The following text may have been generated by Optical Character Recognition, with varying degrees of accuracy. Reader beware!

22- PORT PERRY STAR - Tuesday, May 5, 1998 "Scugog's Community Newspaper of Choice" A Sketches a of Scugog by Paul Arculus Sketches of Scugog is a historical column written by local resident and historian Paul Arculus and published in the Port Perry Star the first issue of each month. [ ] [ [ J Only recently have scholars begun to accept the pre- mise that the delegates who framed the Constitution of the United States in Philadelphia in 1787, did not look upon Blacks and First Nations as human beings. Instead, they were looked upon as mere property or chattels. Thus the phrase "that all men are created free and equal" was a statement which applied to whites only. Even Jefferson never thought of relinquishing the 200 or so slaves who ran his plantations. The wave of humanitarian and legislative reform which swept through Britain in the early 19th century, largely motivated by Christian ideals and sentiment, led to the Great Reform Bills and the abolition of child labor and slavery. The British, who had led the slave trade and profited enor- sonal freedom through residence (in Upper Canada) and any attempt to infringe their rights will be resisted in the courts." One of the great tragedies of United States history is that a Civil War cut the nation in two and that a major cause of that conflict was the issue of slavery. As a result of these problems, many slaves made their way into Upper Canada (Ontario) and Nova Scotia. By 1860, an estimated 30,000 had made Upper Canada their home. There are many stories of the so-called Underground Railway, by which slaves escaped to free- dom in Canada. There are a few early accounts of escaped slaves making their way into Reach Township. However, none took up permanent residence here until 1866 when an escaped slave named Samuel Stoutt (sometimes spelled Stout) arrived and decided to make Port Perry his home. His personal route on the Underground Railway had led him from New Jersey to New York, Kingston, Madoc, Toronto and Uxbridge, and finally to Port Perry. Samuel Stoutt was a man of just under average mously from it, realized the errors of their ways, and slavery and discrimi- nation were slowly abolished. The work of Fox and the Quakers, and then SAMUEL STOUT, Tonsorial Artist, Hair Cutting and Shaving Done in the Latest Fashion. Queen Street, PORT PERRY. Wilberforce, made slave trade an illegal offense in British territories in 1811. In 1833, the | Abolition Act was passed making slavery of any kind, illegal throughout the British Colonies. It wasn't until 1865 that the United States Congress passed legislation to abolish slavery, but it took almost another century before Civil Rights became a real issue. As early as 1793, largely through the efforts of John Graves Simcoe, legislation was passed in Upper Canada to prevent the further introduction of slaves and to limit the term of contracts for servitude within this province. Finally, following the British lead, John Beverly Robinson, the Attorney General of Upper Canada declared in 1819 that "...the Negroes are entitled to per- An advertisement which Stoutt took out in the Ontario County Directory of 1877. He spelled his name as Stout here. height and of a stocky build. When he arrived in Port Perry, he immediately made his way to one of the local barber shops and asked for employment. He quickly established himself in that trade and gained an excel- lent reputation. He had another talent which helped him to gain acceptance in this pioneer community. He was an extremely proficient musician and was apparently able to play well on any kind of wind instru- ment. He helped to organize the town band and was its first leader. Because of his musicianship, he became known as Professor Stoutt. Shortly after his arrival in Port Perry, Harris Burnham, clerk of the division court, gave Stoutt permission to build a simple dwelling, probably no more than a shack, at the rear of his Samuel Stout - Port Perry's Slavery Connection his tonso- rial art was on the south side of Queen Street and was destroyed in the 1884 fire. The balance of his barber- ing career was spent in a single storey building bet- ween Curts and Henderson's store (now Emiel's). The first building on the site was George Boyce's Shoe Store, built in 1854. After the 1884 fire, George Marshall built an identical single storey building to be used as a grocery store. He sold it two years later to A.E. Rogerson, who owned the Port Perry House Hotel, later to become the Sebert House Hotel. Rogerson rented the building out to a ser- ies of barbers. It eventually became more popularly known as Hooey's barber shop. The shop always had at least two barber chairs. Samuel Stoutt was the first assistant barber in this building when it opened as a barber, shop in 1885. Rogerson sold the building to Bill Carnegie in 1932 and it was eventually absorbed by Emiel's and is now the bar at the east side of the restaurant. 'Stoutt continued to work as a barber until the end of the century. His loving and faithful wife Eliza died in 1907. Samuel's age is difficult to determine. His birth date has been recorded in various documents as 1812, 1815 and 1817. When he died on May 4, 1911, his obitu- ary declared that he was a centenarian and "...for years he has held the honors of being the oldest man in Port Perry and vicinity." All the Stoutt children spent their entire lives in this community. None married, and when Alice, the youngest, died in 1959 at the age of 74, the heritage of Samuel Stoutt passed into history. And with her death, Port Perry's only direct link with the grim story of slavery was broken. property. This was in the middle of the block on the west side of Perry Street between Queen and Mary Streets. Two years later Burnham, sold the property [E to C.L. Vickery, and built a new home * further down Perry Street. Vickery established a planing mill and furniture |: factory on his property. Stoutt remained in his humble accommodation until he married in 1876. In 1903, W. Letcher, who owned the funeral parlor next door and to the north, tore down the factory and Stoutt's former home which had evolved into a storage shed. In their places he built a two-storey red brick home which today § is Personal Touch Floral and Gift Shop, across the road from the Liquor Store.- Stoutt became a member of the. Presbyterian Church. In 1876 he married an English girl, Elizabeth Organ, who was considerably younger than himself, possibly as much as 40 years his junior. His marriage necessi- tated finding better living accommoda- tion. He rented a house on Lilla Street 4 (now Simcoe Street) just north of Scugog # Street (7A) on the east side. In this #l house, Samuel and Elizabeth had five children; a child who died in infancy; J Joseph, born in 1877; Samuel John, who L died when only 23 year old in 1903; 1) Professor Samuel Stoutt, seated centre, with three of his Port Perry friends. They are: left to right: George Oke, Wes. Williams and Jack Cook. Alice, born in 1884 and William, born in 1890. The store where he first practiced Marshall's grocery store between Curts and Henderson and the Sebert House. This photograph was taken just a short time before Rogerson purchased the Marshall building and rented it out as a barber shop. This was where Stoutt practiced his tonsorial skills. Prior to that time he was a barber in a store on the south side of Queen Street. So, os MAES LR! H As i |