Edmonton heritage

From C2E forum
Edmonton is a newborn in terms of most European or Asian Cities. As you may notice from the following photos, the building material of choice in those days was plain red brick.

Edmonton Historic Building Tour – Part 2.

Edmonton is but a newborn in terms of most European or Asian Cities. Even compared to eastern North American cities it is relatively young. Fort Edmonton, or Edmonton house was built near the present day Legislature Building in 1830, and in 1871 the first log house was built outside the fort’s walls. 1875 and 1876 saw the first hospital and hotel. In 1891 the first railway reached Strathcona, then a separate town, now a trendy Edmonton neighborhood. On January 9, 1892 Edmonton was given birth and incorporated as a town, a scant 12 years later it became a city.

The majority of surviving heritage structures were born at about the same time as Edmonton itself. This means that most have just reached, or are about to reach their centenary soon. As you may notice from the following photos, the building material of choice in those days was plain red brick, however, there are a few structures which incorporate larger masonry blocks in whole or in part.

I intend to continue adding pictures to this thread as I make my way to photograph other parts of the city, but for today, we will start with Jasper Ave East, and the downtown core.

All names, dates, and history were researched from three sources:
1. ‘Historic Walks of Edmonton’, by Kathryn Ivany
2. ‘Naming Edmonton’, credited writer City of Edmonton
3. Placards fixed to the buildings themselves by the Edmonton Historic Society, I have included pictures of these where they exist.

Hotel MacDonald
Address: 10065 100th St.
Year: 1915

Built over four years for 2.85 million dollars by the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway in classic chateau style common for large flagship railway hotels. The hotel has been restored a few times, the latest after it was sold to the Canadian Pacific Railway. Sold again to the Fairmont hotel group, today it is branded the Fairmont Hotel MacDonald.

Union Bank Inn
Address: 10053 Jasper Ave.
Year: 1911

Originally built for the Union Bank, the building was baught by James Richardson in 1929 and was renamed the Richardson Building. In the 1990s it was restored, and remodelled into a boutique hotel and houses an upscale restaurant on the main floor.

Canadian Permanent Building
Address: 10150 100th St.
Year: 1910

One of the best examples of classical detailing in Edmonton, this building housed the Canadian Permanent Company until 1961.

McLeod Building
Address: 10136 100th St.
Year: 1915

Designed by an American architect, there is an identical building in Spokane. This was the city’s tallest building for forty years after completion, and was the signature building of Kenny McLeod, a man who had already retired after making his fortune in real estate. The building has been said to be built to nine floors, one for each of his children.

Sorry, waited 15 minutes for the Staples truck to leave…

One thing you should note is fort Edmonton actually started in 1795 as a Fur Trading post.

The Boyle Street (Jasper East) area has some great potential with the Quarters, especially being so close to the core. Many people don’t actually know this, but the Boyle area was the original downtown core of Edmonton. It was where the town grew up, and when the Hudson’s Bay Reserve Lands (on current downtown, Oliver, and parts of Rossdale) was subdivided and sold in portions to the City of Edmonton in the late 1900s (1900-1910 – so the decade, meaning 1907-1910ish) and the area where current Churchill Square and TELUS Plaza are were booming like crazy and this is also where the city adopted a formal grid network with streets N-S and avenues E-W contradicting Boyle until later. The current downtown soon became the centre and was called the downtown, ditching Boyle.

To be continued…