Eastman, Nadab

(submitted by Anne Wight) 

Nadab Eastman (1801 -), was born in Grenville County, Ont. He was the son of Amherst Eastman and Lucy Farmer. Amherst, from Vermont, USA, pioneered on grant land north of Prescott. Nadab was known as "a native of Prescott," but later moved to Carleton County, where he married Sarah Elizabeth Gordon (c. 1808 -). They belonged to the Congregational Church. In 1833, they moved to Lot 24, Con. 6 NER, Warwick Twp., shortly after Henry Utter, the first Arkona settler, had come. 

Nadab Eastman and Nial Eastman were the two Eastman familied from whom Arkona was names "Eastmans' Corners." (Nial Eastman, whose lot in Bosanquet cornered Nadab's, was the founder of Arkona Baptist Church.) Nadab's brother Benjamin came a year later to another part of Warwick Twp. 

Charles Nadab Eastman family. Courtesy J Eastman & D Silver.

Nadab had a family of eleven children, one of whom died in infancy and two other about whom no details are known. Nadab's oldest son, William Amherst, moved to Michigan when of age. His next two sons, Joseph and Alexander, lived briefly in Warwick Twp. before moving to Michigan. Two other sons of Nadab, Solomon and Leonard, also lived in Michigan. 

Nadab's fourth son, Marvin bought Lot 23, Con. 6 NER, a lot next to his father, and raised his family there. From Marvin's son, Charles Nadab Eastman, there are several descendants in the area, mostly in Bosanquet Twp. Charles farmed on the lot formerly owned by his grandfather Nadab. Vi Eastman, a daughter-in-law of Charles Nadab, still owns a portion of Nadab's original lot.

Nadab's oldest daughter, Margaret, married Joe Jaynes, a carpenter who helped build homes and barns in and around Arkona Village. Margaret and Joe have descendants in Sarnia. In a 1927 interview, Margaret and Joe, reflecting on their early days in Arkona, recalled

when Highway 7 was just a muddy trail; when the only place of worship was a small log church west of the cemetery;...and when the village was surrounded by a dense bush of maples, beech and elm; and of the mourners following sadly behind an oxen-drawn sleigh serving in the summer as a hearse. 

Melissa, another daughter of Nadab, married Frank Donley, who ran the Donley Hotel in Arkona. Two sons and two daughters were born to Melissa and Frank before the family moved to La Crosse, Wisconsin. 

Chapter 24 of 25 - Eastman, Nadab

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