FAIRFIELD TOWNSHIP
The Township of Fairfield was settled mostly by people from the State of New York. The first land entered in the town was by John W. Austin, Jr. 80 acres, on Section 10, October 7, 1830. The first house was built in 1831, on the southeast quarter of Section 10, by John Arnold. In 1832 there were several log houses erected. The first school-house was put in District No 1, and located on the southeast corner of Section 3. The first church was built by the Baptist denomination on Section 7. Up to 1834 Fairfield was an integral part of Blissfield Township. The first Township-meeting was held in the house of J. H. Carpenter, in the spring of 1834, there being at that time thirty-two electors present! Andrew Millett was chosen Chairman; votes were cast in a hat, in lien of a ballot box, and in the contest between John Baker and John H. Carpenter for the office of supervisor, the former was elected by one majority. Moses Cook was elected the first town clerk. The first saw-mill was built on Section 9 by Levi Shumway and Andrew Millet. The first dairying was commenced in 1832, by Samuel Horton, who carried it on with success during his life, and established the fact that as good cheese could be made in Michigan as in New York. The first cheese-factory was put in operation in 1866, by Rufus Baker. The Township is devoted mostly to grazing, either to make milk for the dairy or to fatten cattle for the shambles, large farms being used for the latter purpose. There are now about 700,000 pounds of cheese made in the Township annually. The first post-office was established in the winter of 1835-6, and was called “Baker’s,” Orrin Baker being the postmaster, - a duty he fulfilled for eighteen years. John Baker was the first mane that contracted to carry the mails from Baker’s Corners to Adrian, a distance of six miles, and the first few mails he carried tied up in his red bandanna. There are now seven churches, thirteen school-houses, four cheese factories, four steam saw-mills, one steam grist mill, and two planning-mills, two shingle-mills, and one cheese-box factory, in the limits of Fairfield Township, which embraces three villages within its boundaries, viz, Fairfield, Jasper, and Weston; the former being popularly known by its original name “Baker’s Corners.” As a contrast between the early day and the present state of things in this part of Lenawee county, we will give on item, viz.; just prior to the organization of Fairfield from the territory of Blissfield Township, Orrin Baker and a few other accompanied a surveyor, who chained a line from what is now Blissfield Village through to Defiance, on the Maumee, without finding a settler in the whole distance!
Copyright Ed Van Horn, 2006, Port St Lucie, Florida