Historical Plaques of
Brant County

In Memory

of

THE PIONEERS

of

Oakland Township

These headstones are the only authentic record of burial in this cemetery1811-1941

Built by free labour of its own congregation with stones gathered from nearby fields, the West Dumfries Chapel was completed and dedicated in 1845. It is a fine example of a type of cobblestone construction seldom found elsewhere in Canada, and introduced into this area about 1838 by Levi Broughton, an American builder. The first minister, the Rev. John Law, served from 1845-7, and the church remained active in the Methodist Conference until services were discontinued in 1921. The building was restored in 1948 as a memorial to the pioneers of the community.

This cairn

erected in memory of

MAUS SCHOOL

centenary

re-union

1829-1929

Allies of the British during the American War of independence, the Six Nations Iroquois received extensive lands along the Grand River in 1784. Mohawks, led by Joseph Brant, established a village of some 400 individuals here by 1788. The community was situated at an important crossing point on the river (:Brant's Ford") and prospered as a resting place for travellers on the "Detroit path", a trail linking the Niagara and Detroit Rivers. Increasingly European settlers encroached on Six Nations' lands. In 1841 the government moved the Grand River Iroquois to a section of their land south of the river. Of the Mohawk Village, only the chapel remains.

This chapel, the first Protestant church in Ontario, was built by the Crown for the Mohawks of the Six Nations Iroquois who settled here in 1794. It replaced the Queen Anne Chapel (1712) at Fort Hunter, N.Y., which the Mohawk lost, along with their lands, as a result of their alliance with the British during the American War of Independence. The church was dedicated to St. Paul in 1788 by the Reverend John Stuart. In 1904 it was given Royal designation by Edward VII. It is the only Royal Chapel in North America.

In 1793 Lieutenant-Governor Simcoe granted to Abraham Dayton the entire township of Burford. Dayton was a native of New Milford, Connecticut, U.S.A. The township was to become the "New Jerusalem" for a religious sect with which he was affiliated. Dayton eventually broke his ties with the sect and settled just west of the present village of Burford. He was responsible for bringing several families into the township and by the spring of 1797 the new settlement consisted of twenty-one families. Abraham Dayton died March 1, 1797 after a prolonged illness. Abigail Dayton, Abraham's widow, later married Colonel Joel Stone and moved to Gananoque, where she lived until her death in 1843, at the age of 93. The Dayton's only child Abiah, was the wife of Benajah Mallory and she and her husband followed her parents into this township. Banajah Mallory became a man of considerable influence and by 1805 was elected member of the Legislative Assembly of Upper Canada representing, Norfolk, Oxford and Middlesex. In June 1812 war was declared against Upper Canada by the United States. During the course of the war Mallory accepted a commission in the U.S. forces and was considered a traitor back home. Benajah Mallory became outlawed and his land was forfeited to the Crown.

The establishment of this mission in 1822 began Methodist missionary work among the province's Indians, and the following year the Reverend Alvin Terry organized the first congregation at an Indian settlement known as Davisville. Within two years services were also being held here at Salt Springs where in 1828-29 the Indians erected a frame church which soon became the headquarters for the mission. Through the efforts of George and William Ryerson and others, the Salt Springs congregation grew, but after 1834 a rapidly increasing proportion of its membership consisted of white settlers who were replacing the Indians in the area. After the erection of an Indian church south of the Grand, a brick church was completed here in 1860 and was replaced by the present structure in 1902.

Ontario's thirteenth prime minister was born on this farm and in 1913 graduated from Ontario Agricultural College. A supporter of the United Farmers of Ontario, he was elected to the provincial legislature in 1919 as member for Brant North and served as provincial secretary until the defeat of the Drury administration in 1923. During the Liberal administration of Mitchell F. Hepburn (1934-42), he served as provincial secretary and minister in charge of the department of game and fisheries. Sworn in as prime minister on May 18, 1943, his government was defeated later that year. Nixon retained his seat until his death in 1961, thus ending 42 years of parlimentary service.

Adelaide Hunter was born in this farm house and lived here until she married John Hoodless in 1881. On February, 19, 1897, she organized at Stoney Creek the world's first Women's Institute. It was her belief that in this organization rural women could discuss their problems and work together to improve their standard of homemaking and citizenship. The movement spread rapidly throughout Ontario and later to the other provinces. Mrs. Hoodless, a natural leader and forceful speaker, introduced the teaching of domestic science into Ontario schools and obtained funds for the building of Macdonald Institute at Guelph.

This house and the adjoining structure were buuilt by Asa Wolverton, a native of Cayuga County, New York, who had immigrated to Upper Canada in 1826. About 1832 he settled in Paris, where he erected sawmills and became a prosperous lumber dealer and contractor. Wolverton acquired this site in 1851 and soon constructed an outstanding residence of stuccoed frame. Designed in a classical manner, the house is distinguished by the entrance portico and the attached storage-wing with its carriage-house. This alignment of structures, often employed in the New England States and the Maritimes, was rarely used in this province and is here adapted to a steeply sloping site. Wolverton resided in the house until his death in 1861.

This house was built in 1831 by Hiram Capron, a native of Vermont who, in 1822, had emigrated to Norfolk County where he helped to establish one of Upper Canada's earliest iron foundries. He settled here at the Forks of the Grand in 1829, divided part of his land into town lots, and in 1830 constructed a grist-mill. The following year he renamed the community "Paris". In 1842 with other partners he purchased the nearby qypsum deposits which he built into the village's primary industry. His leadership in founding and developing the town earned him the nickname "King".

In 1829, Hiram Capron came to the Forks of the Grand and founded the settlement of Paris. In 1850, it was incorporated as a village, with Capron as reeve. In 1856, Paris was incorporated as a town, with H. Finlayson as its first mayor. For the next 142 years, Paris ran its own affairs, with its own mayor, council and control over local services.

Dundas Street, named for Henry Dundas, Secretary of State for the British Home Department, was built on Lieutenant Governor Simcoe's orders in 1793 - 1794. On April 5, 1793, a surveying party under Augustus Jones, Deputy-Surveyor for Upper Canada, surveyed for the road near this site. At the forks of the Grand and Nith Rivers, Jones discoverd qypsum (Plaster of Paris) after which the future Town of Paris would be named. By the fall of 1794, 100 members of the Queen's Rangers under the command of Captain Smith, had cut a road from King's Landing (Dundas) to the east bank of the Grand River. Popularly known as The Governor's Road, it played a major role in the development of Paris.

Cairn erected by the Paris Museum and Historical Society
with financial assistance from the estate of
John Henry Cox.

Cairn unveiled July 1, 1998
by
Jack Bawcutt, Mayor, Town of Paris
Larry McCandless, Chairman, Paris Museum and Historical Society

Lt. Col. M.A. Stevenson, C.D.
(portraying Lt. Gov. Simcoe), Queen's York Rangers

This cairn symbolizes the Art of Cobblestone
Masonry which was brought to Paris in 1839 by Levi
Boughton when he erected St. Jame's Church. A
source of pride to Parisians are the eleven houses
and two churches of this unique construction.

Paris Museum and Historical Society
1998 Executive Members

    Larry McCandless, Chairman        Mary Cassar
    Jackie Remus, Vice-Chairman       Betty Sinclair
    Jack Rogers, Secretary-Treasurer  Ken Sinclair
    Fred Bemrose, Curator             Oliver Watts

Born into a prominent Brantford family, Lawren Harris began to paint as a child. At the University of Toronto, a professor noted he sketched during lectures and advised he be sent to Europe to study art. While in Germany (1904-1907), Harris was influenced by urban realism, landscape regionalism, and theosphy, a transcendental, mystical school of thought. In 1920, he helped found the Group of Seven, an association of landscape artists dedicated to creating a distinctly Canadain form of art. Harris saw a spiritual presence in natural forms and painted in an increasingly stylized manner until, in the 1930s, he became an abstract artist. Harris landscapes such as "North Sea, Lake Superior," and "Icebergs, Davis Strait" remain celebrated Canadian images.

In 1869, on the recommendation of the Rev. Egerton Ryerson, Superintendent of Education, funds were allocated to establish the first provincial school for blind children. The Ontario Institution for the Education of the Blind, which included the nearby gate-keepers lodge, opended on May 1, 1872, with eleven students. Under its first Principal, Dr. E.S. Wiggins, the residential institution combined elementary school subjects with manual and vocational training, and soon gained recognition for its contribution to the theory and practice of education the blind. By 1881 enrolment had risen to 201. Renamed the Ontario School for the Blind in 1913, it later introduced secondary school courses and in 1974 became The W. Ross Macdonald School in honour of Ontario's Lieutenant-Governor.

An internationally renouned author, Duncan was raised in the adjacent house and educated locally. She taught school briefly, but then determinedly turned to journalism, gaining notice for her distinctive and witty writing style. In 1890 Duncan published her first book, A Social Departure, based in dispatches produced during a trip around the world. Following her marriage the next year, she took up residence in India where she continued to pursue a literary career. A prolific writer, Ducan published over twenty books, only one of which, The Imperialist (1904), had a Canadian setting. In this penetrating study of life in Elgin (Brantford) in the late 19th century. Duncan integrated shrewd political commentary with minute social observation, thereby gaining for herself a distinctive place in Canadian literature.

One of Canada's oldest national associations of musicians, the Royal Canadian College of Organists was established in 1909 following an organizational meeting held here in the former Conservatory of Music. Dedicated to elevating the standards and promoting the interests of professional organists, the Canadian Guild of Organists held its first general meeting in 1910. A decade later, when Canadian chapters of the American Guild of Organists were disbandoned the association renamed the Canadian College of Organists absorbed their membership. Local centres were established and membership steadily increased from 245 in 1939 to 1300 in 1959. In recognition of its significant contribution to Canadian cultural life, the college was then granted the designation "Royal". Today it still strives to foster excellence in organ playing and church music.

In July, 1852, the Six Nations Indians sold to Brant County the land upon which this court-house now stands. Designed by John Turner and William Simon and erected by the Provisional County of Brant, the stone and brick building was largely completed in 1852. The original structure contained court rooms, county offices, a law library and a gaol. Additions were made in 1861 and 1886, but the building remains predominantly Greek Revival in style. The centre block facade has two clusters of simple Doric colums rising from the second floor and supporting a triangular pediment. Identical pediments are repeated over each of the wings. The court-house faces Victoria Square, one of Ontario's most impressive public squares.

Victoria Park was set aside as a square when Lewis Burwell surveyed the original town plan for Brantford in 1830. The square was first landscaped as a formal park in 1861. The plans were prepared by John Turner, a local architect who designed many significant Brantford buildings, including the Brant County court house, Zion United Church and Park Baptist Church, which face the square. In recognition of Upper Canada's link to Britain, Turner's plan was based on the configuration of the Union Jack.

In 1886, the bronze and granite Joseph Brant Memorial was unveiled in the centre of the square. One of the first pieces of statuary of its kind in North America, the memorial to Joseph Brant and the Six Nations Confederacy was sculpted by Percy Wood, winner of the international competition.

In 1892, the granite drinking fountain was located to the west of the memorial at the Market Steet entrance to the park. This fountain was donated by J. K. Osborne, who was a vice-president of A. Harris, Son & Co. and Massey-Harris Co. Ltd., forerunners of Massey-Ferguson Ltd.

Victoria Park was designated under the The Ontario Heritage Act by Brantford City Council on September 22, 1986, as having architectural and historic importance.

In the 1820's significant improvements to the Hamilton and London road attracted settlers to the Indian lands at Brant's Ford where this thoroughfare crossed the Grand River. A thriving village soon developed and in 1830 the Six Nations surrendered its site. The opening of navigation to Brantford in 1848, the completion of the Buffalo, Brantford and Goderich Railway to the town in 1854 and the development of a rich agricultural hinterland fostered significant commercial and manufacturing growth in Brantford. The firms of Cockshutt and Harris, established here during the 1870's, laid the foundation for Brantford's development as Canada's leading farm implement manufacturing centre. Brantford, which became a town in 1847, was incorporated as a city in 1877.

Ontario's fourth prime minister was born in Mount Pleasant, called to the Bar in 1865, and practiced law in Brantford for many years. In 1873 he was elected to the Ontario legislature and sat as Liberal member for South Brant until 1899. Appointed provincial secretary and registrar in 1877, he became commissioner of crown lands in 1889. Following the resignation of Sir Oliver Mowat in 1896, Arthur Hardy assumed the portfolios of prime minister and attorney general. During his regime, an extensive revision and consolidation of the province's statutes was completed. He retired from politics in 1899 and, until his death, held the positions of clerk of process and surrogate clerk at Osgoode Hall.

This house, "Echo Villa", was built by the Reverend Peter Jones (Kahkewaquonaby) who lived here from 1851 until his death. Son of the noted surveyor, Augustus Jones, and Tuhbenahneequay, a Mississauga chief's daughter, Peter was born at Burlington Heights. He was converted to Methodism in 1823 and began to preach in the Grand River area. In 1826 he moved to the Missisauga settlement on the Credit River and was elected a chief of that band in 1829. An eloquent preacher, he converted many Indians throughout Upper Canada, and translated the Gospels and many hymns into the Ojibwa language. Ordained in 1833, he made several successful journeys to England to raise funds for Indian missions.

The Mohawk Institute was established in 1831 for children of the Six Nations Iroquois living on the Grand River. Pupils from other native communities in Ontario attended the school as well. Like all Canadian residential schools, the Mohawk Institute tried to assimilate its students into the rapidly growing Euro-Canadian society. To that end, it disregarded native cultural traditions and stressed instead Christian teachings, English-language instruction, and manual labour skills. This building was constructed in 1904 after fire destroyed the previous school. When the Institute closed in 1970 the building reverted to the Six Nations of the Grand River. It then became a centre for the renaissance of First Nations cultures

A leading spokesman for Canadian agrarian and co-operative movements, Good was born and raised on Myrtlevill farm. He early developed a strong sense of social responsibility and, returning here after attending the University of Toronto, he embarked upon a career that effectively combined public service with farming. Good initially focussed his attention on agrarian issues. In 1914 he helped found the United Farmers of Ontairo and the United Farmers Co-Operative Company, organizations he subsequently served, and from 1921-25, following his election on the "Farmers' Platform", he represented Brant in the House of Commons. Then, as president of the Co-operative Union of Canada from 1921-45, Good devoted himself to promoting co-operative ideals as a means of reducing social injustice. He championed this cause until his death.

In this house "Chiefswood", erected about 1853, was born the Mohawk poetess Emily Pauline Johnson (Tekahionwake). Her father, Chief G.H.M. Johnson a greatly respected leader of the Six Nations, built "Chiefswood" as a wedding gift for her English mother, a cousin of the well-known American novelist William Dean Howells. By her writing and dramatic recitals from her own works in Great Britain and throughout North America, Pauline made herself the voice of the Indian race in the English-tongue. No book of poetry by a Canadian has outsold her collected verse, "Flint and Feather".

John Brant was born at the Mohawk Village (Brantford), the youngest son of the renouned Joseph Brant. He was educated at Ancaster and Niagara, and fought with distinction during the War of 1812. Brant devoted his life to improving the welfare of his people. He initiated the establishment of schools and from 1828 served as superintendent of the Six Nations the first native person appointed to that post. Around 1830 his mother Catharine (Ohtowa? Kéhson), clan mother of the Turtle Clan Mohawks, chose Brant to succeed Henry Tekarihogen as sachem of the Turtle Clan Mohawks, a position of great influence within the Six Nations Confederacy. Brant died of cholera in 1832.

An Onondaga from the Six Nations of the Grand River, Tom Longboat was one of the world's great long-distance runners. He ran his first race in Caledonia in 1905 and two years later shot to international attention with a record-breaking win in the Boston Marathon. He represented Canada in the 1908 Olympics. Hailed as professional world champion the following year, Longboat went on to set world records for 15- and 20-mile races. During the First World War he served as a despatch runner with the Canadian Expeditionary Forces (1916-1919). Tom Longboat is a member of the Canadian Sports Hall of Fame.

Faced with the pressure of white settlement, the Mississauga Indians began considering in 1840 the relocation of their Credit River Village near Toronto. In 1847 the Six Nations Council made them an unsolicited offer of land on its Grand River reserve. Native spokesmen for resettlement, including the Reverend Peter Jones, a Mississauga Chief, selected land in Tuscarora and later in Oneida township. Although several had located elsewhere, some 266 Mississauga settled on lots of the New Credit Reserve in 1847. Many of these belonged to the Methodist Church and in 1848 a mission was established here by the Reverend William Ryerson. With the mission's growth and the increase in cultivated acreage, New Credit became a prosperous farming community and in 1903 the Mississauga purchased the Reserve.

Canada's first woman graduate in medicine was born in Mount Pleasant. She attended the Toronto School of Medicine, received her degree from Victoria University in 1883, and was licensed to practise. Her mother, Dr. Emily Howard Stowe, had graduated in New York State in 1868, and after a prolonged struggle for recognition had been licenced to practise medicine in 1880, thus becoming Canada's first woman doctor. Both were ardent feminists, and devoted themselves to the advancement of women in education and public life. Dr. Emily Stowe organized the Canadian movement for female suffrage, and under her daughter's leadership women in Ontario received the franchise in 1917.