Crane asks for 2,500 more trees

Jim Crane addressed Southwold councillors “from the bottom of my heart” as he asked for 2,500 trees to be planted on former conservation land gifted by his uncle that ended up in private hands with a new home on it.

He was speaking at the July 8 council meeting, about the former Crane Conservation Area near Iona Station, west of St. Thomas. His great-uncle, Dr. James Crane, a well-known conservationist, planted a forest of 7,000 trees there, including about 90 different species, on the 8-acre lot in 1938. It had been sold for $1 to University of Western Ontario in 1955, on the condition it would remain a conservation area.

It was subsequently sold to the County of Elgin in 1961, then Lower Thames Valley Conservation Authority in 1976, each time for $1, always to remain a conservation area.

Mr. Crane, a Malahide resident, had, by luck in early 2021, been driving by the property and noticed a brass plaque, installed in 1961 to recognize the property’s history, was missing. He stopped to search for it, and encountered a man on a tractor coming out of the bush area.

The man, Joshua Englehart, explained he now owned the lot, and the brass plaque was now inside his home on the adjacent property, which has also been previously owned by Dr. Crane. According to Mr. Crane in a 2021 interview with the Aylmer Express, Mr. Englehart also appeared to be thinning out the bush.

Mr. Crane found out from LTVCA that they had deemed the property surplus in 1996 and sold the property to Mr. Englehart on Feb. 13, 2019 with a restrictive covenant. The new owner was to maintain the rock memorial with the plaque, and the forest.

The 8-acre property was sold for $9,000. A real estate appraiser said it was assessed for tax purposes for $60,000. Mr. Crane, a certified appraiser of farm equipment, and owner of several rural properties for many years, estimated the land itself was worth $300,000 at the time.

For the complete story, see the July 24 edition of The Aylmer Express.