Turning the pages in the first of the Abstract Index Books for the Township of East Flamborough that document the ownership of Lot 8, Concession 5, it revealed who the first owner of the property had been and it had not been the Baker family.

On March 10, 1797, the Crown awarded John Cain of Niagara, the whole 200 acres of Lot 8, Concession 5. It appears Cain retained ownership for only a very brief period before selling it to Samuel Street of Niagara for £50 on Sept. 11, 1800. While a land grant was an attractive incentive to many Americans crossing into Upper Canada, the remoteness of the area beyond the Niagara Peninsula made the property of little interest to them, other than as a source of cash.

Samuel Street (1753-1815) was a notable Niagara Peninsula resident, merchant, judge, entrepreneur and political figure. Involved in the ownership of considerable property and with land speculation schemes in the Niagara area, he held this and his various other properties until after the War of 1812. He then began divesting himself of them, but it appears Street had had little luck selling this isolated East Flamborough lot. He eventually divided the lot into two 100-acre parcels to make it a more attractive purchase – the eastern lot going to Jacob Tenbrock and the western half to David Parsons.

In 1822, Tenbrock sold his 100 acres to George Baker of East Flamborough Township for £25, the first member of the famous township family to settle on the lot that was to remain in the family for over 120 years. The original handwritten transaction states:

“A memorial to be registered pursuant to this statute of a deed of Bargain and Sale bearing date this fourteenth day of February in the year of our Lord one thousand and twenty two, by and between Jacob Tenbrock of Grantham in the County of Lincoln District of Niagara and Province of Upper Canada, Yeoman of the one part, and George Baker of the Township of East Flamboro in the County of Halton and District of Gore and province of aforesaid, Farmer, of the other part.”

The exact measurements of the lot are described in the deed as, “Beginning at a post for the corner in front of the fifth concession marked 8/9” – not exactly the easiest marker to find in what was virtually an uninhabited wilderness in 1822.

Sylvia Wray is the former archivist with the Flamborough Archives. She can be reached through the Archives at archives@flamboroughhistory.com.

This article was originally published in the Flamborough Review, 10 July 2014.