Early Industry
- By the early 1840s, Richard Paxman, a shoemaker by trade who hailed from the UK, had built a house and an outbuilding in which he was operating a tannery. The buildings were on a parcel of land along the north shore of the Humber River, part of George Bolton’s mill site
- The plentiful supply of hemlock trees in the vicinity provided an ample source of bark to create the tanning solution that converted raw animal hides into leather
- The resulting leather was used to make shoes, boots, saddles, straps and harnesses
- By 1845, Richard Paxman had achieved sufficient success to purchase the property from George Bolton
- In 1848, he sold the tannery business to Joseph Warbrick Sr.
The name Paxman has been recorded as ‘Pexham’ in some documents


