The idea to place a marker in honor of the early missionaries who came to Upper Canada began in 1994 as Napanee Branch Pres. Raymond Mackintosh read a passage from Ivan J. Barrett's book, Joseph Smith and the Restoration.
Pres. Mackintosh said that a chapter included three pages on missionary work in Canada, commencing in June 1832 and of the forming the first branch of the Church in British America."This meant that the first branch of the Church in Canada had been located within the present boundaries of the Napanee Branch. I wondered how to use this knowledge."
Through a series of circumstances, he was invited to visit President Monson during a trip to Salt Lake City in the summer of 1995. He explained to Presidentt Monson what he had read and said that he wondered why that phase of Church history wasn't more widely publicized. He said that President Monson listened with interest and then suggested that he might research the question to establish the claim as fact and to keep him informed.
Pres. Mackintosh said he didn't know anything about historical research, but he proceeded and received good support from various sources. He eventually compiled a chronological history of the events that led to the branches of the Church being established in eastern, as well as western, Ontario and sent it to the Church Historical Department. In the summer of 1996, he received a letter from the Historical Sites Committee stating that his findings had been accepted as fact and that a historical marker could be placed in an appropriate location.
