Brighton Area Historical Society

Maple Lawn Farm, on Pleasant Valley Road just north of Buno Road, in Brighton Township stillhas maples in the lawn. A. c.1900 newspaper clipping lists Wm. J. Donaldson as the owner.

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The Brighton Argus, c. 1900, listed a number of farms, with a name and the name of the owner.  Research into location, type of farming and a bit of family background is undertaken.  This study is an attempt to provide an understanding of the early days of the area and its residents. 

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Eight children were born to John and Polly Curry while living in New York and Pennsylvania.  Among the very earliest names recorded in the area’s history is that of Curry.  John and Polly’s sixth child, Enoch Waldron, b. May 17, 1821, arrived in Brighton in 1841.  He bought land in Brighton Township in the Pleasant […]

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A newspaper clipping (c. 1900) contains a list of 41 farms, almost all in Brighton Township.  From that list & research on background of these farms should show what life was like at that time.  The Lamart Hicks Farm on Skeman Road is the subject of this article.

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The 80-acre Hillcrest Farm of Robert Longthorn was located on the west side of Flint Rd., south of Hilton Rd., E ½ SE section 19, Brighton Township.  Prior to his purchase, it had been owned by Henry J. Warner.  It was originally bought from the Federal Government November 16, 1836, by John Dean (Pennsylvania) and […]

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Thomas S. Hilton, born in England in 1822 came to the U.S. in 1849; settling the Brighton Township shortly after.  By 1852 he and Adeline Rogers, neighbors across the road, married.  Adeline, born in 1834 in New Jersey, came with her parents, Amos and Permelia Rogers in 1836.  (The 1859 Atlas shows Rogers owned 50 […]

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Less than 20 years after the earliest pioneer settled in Brighton Township, Rev. and Mrs. Chauncey Osborne arrived in 1852.  Newcomers to the village area were hard pressed to find organized Christian leadership.  The German congregation of St. George Evangelical Lutherans had been chartered in Genoa Township and St. Patrick Roman Catholic Church was making […]

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In the 1870 census of Livingston County we find the first evidence of Myron West living in Brighton Township.  He is working for Hiram Nichols who has 120 acres in Section 35, SE ¼ (The present side of Brighton Hospital.  The house, which formed the nucleus of the hospital was moved to its present location […]

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