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HomeMy WebLinkAbout422"Article copied from The Woman’s Globe and Mail, Toronto, Thursday, February 6, 1969. OLD HOMES MADE NEW BY SETTLERS BY MARY JUKES GLOBE AND MAIL REPORTER Illustrations: - Imposing colonial, Victorian-Georgian residence is at southwest corner of Brougham's crossroads. Built in 1850, it has been restored by Mr. and Mrs. Donald Gibson. - Anne and Jill Gibson relax in corner of large, cozy kitchen. Right: Jill stands in bedroom near door leading to husbands study. The two rooms were once a ballroom. - Front view of well designed small frame farmhouse owned by Mr. and Mrs. Kenneth Fallis. - The charming upstairs sitting room is furnished in Victorian period. - Kathleen Failis enjoys cooking in her roomy wood-trimmed pine-furnished kitchen. Mrs. Fallis has a large collection of pine pieces, all of which she restored herself. - One of Brougham’s two remaining 19th century inns is now a private residence. - Katharine, Gillian & Gregory Elmer. - Elmers frame house, begun in 1837 & added to through the years. BROUGHAM — A new kind of settler is giving Brougham (population 293) a new look. Townhouses and farmhouses that lost their original starch when the community lost its early wealth and settlers are being restored by the commuter. Brougham is at Highway 7 and Brock Road, about 30 miles northeast of Toronto. During most of the Nineteenth Century, Brougham bustled with life generated by many small businesses, a distillery and sawmill. It was also a haven for coach travellers, who had a choice of four inns for their overnight stay. Today a traveller might be forgiven for thinking that Brougham is little more than four corners. All the original enterprises, plus two of the four inns, have long since vanished. One is boarded up and the other is a private residence. But Nineteenth-Century settlers built their houses with style and endurance. Even some of the very small frame houses have great charm. A good cross section of the kinds of houses that have been restored in the area are an impressively large colonial Georgian residence, built about 1850 on the southwest corner of Brougham's four corners; an enlarged frame farmhouse, a few hundred yards south of the four corners (the original part built about 1837); and a very small frame farmhouse, built about 1850, on the first side road west of the four corners. The Georgian town house and two acres of land were bought 10 years ago by Donald Gibson, vice-president of General Foods Ltd. His wife, Jill, describes the house at that time as ""in ramshackle condition. It needed a new roof. There was no plumbing, no heating and the electrical outlets were primitive. But it was a bigger house than we could have afforded if it had been in Toronto."" Mr. Gibson—a historical buff and member of the Pickering Historical Society—says the house was built by William Bentley, who came from upstate New York about 1829. When Mr. Bentley first arrived, he was listed in the township assessment records as a pill peddler. By the time he had finished his imposing house—it has a belvedere (lookout) and a second-floor ballroom—he was listed as a vendor of medicines. Mr. Bentley died in 1860 and the medicine business was bought eventually, by a Toronto firm. The house passed to a nephew Dr. Lafayette Bentley, who died in 1924. It remained in the Bentley family until 1956, but was empty for three years before the Gibsons discovered it. Mrs. Gibson says she and her husband did a lot of the inside work themselves, such as papering, painting, re-puttying the windows and sanding the floors. As they had no use for the ballroom, they divided it into a master bedroom and study. Mr. Gibson, a self-taught woodworker, panelled the study and built a stable behind the house for a couple of riding horses. On weekends he and his 15-year-old son Bruce take advantage of country life by working a farm he bought in the area. Mrs. Gibson and her 14-year-old daughter, Anne, keep the horses in condition. The whole family is involved in local affairs from time to time. Mr. Gibson and Bruce are volunteer firemen. Mr. Gibson says: ""When we're called out at 3 in the morning it isn't the most pleasant thing in the world, especially when you know you'll be hitting the trail in a few hours. But you jump to attention because you know others would do the same for you."" Last year, Richard and Elisabeth Elmer bought the frame house on Brock Road a few houses south of the Gibson home. It had already been restored and enlarged by architect Bill Rankin. Mrs. Elmer says: ""I liked the house so much but had grown up in the country and wanted to live in the city. Dick had grown up in the city and wanted to life in the country. He said, 'Give it a year and if you don't like it, no hard feelings'"" She said it took only three months to find out that Brougham was the place for her. The house has special charm because it has been added to so many times. There are five cosy bedrooms upstairs which gives a bedroom to each of the Elmers' three children-Gregory, 7, Gillian, 5, and Katherine, 3. Downstairs, two rooms were added by architect Rankin—a family room and large living room enhanced by a huge stone fireplace, hand-hewn beams and parquet floor. Mr. Elmer, an engineer with Taylor Instrument Companies in Toronto, finds the drive back and forth to his office relaxing. His wife says, ""The thing that makes living in Brougham so pleasant is all the wonderful people—many of whom do the commuting bit."" Mr. Elmer is also a volunteer fireman. Kenneth and Kathleen Fallis bought their small frame farmhouse and eight acres of land (on the first sideroad west of Brougham's four corners) 10 years ago. Mr. Fallis, who is with the provincial Department of Agriculture, was more enthusiastic about living in the country than his wife. She thought she would miss all the cultural advantages Toronto has to offer. Mrs. Fallis is a good amateur painter and enjoys singing. ""But we had a retriever who needed a life in country so we bought the house,"" she said. She had taught school before her marriage and because of the teacher shortage was soon talked into taking the post of principal of Brougham's two-room schoolhouse — a post she held until last June. Her husband's weekend involvement is raising sheep. The couple's only son, Brian 13, makes pocket money by raising chickens and selling the eggs. During the past ten years Mr. and Mrs. Fallis have rebuilt an original fireplace, moved some doors, modernized the kitchen, repapered, painted the house and scraped down many pieces of early pine furniture to make the small frame house one of the most charming and comfortable in the area. "