George IV, the reigning British monarch; thus the nickname The Royal City. The directors of the Canada Company had actually wanted the city to be named Goodrich, but reluctantly accepted the fait accompli.
Guelph was the home of North America's first cable TV system. Ted Metcalfe created McLean Hunter Television and their first broadcast was Queen Elizabeth's Coronation in 1953.
Guelph's police force had Canada's first municipal motorcycle patrol. Chief Ted Lamb brought back an army motorcycle he used during the First World War. Motorcycles were faster and more efficient than walking.
The city is home to the University of Guelph and Gleeman Breweries Ltd
