In 1846 a group of converts to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints enroute from Gardner's Mills to Nauvoo, Ill., chopped a road through the forest to reach the London Road. Among them was Archibald Gardner the first settler of Alvinston who built the first grist mill in Brooke Township. The Nauvoo Road sanctioned as a Brooke Township highway Nov. 22, 1851, comprises that portion of Highway 79 from road allowance between concessions 8 & 9 to the northern township line. This stone from Gardner's Mill was contributed by the Brooke and Alvinston Agricultural Society to whom it was presented by Duncan J. McEachern who provided for its removal from the original mill site on the east bank of the Sydenham River.
