NEW! Live from Laksay Emporium
In honour of National Historic Places Day 2020, we hosted a Facebook Live from Laskay Emporium, answering all your questions about shops and shopping in the 1860s.
Learn why the general store was a rural community’s connection to the world!
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Dates From: 1845
Original Location: Laskey, Ontario (King Township)
Laskay Emporium, the general store and post office built by Joseph Baldwin in 1845, served customers well into the 20th century.
The frame structure has a “boom town” front, with a long slope-roofed veranda. The structure included a store room, flanked by an open-front horse and buggy shed.
The store was saved from demolition and brought to Black Creek Pioneer Village for restoration in 1960.
The general store often housed the first post office in a community. In 1854, Joseph Baldwin established Laskay, Ontario’s first post office in his establishment.
Baldwin’s son Henry became postmaster in 1856. The position of postmaster carried considerable responsibility, and could be quite a boon for the store that secured the position!
After Henry Baldwin died, the position of postmaster went to rival store owner Benjamin H. Rolling, the son of a former enslaved black man and an Indigenous women. Rolling became one of the first black postmasters in Canada.
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