Brantford is a city in southwestern Ontario, Canada, founded on the Grand River. Modern Highway 403 connects it to Woodstockin the west and Hamilton in the east; and Highway 24 connects to Cambridge to the north and Simcoe to the south. It is the seat of Brant County, but it is politically separate with a government independent of the county.
Brantford is sometimes known as the "Telephone City": former city resident Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone at his father's home, the Bell Homestead. In 1876 he conducted the first long-distance telephone call, making it from Brantford to Paris, Ontario.
Brantford is also the birthplace of hockey player Wayne Gretzky, comedian Phil Hartman, as well as Group of Seven member Lawren Harris. Brantford is named after Joseph Brant, an important Mohawk chief during the American Revolutionary War and later, who led his people in their first decades in Upper Canada. Many of his and other First Nations citizens live on the neighbouring reserve of Six Nations of the Grand River First Nation, the most populous reserve in Canada.
