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ISAAC GILBERT BAKER, merchant, now of St. Louis, Mo, is a son of Connecticut and was born in Ridgefield, in that State, August 22, 1819. Isac Gilbert, grandfather on his mother's side, was a descendent of Matthew Gilbert, one of the planters of the New Haven colony, and Dr. Amos Baker, his other grandfather, served in the American Revolution as assistant surgeon in Wadsworth's Connecticut brigade,. With his father's family, Isaac G. Baker left the old home in Ridgefield, when eight years old, and moved to New Haven, where the lad learned all that common schools could teach him, spending on year thereafter in the academy at Wilbraham, Mass. Then, as a clerk, he began to sell groceries in a retail store.
In the spring of 1839, before Horace Greeley had uttered the famous remake, "Go West, young man," and indeed before there was any New York Tribune in which to utter it, Mr. Baker crossed the State to enter as a clerk at a store in Burlington, Ia. In 1841 he accepted a situation in the Sac and Fox Indian agency at Des Moines, Ia, and was present when the treaty was signed, under which the red men ceded more the three-fourths of the present state of Iowa to the Federal government. The Indians thereafter removed to a reservation near what is now Ottawa, Kan, Mr. Baker following them and carrying on the Indian and general trade until 1851. Then, while continuing his store at the Sac and Fox agency, he opened another in Wesport, Mo. In 1864, Pierre Chouteau, jr. & Co, offered to Mr. Baker control of the trade in furs and Indian supplies at the distant Fort Benton. The offer was accepted. Mr. Chouteau died in 1865, and the exclusive control of the Missouri river trade of Piere Chouteu jr., & Co. was
was sold to a new company, of which Martin Bates of New York was head and principle stockholder. In 1866 Mr. Baker built a general store and warehouse at Fort Benton, and engaged in mercantile business under the firm name of I.G. Baker & Co, operating the Baker line of steamboats, transporting freight by wagons to the mining towns, and trading with the Indians. Every year, he collected in that region from 15,000 to 22,000 dressed buffalo robes and shipped them to market in the East. In 1874 the Canadian government raised a force of 500 mounted police and garrisoned the American boundary line, and the Missouri river then became the most practicable route over which the police could obtain supplies and Mr. Baker shared largely in the business.
Mr. Baker sold his mercantile business in 1878 but retained large interests in Montana to the present day. He is president of The Benon & St Louis Cattle Co., a the valley at the foot of the Highwood mountains, twenty-five miles from Ft. Benton, and upon that property spends three months every year with his family and the domestics. the remainder of the year he dwells in St. Louis, and is occupied there with the affairs of the Continental National Bank.
America's Successful Men of Affairs: The United States at large
edited by Henry Hall
The New York Tribune 1896
http://books.google.com/books?id=Hp0MAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA48&dq=antique+new+haven+planters+original+gilbert&hl=en&sa=X&ei=DVciT6OhEK7jsQKqvvH7CA&ved=0CGsQ6AEwCTgU#v=onepage&q=antique%20new%20haven%20planters%20original%20gilbert&f=false
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