Reginald Barton-Wright, 'Bartoon' as he was called by his contemporaries, arrived in East Africa from Malaysia, where he had been carrying out a trigonomical survey, in 1897. He was attached to the railway construction parties, and one of his tasks was to manage foot safaris to Lake Victoria taking, in small loads, pieces of the lake steamers, probably the William Mackinnon and or the Winnifred and Sybil, which were based at Kisumu. Trouble en route was encountered from raids by the Nandi.

In 1902, the Governor, Sir Charles Eliot, established the Lands Department, and Barton-Wright was put in charge of administering the Crown Lands Ordinance, involving the distribution of farming land to European settlers. He had one of the first, if not the first, privately owned cars in Nairobi, a chain driven G.W.K., and he constructed the first tennis court in Nairobi, beside his bungalow, almost opposite the Nairobi Club. He returned in 1919 and handed over to H.T. Martin. Barton-Wright married Helen Muriel Holden, and their three children were among the first Europeans to be born in Nairobi.

Compiled with reference to Some notes on an East African 'Old Timer', by William Hale.