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WAS born in Hagerstown, Maryland, June 15, 1765. The Hagers and Kershners were his immediate relatives.  His father died when he was two years old, leaving two children—Jacob, aged four, and Martin.  Mr. Baum, in his later years, was fond of relating his various adventures when a youth, crossing the Alleghany Mountains with the sutlers' trains of supplies to Wayne's army, then fighting the Indians in the North-western Territory. He was afterward engaged in surveying in New Jersey, and is supposed to have come West with a surveying party, probably with John Cleves Symmes.  His great tact and judgment in selecting the finest localities in South-western Ohio would seem to indicate that he profited by the knowledge thus acquired. Witness his selection of the Yellow Springs, Greene County, where he once owned three or four sections; also lands near Miamisburg; and again five or six miles above Hamilton, Butler County, where he located his mother and his half-brothers. He selected Cincinnati for his future residence in 1795, and from that time to his death, he was one of the most prominent, energetic, enterprising of her citizens. He married, in November, 1804, Miss Ann Wallace, sister of Mrs. Judge Burnet, at whose house the wedding took place, in their then new brick house, where the Burnet House now stands. Mr. Baum immediately built a brick residence on Front Street, north-west corner of Sycamore Street, his place of business being a log-house (weather-boarded) right on the corner, his garden running back about two hundred feet to the residence of his brother-in-law, Samuel Perry. 

Mr. Baum engaged in every thing that would advance the prosperity of Cincinnati ; owned an interest in the first steamboats, on one of which D. K. Cady was clerk ; in the first steam flour-mill, located at the foot of Broadway; in shipping produce to New Orleans, and bringing back in his barges sugar, coffee, tea, and all groceries from thence; with Judge Burnet, in the first sugar refinery, of which Jacob Guelick was manager and afterward owner.  He was for some time president of the Miami Exporting Company Bank ; was the first mayor; was interested in the first public library ; the Cincinnati College; was president of the building committee of the Second Presbyterian Church, recently torn down, on Fourth Street, between Vine and Race Streets; was very much interested in the construction of the Miami Canal; he was president of the companies that selected and bought, at the land-office in Wooster, in 1817, the lands on which Fremont, Maumee City, and Toledo are now located. He built, in 1820-1823, the large house east of Pike Street, afterward owned by Nicholas Longworth, and at present the residence of David Sinton, probably as commodious, and delightful a residence still, after the lapse of sixty years, as any in the city. After this active and useful life, Mr. Baum became involved, through indorsements and losses, and saw a large part of his fortune swept away. He died, December 14, 1831, during an epidemic of influenza, which carried off a number of citizens.  He left a widow and six children—four sons and two daughters—of whom only two, Mrs. Mary P. Ewing, widow of Alexander H. Ewing, and Mrs. Eleanor Hartshorn, widow of Charles Hartshorn, now survive.

Source:  In Memoriam Cincinnati 1881, Cincinnati, A. E. Jones, Publisher, 1881.