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10- PORT PERRY STAR - Tuesday, May 4, 1999 "Scugog's Community Newspaper of Choice" by Pa in the Port Perry Star each month. birth or of the location of it. There is no birth certificate or registry of T'S OFFICIAL! Daniel David Palmer founder of Chiropractics was NOT born in Port Perry! The beautiful park at Port Perry's waterfront, ramed in his honor in 1938 will still be known as Palmer Park. The statue which graces its north west corner will still remain DANIEL DAVID PALMER as a point of public interest and Chiropractors from around the world will still come to Port Perry to honour their founder. But the designation of Port Perry as D.D. Palmer's birthplace will have to be changed. There is absolutely no doubt that Palmer lived here as a boy. His name is clearly recorded in the 1861 census but the site of his birthplace has recently come under scrutiny. In his autobiography, Daniel David Palmer wrote; "I was born on March 7, 1845, a few miles east of Toronto, Canada. My ancestors were Scotch and Irish on my maternal side and English and German on my paternal side. When my grand- parents settled near the now beautiful city of Toronto, there was but one log house, the beginning of that great city. That region was known as 'away out west.'" He makes no further mention of his Daniel David Palmer is shown here treating a patient in his clinic in lowa. Palmer's birth. Birth records in that period were frequently poorly kept and many were never record- ed. Census and assessment records were not accurate either. The keeping of vital statistics was not compulsory at that time. The assumption that Palmer was born in Port Perry probably stemmed from the fact that until recently the earliest known record of Palmer's life was that he had been listed in the 1861 census records in Reach Township along with the rest of his family. In the 1861 census for Reach Township, Thomas Palmer, age 37 and his wife Catharine, age 34 are listed with their children; Daniel David age 16, Thomas J. age 14, Lucinda 12, Hannah 10, Bartlett 7 and Catharine 4. The census also notes that all the children were in attendance at school. Thomas is listed as a "cordwainer" or leather worker. This particular census record was critical since the residential portion of the 1851 census record for Reach Township has been lost. With this absence, it had been assumed that D.D had been born in Port Perry, or more accurately, in Borelia. Recently, Herbert J. Vear, an Australian chiropractor and researcher, in checking the International Genealogical index came across a listing for Thomas Palmer in Whitby Township in the 1851 census. After further research, he was able to determine that D.D. Palmer's father, Thomas was born in Hillier, a few kilometres west of Wellington in Prince Edward County. Catharine McVay, his wife was born in Whitby Township in 1827. Daniel David was named after his maternal grandfather, Daniel McVay. Thomas Palmer and his wife and children, including Daniel David, are clearly listed in the 1851 Census for Whitby Township. Thomas is listed as a 28 year old shoemak- er, living on Lot 3, 4 Concession 4, next door to his brother Henry and across the road from their father Stephen. At the time of Daniel's birth, Thomas was living with his father Stephen on the north side of Concession 4 in lot 5. This would have been the true birthplace of Daniel David Palmer. Concession 4 today is Taunton Road, and the area of the Palmer home- steads is on Taunton Road immediately west of the Audley Road, Thomas and Henry on the south side and Stephen on the north. Nothing remains of the log cabins which would have been their residences. There is nothing remaining of the original Hamlet of Brown's Corners, later to be renamed Audley. The Audley Post Office opened in 1853 and Thomas Palmer became its postmaster in 1858. . It closed in 1914. Another factor relevant to this study was the reference to a schoolmaster named John Black. Thomas J. Palmer, later wrote that his brother Daniel, "... under the prodding of a brutish school- master, one John Black, the boy mas- tered the equivalent of eighth grade school work by the age of nine years." John Black lived east of Palmer families on the same road but just west of Durham Road 23, today's Lakeridge road. The schoolhouse was a log cabin at the corner of Lake Ridge and Taunton roads. Thomas Palmer relinquished his position as Audley postmaster in 1860 and moved with his family to Borelia, immediately west of Port Perry. They lived in this community until 1865. At that point, at the end of the American Civil War, he moved his family to Iowa were jobs were plentiful, particularly in the coal mines. The family settled in What Cheer, Iowa. In 1866, Daniel David Palmer is recorded as a teacher in Iowa. In the 1880 census, he is listed as a "honeyard fruit" which was probably a poorly writ- ten "honey and fruit" meaning that he was involved in the production of honey and fruit, presumably with an orchard. At this time he is listed as married to Lue who had a son Frank by a previous marriage. Palmer went on to settle in Davenport Iowa and founded what is now recog- nised as chiropractics in 1895. Under the assumption that Daniel David Palmer had been born in Port Perry in 1845, the Chiropractors Association of Canada and the United States petitioned the Port Perry Council in 1937, to designate a public space to the memory of Daniel David Palmer. Members of the National Chiropractic Association (U.S. A.) at their convention in Toronto in July, 1938, drove to Port Perry in an extensive motorcade and participated in the dedi- cation of the Palmer Memorial Park at Port Perry's water- front. Port Perry's Reeve, W. M. Letcher participat- ed in the ceremony. In August 1946, another motorcade fromthe N.C. A., joined by members of the Ontario Chiropractic Association, re- dedicated the Chiropractics founder "¥| not born in Port Perry Sketches of Scugog is a historical column written by local resident and historian Paul Arculus and published Inscription on the Daniel David Palmer Memorial in park suggests he was born in Port Perry on March 7, 1845. park and a new statue of Palmer. Among the many dignitaries were David Palmer, the grandson of Daniel David Palmer, the provincial secretary Roland Michener, later to become Governor General, and Port Perry's Reeve, Fred Reesor. In September that year, the Palmer family purchased what was thought to be the birthplace of David Palmer on Simcoe Street. This home, on what is now Old Simcoe Road, has functioned as a museum for Chiropractics and is now signposted as the childhood home of D. D. Palmer. It was recently pur- chased from the Palmer family by the American Chiropractic Association. The A. C. A. is exploring a partnership arrangement with the Scugog Shores Museum for its operation and mainte- nance. Each year, prior to the commencement of classes, students of the Canadian Memorial Chiropractic College in Toronto, visit Port Perry to see the Palmer homestead, Scugog Shores Museum and the community in which Palmer lived as a boy. Port Perry, with its visible connec- tions with the youth of Daniel David Palmer will continue to be a pilgrimage site for chiropractors around the world but its status is now, without doubt, the site of his childhood and not his birth- place. All evidences of his actual birth- place vanished years ago. Port Perry can take pride in maintaining its ties with Daniel David Palmer.