Here is the e-mail that I sent to the current owners of this hotel, which was built by my ancestors John and Alfred Burgoyne who were brickmakers in Little Mill, Wales.  If I was doing a house history on this magnificent house I would be contacting myself!

 

My name is Robin Burgoyne.  I am a house historian living in Toronto, Canada www.housestories.ca and I am VERY interested in the history of Gliffaes Country House Hotel.  My interest in the hotel is twofold.  Not only am I interested professionally and personally in the background behind houses of historical significance, but I have a particular interested in Gliffaes.  You may or may not recognize the name Burgoyne.  The Burgoyne’s were Welsh brickmakers.  John Burgoyne came from Hertfordshire to start up the “Burgoyne Brickworks” in Little Mill around 1850.  He was my great-great grandfather.  John had a son, Alfred James Burgoyne who also went into the brick business.  Cut to the early 1980’s  when my father Edward Burgoyne, who had moved to Canada in 1954 and had made his career as a planner/real estate appraiser and my mother Jocelyn, were travelling through Wales.  While visiting the area where my father grew up my mother and father came upon a grand old house that was being used as a hotel.  As they approached the house my father turned to my mother and said to her;  “I think that my great Grandfather built that house.”,  and so inside they went.  They spoke to the proprietors of the hotel and recounted to them my father’s story.  The response that they received in reply was; “You’re name is Burgoyne?  I think there may be some bricks with that name imprinted on them out back.”  And so my parents went around to the back of the house.  There in the orchard amoungst the trees they came upon a pile of bricks with the name of my great-great grandfather’s brickworks on them.  I am therefore guessing that my father was probably correct in his belief that my forefathers at least had some hand in the making of this house.  While in the orchard my parents picked  up four of those bricks and with great effort they brought them home to Canada with them.  Each one of the those bricks now lies in the home of one of Edward Burgoyne’s children in Canada.  They act not only as interesting conversation pieces, but also as reminder of our ties to Wales and our family that once lived there and produced bricks.  You can now understand why I feel a connection and am so interested in the history of Gliffaes.

Sincerely,

Robin T Burgoyne

 

 

Today when I met with my writer friend Robert Hoshowsky for our usual coffee and chat, I started to think.

It is seldom that most of us stop to reflect upon the history of the buildings that we frequent each day.  When they were built?  How the spaces have been used in years gone by, and who frequented them?  These are questions to which, in general, we tend not to pay much attention.  In my case, the venue that is my regular haunt is a coffee shop located at the corner of Redwood and Gerrard, an integral part of the Leslieville community.  The location of the eastern most boundary and thus whether or not this area is actually part a of Leslieville, is definitely up for debate.  Some say it stops at Greenwood, others say Coxwell.  I would say that historically the boundary was Greenwood but that over the years that  commonly-agreed-upon boundary has slowly shifted to included the area right up to Coxwell.

Regardless, the Sideshow Cafe is not only a comfortable hangout for a host of coffee consuming regulars, myself included, but is also a well known pit stop for those who drop of their children at the Centre of Gravity Circus, a circus school located in the large hall next door.  The venue is a place for circus and theatrical performances as well as playing host to other community events, such as NDP film screenings and community meetings.  It is a large part of the vivacity and charm of the Sideshow that derives from the synchronicity that lies between the two venues.

Now back to my original musings.  After thinking about what my local coffee shop and the space attached to it might have been like in years gone by, I decided to do some detective work to find out for myself. The first thing that I discovered is that the current incarnation of the space at 1298 and 1300 Gerrard St E began in 1998, at which time the owners undertook an extensive renovation project so that it could be used for its current purposes.

But what was it before they took over?  I soon found that the building for a good portion of its existence has been used, as it is now, as a performance/theatre space.  Built in 1914, the building was initially operated as a vaudeville theatre called The Classic.  Vaudeville in Canada began in the 1880’s and existed until the early 1930’s.  It was a genre that consisted of a series of separate acts such as music, dance, live animals, male and female impersonators, and acrobats, to name a few.  The “Classic” theatre was just one of the many venues which sprung up in Toronto to house such performances.  It was built by a man by the name Joseph Garnet, who lived at 730 Logan Ave and also had what was likely an office at 1301 Gerrard St E.   His profession was, according to the city directory of 1917, “amusements”.  Garnet quickly disappeared from the Toronto scene after its opening but the theatre continued to operate.

 

 

There is very clearly a tie between the building and the development of this particular part of Toronto.  Prior to 1914, when The Classic opened the portion of land between Greenwood and Coxwell and north/south between Queen Street E and Danforth Ave was owned almost exclusively by the Ashbridge family.

 

 

They were a well established farming family that moved to Toronto from the United States towards the end of the 18th century.  However, by 1910, due to pressure placed upon the area by the rapidly expanding City of Toronto, the family started to sell off their land to developers and various individuals, mostly new European immigrants. What was known as Ramblers Road, which started at Greenwood and ran through to Coxwell, was then taken over by the city after the annexation of 1909, and became an extension of the already existing Gerrard St E.

So it was that with the creation of this portion of Gerrard as a truly public street and development of this expanse of land, that services needed and desired by the growing population in the area began to emerge.  These included other theatres such as the Oxford Theatre at 1326 Gerrard, which opened at about the same time as the Classic but lasted a few short years, it would seem also owned by Garnet, and another theatre called The Guild which opened at 1275/1279  Gerrard St E.  Confectionaries, hardware stores, pool halls, barbershops (there was one in 1298 at the beginning of the twenties) all started to line the street. When The Classic was first built, as now,  it was with a smaller space attached which was 1302 Gerrard.  The first occupant of this space was Thomas Taylor, a confectioner. Now back to the particular story of the Classic.  Soon after the opening of the theatre and following WWI, the era of the silent film in Canada took hold and the theatre expanded its repertoire to include film showings.

 

 

The hall was for a time used by the Rhodes Presbyterian Church to conduct meetings and services.

 

 

The theatre was also turned into a pool room for a short time in the years around 1928.  By this time the space located at 1302, although still utilized as a corner store was now run by William Kingsmill until sometime after WWII.  The space continued to  house a corner store/cigar store for many years after that.

 

 

 

The Classic theatre has always been, as it today, a venue for active community political discussion.  In 1933 the CCF, the precursor to today’s NDP got into a disagreement with the owner of the theatre of their use of the venue.  Today the NDP are welcomed and regular film screenings in the theatre.

By the end of the Second World War a further reconfiguration of the Classic Theatre became necessary with the arrival of the “talkies” and in August 1939, plans were drawn up.

 

 

During the nine forties and early nineteen fifties The Classic remained active as a movie theatre and central neighbourhood hub.

 

 

In 1956 it closed its doors and 1300 Gerrard was taken over by a large retail store called Pennyworth’s Department Store.  It continued as a retail space for a number of years until its transformation back to a performance/theatre space in the late 1990’s at which time, most importantly, my hangout The Sideshow Cafe also came into existence.

 

 

 

 

Last weekend was one of my favorite weekends in Toronto.  The occasion was the annual Doors Open.  For historians it’s a great opportunity to venture inside some of Toronto’s oldest and most well preserved buildings.  This year however, there was one offering that was of particular interest to me.  I was delighted to find that Canada’s oldest family run and one of its most historically significant businesses, which I have had the pleasure to deal with on many occasions, was on the list of participants.

              

 

Robert McCausland Limited was founded in 1856 and since that time the business has created an enormous number of the stain glass windows in Toronto, an estimated 32,000 have been recorded in the company’s books since its beginnings.  These windows are predominantly found in religious contexts but can also be found in many homes and commercial buildings throughout the city.  The company has been run by a long line of McCausland men over the years, the most recent of which is the very affable and the fifth in succession, Andrew McCausland.  While visiting the company’s glass studio I learned that Robert McCausland Limited has not only been handed down from generation to generation, but has also changed locations approximately 4 times since its inception.  Its most recent location is in Etobicoke.  Andrew also proudly informed visitors to the studio that during the period since 1925 the company has employed a total of only 4 artists/designers and approximately 5 bookkeepers/receptionists.  I was indeed in the heart of a very special place, a place where this one family has for so long proudly operated its business and created beautiful stained glass.

                      

What made my trip to the McCausland studios all the more meaningful was that I have been in touch with Andrew on several occasions while researching the history of houses that had McCausland stained glass.  Each time I was pleasantly surprised that, after having sent a email and picture of the window, I  quickly received confirmation that the stained glass  was indeed  created  by the McCausland clan.  The fact that the windows in the historic houses that I was researching were all indeed created by the McCauslands was of no great surprise to me.  Between 1856 and 1923 when Robert McCausland died, a extremely significant percentage of the stain glass manufactured in Toronto and many other parts of Canada, was made by the McCauslands.  While visiting the studio last weekend I learned from talking to Andrew that the business did not have extremely detailed records of each commission over the long length of its existence.  However he could tell, particularly in the case of the secular work, by the design whether or not it was one of the company’s creations.

One client for whom I wrote a house history has meticulously restored their beautiful Annex Queen Anne style house, and as part of the renovations restored the stain glass windows.  They were McCausland windows, likely made by Robert McCausland himself and installed in 1897 when the house was built.  The restoration of the windows was done by Andrew, Robert’s great, great, great grandson, in 2008.  Talk about coming full circle.  This was not the first time however, that Andrew had followed up on the work done by his illustrious ancestors.  For instance,  several years ago  Andrew restored the magnificent dome located in what was known as the most impressive commercial building of its time, the 1885 Bank of Montreal building, now the Hockey Hall of Fame.  The dome is also deemed to be one of Robert McClausland’s most impressive creations.

After having visited the studio it is evident to me from the way that Andrew talks about his work that he is extremely proud of what he does and the legacy of his family.  It is the revelation of these connections that is one of the things that I enjoy most about my job.  Finding those ties between the past and the present which manifest themselves in very tangible ways, is not only intriguing and a lot of fun, but it is also gratifying, through my work, to be able to pass it on to others.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I was recently invited to a gathering at 45 Spadina Rd, once known as the Spadina Gardens Apartments. This impressive building is one of a pair of Victorian apartment buildings, constructed in 1906 by Sir Henry Pellatt, wealthy entrepreneur and builder of Casa Loma.  My hostess, when I told her what I did for a living,  engaged me in the story of the history of the building as she knew it.  Apparently, when Pellatt went bankrupt, lost Casa Loma, and had to sell its contents, (an interesting aside: I once found a detailed newspaper listing of the items sold at this bankruptcy sale, in which there was reference to the occupant of one of the houses that I was researching, purchasing a elaborate chandelier), he and his wife Mary Pellatt (nee Dodgson) went to live at 3 Spadina Gardens.  My hostess further explained that it was her understanding that the Pellatt’s did not share the same apartment but rather, lived across the hall from one another.  The story was that the death of Lady Pellatt in the apartment building in 1924 was in fact suicide.

Of course when I returned home from the gathering, my curiosity got the better of me.  Did this poor woman really commit suicide while living in the beautiful building that I just visited?  I set out to find out whether there was truth to this story.  I found one reference to Lady Pellatt’s death written by Charles (Carlie) Oreskovich  http://www.kingofcasaloma.com/ghosts.html  in which the author indicated that Lady Pellatt may have “shot herself ‘accidently'”.  However, there are other sources, for example, the death registration obtained from ancestry.ca, which list death to be a result of a heart attack brought on by long-term diabetes.

 

The Toronto Star and The Globe and Mail both also described Mary Pellatt’s death to be a result of a heart attack.  The question then is whether or not the circumstances surrounding the death of Lady Mary Pellatt was the subject of urban myth or if in fact, there was what we would now term a “cover up”.  Perhaps my meanderings will lead me to find the absolute truth or perhaps not.  But that is the often the case with history, sometimes the absolute truth can be elusive.  I think in this case I may carry on and try to find it.