Loran Ellis Baker (May 13, 1831 – December 31, 1899) was a successful businessman in Yarmouth where he built a large importing and mercantile business and eventually branched into ship ownership to facilitate the trade. He was born on May 13, 1831, in

Yarmouth, Nova Scotia Yarmouth is a town in southwestern Nova Scotia, Canada. A port town, industries include fishing, and tourism. It is the terminus of a ferry service to Bar Harbor, Maine, run by Bay Ferries. History Originally inhabited by the Mi'kmaq, the regi ...

, the only child of Delina (Kenney) and Ellis Baker. He was in 1870, the first president of the ''Western Counties Railway Company'', the WCR was one of the founding companies of the

Dominion Atlantic Railway The Dominion Atlantic Railway was a historic railway which operated in the western part of Nova Scotia in Canada, primarily through an agricultural district known as the Annapolis Valley. The Dominion Atlantic Railway was unusually diverse for a ...

. Baker is credited with establishing tourism in Nova Scotia in 1885 using the ''Yarmouth Steamship Company'' to bring tourists to the province and forming a company which built the requisite hotels and amenities at appropriate locations. He was appointed to the

Legislative Council of Nova Scotia The Legislative Council of Nova Scotia was the upper house of the legislature of the Canadian province of Nova Scotia. It existed from 1838 to May 31, 1928. From the establishment of responsible government in 1848, members were appointed by the ...

in 1878. On December 31, 1899, he died while sleeping on a train from

Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

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