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Toronto; began his engineering career early in life
upon the first construction of the Welland Canal
and continued upon the works until 1833, spending
part of his time at the College. In this year he was
appointed Secretary to the Commissioners of the
St. Lawrence Navigation—a mere step to connect
him with the works of the Cornwall Canal. Under
Judge Wright, C. E. and John B. Mills, C. E., he
was first engaged in the survey for that Canal, and
afterwards under Lieut.-Colonel Phillpotts, R. E.,
from 1833 to 1839, remained as resident engineer in
charge of construction. In 1839, he was appointed
Secretary of the Board of Works of Lower Canada,
and, upon the union of the two Provinces in 184r1,
and the establishment of a Board of Works for the
united Provinces, he was made Engineer of that
Board, which position he held for thirteen years,
during three of which—1846, "47 and ’48—he was
locally in charge of the Welland Canal, to finish the
first enlargement, begun under Samuel Power, C. E.
During this time, he was also Superintendent of the
navigation. As Engineer of Public Works he per¬
sonally surveyed and located the line of the Beau¬
harnois Canal, the first enlargement of the Lachine
Canal, and the locks and dams at St. Annes and St.
Ours, all being constructed after his plans. He also
made a survey for the Sault St. Marie Canal, on the
Canadian shore, not yet constructed. He surveyed
as well, the line for the Grand Trunk Railway
between Montreal and Kingston. In 1850, Mr.
Keefer introduced, for the first time on the St.
Lawrence canals, the solid timber lock gates, which
since then have been generally adopted on the
larger canals, to the greater safety and advantage
of navigation. The beautiful suspension bridge at
Ottawa, the first of its class in Canada, was one of
his earliest efforts, being opened for traffic in 1844.
On the commencement of the Grand Trunk Rail¬
way, in 1853, he resigned his position with the
Government, to take the situation of Engineer in
that railway, under the late A. M. Ross, C. E. In
that capacity he finally established the line between
Montreal and Kingston. which he had previously
surveyed for the Government, and remained in the
service of the company to personally superintend
its construction. At the same time, by a minute
hydrographic survey of the River St. Lawrence in
front of Montreal City, he fixed the line of the Vic¬
toria Bridge where it now stands. He also projected
the high level bridges over the Ottawa at St. Annes,
and over the Rideau Canal at Kingston Mills. On
the first opening of this section for traffic, he, for a
short time, superintended this division, until he
returned once more to the Government service.—
of the Brockville & Ottawa Railway, acting on behalf
of the company and the municipalities, and in that
capacity directed the location of the line and deter¬
mined the character of the works. Under the
“Accidents on Railways” Act of 1857, Mr. Keefer
was appointed Government Inspector of Railways,
a position which he filled for seven years. In 1864,
he retired from the public service to his private
residence in Brockville, where he now lives.
Since his retirement from official life, he has been
engaged in the private practice of his profession, in
the course of which he has accomplished one of the
most remarkable engineering feats of the day—the
construction of the new suspension bridge at Niagara
Falls. The beautiful bridge at Ottawa, before re¬
ferred to, is 242 feet span, while the Niagara bridge
has a clear span of 1,268 feet, and is now the longest
single span bridge anywhere in use.
EARLY HISTORY OF BROCKVILLE.
William Buell, Sr., received a grant of about 505
acres of land from the Crown, of which 265 acres
were composed of the west half of Lot No. 11 and
east half of Lot No. 12, in the ist Concession of
Elizabethtown, with the broken fronts, and the
remainder being Lot No. 12 and the west half of
No, 11, in the 2nd Concession of the same Township.
To the front part of this land, adjoining the river,
Mr. Buell removed, with his wife and one child, in
the winter of the beginning of 1785, having in the
previous year erected a log house and settled. He
at once cleared a small piece of ground, where the
stone dwelling house now occupied by Mr. Robert
Findlay stands; and in the following year planted
a number of apple seeds, from the product of which
he, in a few years, reared an orchard of about five
acres, on the south side of what is now known as
Main Street, between Home and St. Andrew Streets.
At that time flour could only be secured in Montreal
or at the Cataraqui Mills. The original log house
and a new one composed of hewn timber was next
erected. The western part of the new house stood
in what is now known as Home Street, a few feet
east of Mr. Findlay’s present residence. Anaddition
of frame was subsequently built on to the “ Block
House."
The only road at that time leading to the country
is now known as Perth Street.
Nehamiah Seaman built a small dwelling house
and also a blacksmith shop. He afterwards erected
a stone dwelling house, now standing on the corner
of Perth and King Streets. Next came a small
tavern, standing on the south side of King Street ; it
stood a little west of Home Street, and was owned
by the late Adiel Sherwood, Soon after, the late