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This two storey vernacular farmhouse is located on the west part of Markham Township Lot 21, Concession 6. George Pingel, the eldest son of the Berczy settler family of Joachim and Anna Maria Pingel, received the Crown patent for the full 200 acres of this lot in 1804. George Pingel married Maria Koepke. One of their sons, Jacob Henry Pingel, inherited the family farm after his father’s death in 1852. Jacob Henry Pingel’s first wife was named Martha. In 1847 he remarried, his second wife being Henrietta Speas. According to the 1851 census, by that time George Pingel was no longer listed as residing on the property. His son, Jacob Henry Pingel and his family were farming here, residing in a two storey log house.
A new farmhouse had been constructed on the property by the time of the 1861 census. The Pingel residence was described as a one storey brick dwelling. There were two daughters in the family, Marcella and Alice. By 1871, with no sons to take over the farm, Jacob and Henrietta Pingel had moved and rented their property to tenant farmers.
Jacob Henry Pingel died in 1878. His widow, Henrietta relocated to Toronto where she lived with Marcella Nellie McKay, one of her daughters. In 1907, the farm was sold out of the Pingel family’s ownership. In the early 20th century, the former Pingel farm had a series of owners. One of these, either George Reesor (owner from 1907-1910), Henry Arnold (owner from 1901-1912) or Edward Bewell (owner from 1912-1922) raised the one storey brick dwelling to two storeys.
The next major period of change for the house at 4638 Major Mackenze Drive East occurred under the ownership of Frank and Ila (Hastings) Brown, who purchased the property in 1937. Both Frank and Ila Brown were from Scarborough Township. They expanded and remodeled the farmhouse on the property into the form it has today. They also re-built the barn after it burned shortly after they moved to the farm. Members of the Brown family continued to reside on the property into the 2010s.
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