Ferguslea is a rural locality situated in the northern reaches of Grattan Township, a sparsely populated area once accessed primarily by colonization roads and logging trails. While today it is little more than a cluster of homes and agricultural lands, the area’s early development was shaped by the broader wave of Irish settlement that spread through Renfrew County in the mid-19th century.

The name Ferguslea likely derives from a local family name or a romanticized borrowing from Scottish or Irish heritage, as was common at the time. The area gained early traction due to its position near the Bonnechere River system, which influenced both land allocation and resource extraction. Settlers here would have encountered heavily forested terrain, requiring years of labour to convert bush lots into viable farmland. A schoolhouse and a post office once served the area, but both were discontinued by the mid-20th century as populations consolidated into nearby centres like Eganville and Douglas.

For land surveyors, Ferguslea exemplifies rural cadastral evolution with minimal subdivision. Original Crown lots remain largely intact, though altered by irregular severances, often for family inheritances or small-scale land sales. Crown patents issued under settlement duty requirements form the baseline for legal descriptions, though boundary evidence may now be limited to fence lines or blazed trees. In parts of Ferguslea, road allowances were never opened or were informally rerouted, requiring careful reference to deviation by-laws and original Crown field notes.