Jacob Beck (born Grand Duchy of Baden, 1816), an enterprising young German, came to Waterloo Township in 1837 from Schenectady, N. Y., having come from Germany the year before. He had invented a peculiar water wheel, described as of small size and large power, which soon gave him an enviable reputation. Starting a small foundry in the Village of New Hope he soon transferred to Preston and built a foundry on the premises later owned by Peter E. Shantz, where he did a rapidly increasing business. Unfortunately, a fire completely destroyed his foundry and rendered the proprietor penniless, as he had no insurance. Thanks to the liberality of neighbors a sufficient sum was raised by subscription to enable Mr. Beck to start anew and to have a larger plant than that destroyed by the fire. He soon had a large staff selling his stoves, etc., in Western Canada. With increasing success he enlarged his premises and took into partnership two of his assistants, John Clare and Valentine Wahn. For improving the water power of Robert Hunt, proprietor of the woolen mills in the village, Mr. Beck obtained the privilege to build a saw mill on Hunt's property, which he carried on for some time. Beck evolved a project for a water power canal leading from the Speed River dam and supplying power to mills and factories along it, such was the confidence in those days in the plentiful flow of the river. The scheme for the power canal did not find support. Beck became displeased with Preston, dissolved partnership with Clare and Wahn, Wahn continuing the foundry. He located a good water supply in Wilmot Township, at a place he called Baden, where, beginning in 1856, he soon established a foundry and a grist mill and did a flourishing business. Lovell's Canada Directory of 1857 gives Beck as postmaster at Baden, miller, founder and machinist. Mr. Beck died in 1906. One of his sons is the Hon. Adam Beck, Chairman 'Hydro-Electric Power Commission of Ontario, born in Baden, 1857.

First Annual Report Of The Waterloo Historical Society, 1912 pg 12