Celebrating 140 years One winter’s evening in 1878 a young farmer earnestly scratched his plans and dreams into his diary. The place? 120 acres tucked under the protective shadow of the Escarpment in Ontario’s Niagara Peninsula. The dream? To establish a prosperous farm for future generations. Trying to make a living, he had experimented with grapes, onions, hens, cows, sheep, grain — and that year, a little patch of strawberries. Sure enough by 1882, his hard work began to pay off. But little did E.D.Smith know that the juicy strawberries that grew so well in this rich soil, would be the beginning of a food empire.