Buffalo wasn't quite the same in 1904 as it is today. Erie County didn't have over one million population and there was less industry and commerce. But then, just as now, there was a great need for professionally designed protection against the financial disaster of fire and other perils. It was in an effort to fulfill this need for individuals and businessmen that Herbert Deuel and Percy Lapey formed Deuel, Lapey and Company, the predecessor to Edmund D. Stevens, Inc., now one of Buffalo's oldest independent insurance agencies.