Ever since Vince Agostino from Toronto purchased a house nearly 160-years-old in Elora five years ago, he became fascinated with the house’s history and had been looking for descendants of the man who built his home.

Little did he know, they would come right to his doorstep. 

The old stone house belonging to Agostino sits on Princess Street near downtown Elora and belonged to Francis Dalby, who built the house himself and whose legacy is known far and wide across the town. 

Agostino, a businessman from Toronto, found it to be a little slice of paradise and it wasn’t just the architecture in and outside the house that intrigued him, it was the history of the house and the man Francis Dalby himself.

“I cannot put into words with you what it’s like living there,” says Agostino who lives in the Elora home with his wife Susan and two children – Marcus 23, and Nicole 26. The family has split its time between Toronto and Elora during the pandemic. 

The house is hidden on a street facing the Grand River surrounded by greenery. Old wooden floorboards cover the interior which is furnished with antique fixtures such as an old wood oven, and mini curtains to cover the little windows. A little balcony on the top floor overlooks the garden below decorated with statues and fountains and an old water pump in the garden from Dalby’s time which works even today.

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