Society for the study of architecture in canada - SEXTONdigital

SOCIETY FOR THE STUDY OF ARCHITECTURE IN CANADA / SOCIETE POUR L'ETUDE DE L' ARCHITECTURE AU CANADA
SEPTEMBER 1996 SEPTEMBRE NUMBER I NUMERO 3

Society fer tlto StHy of Arclln.cturo in C.n1d1
Sociiti ,..t'itH• IIIIo I'IJclrtitKt•• •• C1nlll1
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Dorothy Field office (403) 431 -2339
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The Society for lhe Sludy of Architecture in Canada
is a learned society devoted to lhe examination of
the role of the built environment in Canadian sociely.
Its membership includes structural and landscape
archilects, architectural historians, urban historians
and planners, sociologists, folklorists, and specialists
in such fields as heritage conservation and landscape
hiStory. Founded in 1974, the Society is currently
the sole nalional society whose focus of interest is
Canada's built envir0flfl8nt in an of its manifestations.
La Societe pour r&tude de ran:hitecture au Canada est
une soci8t8 sav~nte qui se consacre 8 rexamen du rOle
que jooe renvironnement biti dans Ia societe
canadienne. PMmi ses membres, on retrouve des
irQ&niews en structl.n, des arttitectes de paysage, des
Nstoriens en architecture el en urtJanisme, puis des
..-batistes, des sociologues, des folkloristes et des
sp6cialistes dans des domaines tels Ia preservation du
patrinoine et rhistoire du pay-. Fondieen t974, 1a
Sdt8 est pr8senternent Ia seule association nationale
dont rintirit se concentre sur renvironnement biiti du
Canada sous toutes ses formes.
Society for the Study of Architecture in Canada
Societe pour I' etude de I' architecture au Canada
BULLETIN
Volume/Tome 21, Number/Numero 3
In This Issue I Le numero de ce mois-ci
by Percy Johnson ..... .... ......... .. ................................................................................................... 59
The First Leaders of McGill's School of Architecture: Stewart Henbest Capper,
Percy Nobbs, and Ramsay Traquair
by Isabelle Gournay ...... .. ...... .. ................................................ .. .... ............ .. .......................... .. .. 60
Teaching the History of Architecture at McGill, 1896-1903
by Norbert Schoenauer ............................................................................................................. 67
'Archi-ettes' in Training: The Admission of Women to McGill's School of Architecture
by Annmarie Adams ................................ .. ..................................................... ............... ....... .. .. 70
George Heath MacDonald (Class of 1911): The Story of One Graduate from McGill
University's School of Architecture
by Percy Johnson .... ..... .. .... ...................... .. .... .............. .. ........................................... .. ............... 74
Quoi de neuf? I What's New in Print ........................ .. ............................................................. 77
Membership fees are payable at the following rates:
Student, $15.00; Individual/Family, $30.00;
Organization/Corporation/Institution, $50.00;
Patron, $20.00 (plus a donation of not less than
$1 00.00). There is a surcharge of $5.00 for all
foreign memberships. Contributions over and above
membership fees are welcome, and are tax·
deductible. Please make your cheque or money order
payable to the SSAC and send to Box 2302, Station D.
Ottawa, Ontario K 1 P 5W5.
ISSN No. 0228·0744
L'abonnement annuel est payable aux prix suivantes:
etudiant, 15,00 $; individuel/famille, 30,00 $;
organisationJsocieteJinstitut, 50,00 $; bienfaiteur,
20,00 $ (plus un don d'au moins 100,00 $). II y a
des frais additionnels de 5,00 $ pour les
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deductibles d'impot. Veuillez s.v.p. faire le cheque ou
mandai poste payable a l'ordre de SEAC et l'envoyer
a Ia Case postale 2302, succursale D. Ottawa
(Ontario) K1P 5W5.
Produced with the assistance of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council
COVER: Perspective watercolour drawing of the McGill University library extension, Percy Nobbs, 1921; Nobbs & Hyde, architects (Canadian Architecture Collection, McGill
University, Montreal/.
58
SSAC BULLETIN SEAC 21 :3

In This Issue I Le numero de ce mois-ci
e year 1996 marks the centennial of
TiMcGill University's School of Architecture.
McGill is also celebrating its 175th birthday this
year, and several celebrations are planned to reflect
on this venerable institution's history and its futme
role in Canada.
The four articles in this issue of the
Bulletin address the impact McGill has had on
Canadian architecture by considering some of the
School of Architecture's key educators, students,
and courses during its early years. Prof. Isabelle
Gournay's article discusses the significant contributions
made by the first three holders of the
school's Macdonald Chair of Architecture, particularly
on urban and housing reform and on
aesthetic and cultural issues relating to architecture
in this country. Through various lectures
and publications, Stewart Henbest Capper,
Percy Erskine Nobbs, and Ramsay Traquair each
expressed his views on urbanism and regional
identity while simultaneously occupying the
positions of architect and educator.
Norbert Schoenauer, the William C.
Macdonald Emeritus Professor of Architecture
at McGill University, describes the approach
taken by his predecessor S. Henbest Capper in
teaching the history of architecture at McGill
between 1896 and 1903. From his position as a
former educator of student architects, Prof.
Schoenauer laments the diminishing importance
placed on the teaching of architectural
history in the training of Canada's next generation
of architects: displaced by essential new
subjects such as computer-aided design, the
teaching of architectural history today has taken
a secondary role in the training of architects, to
Schoenauer's regret.
Annmarie Adams' article focuses on
the acceptance of women to McGill's School of
Architecture, and on the substantial contributions
to the field of architecture eventually
realized by some of the school's early female
graduates. Drawing upon her extensive research
on this subject. Prof. Adams notes that many
illustrious architects and educators can be
counted among the 39 women who graduated
from the school between 1943 and 1970, despite
the obstacles placed in their way.
In the final article, I investigate the career
of one of McGill's early graduates, George Heath
MacDonald (class of 1911). Already a highly qualified
draftsman in Edmonton, MacDonald chose McGill
over Cornell University when selecting an school at
which to study architecture. While it is impossible
to determine the exact influence of educators such
as Percy Nobbs, MacDonald's decision to enroll at
McGill, and his experiences as a student in Montreal,
are evident in the work subsequently produced by
one of western Canada's most prolific early-20th
century architects.
The architects and educators discussed in
these four articles-and the educators who contributed
the articles-continue to influence the manner
in which architecture in Canada is viewed and discussed.
It is perhaps fitting, therefore, that
publications such as this allow for a moment of reflection,
both to see the path that was chosen and to
mark the trail before us in light of the contributions
and influences of one of Canada's proudest institutions,
McGill University.
I deeply appreciate the assistance and
suggestions offered by the SSAC's Editorial Board,
and the opportunity to guest-edit this special issue
of the Bulletin.
Percy Johnson
Montreal
175
a
1821 Uij 1996
McGill
MONTREAL
21 :3
SSAC BULLETIN SEAC 59

The First Leaders of McGill's
School of Architecture:
Stewart Henbest Capper,
Percy Nobbs, and Ramsay Traquair
In 1939 the School of Architecture had been in operation forty-three years, but the venture had
not proved very successful. The first director, Ste~art Henbest Capper, was a scholar of great
charm, a linguist, musician and Egyptologist, who laid the foundation of an excellent architectural
library, but who did little to build a professional school. Percy Nobbs who followed Capper
in 1903 was a superb draughtsman, an architect who often executed the work of craftsmen he
could not find for his buildings .. .. After ten years he resigned the directorship of the school. but
remained on a part-time basis in the department with his successor, Ramsay Traquair. Like Capper
and Nobbs, Traquair had received his training in Edinburgh. He was an archaeologist and historian
of architecture, and a brilliant lecturer, but again not the man to build up the fortunes of the
school as a professional training institution. By 1939 the number of students had fallen to twentyeight
in five years of classes. 1
by Isabelle Gournay
Found in Stanley Brice Frost's standard history of McGill, this rapid assessment does
not do justice to the first three holders of the Macdonald Chair of Architecture. 2 This
article discusses their significant impact outside academe and beyond the small number
of students to whom they catered by exploring their published views on urban and
housing reform, two topics which were not discussed at length in Canadian architectural
circles until the early 1920s, as well as on aesthetic and cultural aspects of architecture in
Canada and Quebec.
"Gifted with an ingenious theorizing mind of the kind that shed light in controversy,
"3 Capper, Nobbs, and Traquair (figures 1, 2, 3) introduced to Victorian
Montreal the Scottish ideal of the architect as scholar, historian, and polemicist. 4 Their
liberal arts backgrounds acquired at the University of Edinburgh endowed them with
the articulate and inquisitive spirit suited for criticism and the pursuit of reform. 5
They typified the "highly mobile and well-trained individuals who often could not be
accommodated at home but were ideally suited for roles of leadership in Britain's overseas
empire" produced by a Scottish educational system based on "concepts of talent and
utility rather than class or tradition," stressing "the needs of contemporary society." 6 Like
many members of Edinburgh's upper-middle class, the three men completed their
training on the Continent. They all visited Italy and France on a "mini-Grand Tour."
Capper studied briefly in Heidelberg, Traquair in Bonn. In part to escape the Scottish
climate so detrimental to his health, Capper spent four years as tutor and later diplomatic
secretary of Sir Robert Morier in Lisbon and Madrid. 7 He was a student of Jean-Louis
Pascal at the Paris Ecole des Beaux-Arts from 1884 to 1887. 8 Traquair, who never
earned a degree from the University of Edinburgh, studied medieval churches in
Greece and Constantinople under the aegis of the British School of Archaeology at
Athens.
Prevented from active practice by McGill rules, heads of the architecture
school found outlets in lecturing and writing. In pre-mass media days, when public
lectures played a major cultural role, their academic status, as well as verbal and literary
skills rarely matched by other Montreal architects, gave them prestige and
credibility among their peers and the general public. 9 Capper's numerous addresses to
60
SSAC BULLETIN SEAC 21 :3

the Province of Quebec Association of Architects (PQAA), over which he presided in
1899-1900, were reported in the Can·adian Architect and Builder. Nobbs wrote anonymously
in the same periodical and also published in the journals of the Royal
Architectural and Town Planning institutes of Canada, of which he was an active
member. He contributed criticism on current Canadian architecture not only in his
adopted country but also in English publications, where surprisingly little was issued
on the topic. 10 Nobbs' prose often had the spunk expected from a man who won the
silver medal in fencing at the 1908 Olympic games. Prior to his departure, Traquair
was already a prolific author; in Montreal, Traquair continued writing on Byzantine
architecture, art education, and the interaction between the artist and the publicn
He widened his audience to Teacher's Magazine, Canadian Bookman, and the American
journal Atlantic Monthly, where his essays on broad social issues betrayed a "slight
sententiousness of manner." 12
In Edinburgh, Capper had played an important role in the University Hall
movement, which the renowned and influential town planner Patrick Geddes had
founded in 1887. He designed the original western range of Ramsay Garden (1891-93,
figure 4), which was conspicuously located on the Castle esplanade and in which Geddes
occupied a twelve-room apartment. 13 Ramsay Garden was the starting point for Geddes'
civic revitalization and gentrification of Edinburgh's Old Town. He also entrusted Capper
with the restoration and partial reconstruction of Riddle's Close (1893), a tenement on
Lawnmarket. In Montreal, except for a mention that a perspective of Ramsay Garden
was exhibited at the Art Association in 1899, Capper's close involvement with Geddes
seem to have passed unnoticed. Why should have McGill and the PQAA exercised
censorship on this reform issue? Most likely, Capper-whose priorities for Quebec architecture
were the establishment of an educational framework and the strengthening of
professional organizations-thought there was no point in discussing it. McGill was
too conservative to endorse the type of student self-government advocated by Geddes:
Quebec was too much driven by American laissez-faire and materialism to be interested
in the socialist ideals of a still rather obscure Scottish biologist such as Geddes. Montreal
did not have the suitable contingent of designers, craftspersons, and patrons to sustain a
socially responsible version of the Arts and Crafts movement.
Traquair's record as an advocate of urban and housing reform was modest.
Nonetheless, in early 1919, when hopes among professionals and the educated public
for change in national and regional policies reached a high point, he contributed two
significant articles in a series on "Canada in the Building" sponsored by the Montreal
Daily Star. 14 Resulting from workers' "constant anxieties, discomforts and worries of
their home life," labour unrest was a "far more acute" threat that before: "under the
present conditions, slum property pays-the slummier the better." Traquair traced the
origins of worker housing betterment to Britain and praised wartime communities in
this country and the United States. He argued that "if congestion is forbidden and local
transportation improved, land prices will fall." To this end he advocated low-density
Figure 1 (left). Stewart Henbest Capper. {McGill
Collection)
Figure 2 {middle). Percy Nobbs. {Notman Photographic
Archives, McCord Museum, McGill University)
Figure 3 {right). Ramsay Traquair. {McGill Collection)
21 :3 SSAC BULLETIN SEAC
61

Figure 4. University Hall Extension, Castle Hill,
Edinburgh, 1891·93, S. Henbest Capper, architect.
(Academy Architecture 5(1893): 67)
cormnunities along Garden City lines, and regarded the provision of parks and playgrounds
as civic duties. His Scottish background encoLiraged Traquair to identify "the urban
place with higher levels of authority and order than what was expected by the English":
The State can and indeed must give assistance in several ways. Firstly, by collecting, tabulating
and distributing information as to housing conditions, prices and labor. ...
Secondly, by organizing the production of standard materials on a large scale, and by arranging
for their distribution.
Thirdly. by providing. at a small cost, skilled advice and model plans ....
Fourthly, by legislation on public health, on the acquisition of land for public purposes, and on
city planning.
Fifthly, by providing initial capital at a low rate of interest. 15
Progressive within the boundaries of bourgeois reformism, Traquair warned against
an excess of state intervention, as in England, where "much harm has been done by
the attempts of overzealous reformers to enforce impossible and expensive regulations
compelling. for instance, fireproof construction in isolated cottages." He concluded
his second article with a call for gaining the necessary "support of enlightened public
opinion" and enforcing proposed policies by the Edinburgh-born planner Thomas
Adams, "an expert adviser of proved ability." 16
By comparison, Nobbs' contribution to town planning reform in Montreal
was considerable and more thoroughly argued. 17 In particular, he introduced urban
studies at McGill and involved PQAA members in planning issues. Of note were his
broader outreach efforts as chair of the Urbanism Committee of the Civic Improvement
League, a privately sponsored organization founded by French- and English-speaking
business leaders and educators in 1909. Nobbs' tireless attempts to overcome "the
natural inertia of opinion" and gain "a very different spirit in the matter of community
feeling and cormnunity rights" are best expressed in a 1928 article from the supplement to
the McGill News; his specific aim was to find support for a comprehensive Town Planning
and Zoning Enabling Act he had submitted to the provincial government. 18 Nobbs
blamed Montreal for being the prey of "unrestrained individualism" and Montrealers
for having been "so busy making money rather easily that they have occupied their
mind with little else." The city's "all-pervading gridiron layout. whose directions or
axes are determined by the old farm boundaries and thus ignore the orientation desirable
for dwellings in these latitudes," was "radically defective and inept." Montreal could
learn "from the Scandinavian Kingdoms, the new Baltic Republics, and the despised
Balkan States, to say nothing of the French colonies in Africa." He proposed that
Montreal's "happy-go-lucky regime" should be converted into a borough system like the
London County Council, the fire brigade of which he had worked for. Nobbs concluded
by advocating co-partnership (the battle horse of English Garden City
reformers such as Raymond Unwin, with whom he corresponded and whom he invited
to lecture in Montreal) as "the sanest, cheapest, and in every way the best method of
owning realty on the moderate scale of a house for oneself to live in."
62
SSAC BULLETIN SEAC 21 :3

A Report on Housing and Slum Clearance for Montreal, drafted in 1935 with
Leonard Marsh on behalf of the City Improvement League and the Montreal Board of
Trade, was Nobbs' major attempt at reaching out to industrialists and the business
community. 19 This well-documented inquiry on living conditions for Montreal workers,
on planning, and on financing of housing units in the United States, England, and
Western Europe alerted readers to the increasing gap between Canada and other countries.
Insisting on the inadequacy of existing duplex or triplex flats, Nobbs again advocated
reconfiguring the Montreal grid by subdividing its long and narrow blocks (figure 5).
Going against conventional views, he insisted that "social work must be associated
with slum clearance operations" and promoted corporate ownership and management
of low rent dwellings, with a system of state aid adapted from the British Housing Act.
Because of Quebec's climate, he estimated that decent government-assisted housing
would be twice as expensive in Montreal as in Great Britain. Only large-scale operations,
accompanied by the remission of taxes, would therefore be financially sound.
The lack of cultural identity and the aesthetics of recent buildings in Quebec
apparently disappointed Capper, Nobbs, and Traquair on their arrival in Montreal.
Missing, according to Capper, were the "freshness and vigor of design sufficient to give
character and value to architectural work" 20 so evident at Ramsay Garden, a "brilliant
essay in Old Town picturesque tinged with late medireval and early renaissance
Continental influence." 21 Neither he nor his successors advocated direct borrowing
from Scotland's past. since it was ill-fitted to the local climate. However, Nobbs' and
Traquair's Scottish legacy had an impact on their search for a Canadian style, drawing
from the country's national past. Having both worked for Robert Lorimer, they were
fully aware of the Second Scottish Revival. 22 Devised in reaction to the excess of the
Baronial style, this movement took its cue from 17th-century religious and domestic
vernacular architecture. In the same way, for Nobbs and Traquair, an architecture suitable
for Montreal and Canada should rely on the "long French cottages" and "older
churches" of rural Quebec. 23 In ecclesiastical and residential works they encouraged
their colleagues to pay more attention to local rather than to foreign precedents. At
McGill, expanding Nobbs' initiative of sketching trips, Traquair launched in the 1920s
a systematic inventory of vernacular architecture and related crafts, along the same
lines as the National Survey of Scotland, for which he had been an intern. 24 Because
there was for him no other residential form distinctive of North America, he focused
his literary energy on the subject, summarizing his findings in The Old Architecture of
Quebec (figure 6). Traquair's tireless advocacy extended to foreign publications such as
the Journal of the Royal Institute of British Architects 25 and the widely distributed American
magazine House Beautiful, in which he stated that "just because we cannot copy the
French Canadian House is no indication that we may not learn a great deal" from its
"straightforward use of the material to hand; simple, usually rectangular shape; and
absence of 'features"' and "general largeness of parts, and a simple dignity which
avoids even the smallest touch of frivolity." 26
Traquair's early version of critical regionalism-unknown among French- or
American-trained architects in Montreal-also stemmed from traits of character. Very
adaptable to other cultures, Scottish immigrants generally supported the idea of
Canadian national identity. 27 To Traquair, who felt proud to regard Canada as his
adopted country, 28 being pro-New France did not mean being openly pro-French. He
stressed the originality of old Quebec architecture, which he regarded as less dependent
on its European roots than that of the English colonies south of the border. "Canadian
settlers took many liberties," he wrote in The Old Architecture of Quebec. "They developed
their traditions very freely and so produced a real Canadian architecture, moulded by
climate and life and by a genuine feeling for beauty." 29 At the same time, Traquair, who
wrote in the Atlantic Monthly that French Canadians were "a virile and flourishing
race, with a well preserved French culture," was one of the few Quebeckers able to (at
least partially) transcend linguistic and ethnic boundaries. 30 Among Francophones he
successfully lectured to nonprofessionals and collaborated with intellectuals, such as
the anthropologist Marius Barbeau.
As Scottish immigrants, Capper, Nobbs, and Traquair were particularly sensitive
to the growing impact of the "highly specialized architecture of the United
States." 31 While not rejecting its modernity a priori, Capper underscored the technical
and formal difficulties in achieving truth in skyscraper construction, which he
deemed undesirable for Europe. 32 In the Atlantic Monthly, Traquair attacked North
American civilization as a whole for being too utilitarian and too much controlled by
Figure 5. Proposals for reconfiguring Montreal city
blocks, Nobbs & Hyde, architects, 1934. I A Report on
Housing end Slum Clearance for Montreal (Montreal:
Montreal Board of Trade and the Civic Improvement
League, 1935(, 321
21 :3 SSAC BULLETIN SEAC
63

N29:1. 5 ! ·P'Cfi:li,5TRUT·
UDa!::C · I"JJO ~.H> tu:vmore
..,_..,.,_.
~';"£~:;:-;;;.;:!::-- --
Figure 6. An illustration from Ramsay Traquair, ThB Old
ArchitecturB of DuBbBc IT oronto: Macmillan, 1947): the
Fargues House, Quebec City, drawn by Traquair in 1929.
women, whom he deemed "inferior to men in imagination, intuition and the abstract
qualities" (and therefore unable to become good architects). 33 For him, "Canada's independence
of Great Britain has been assured for years; but her independence of the
United States is less certain. Canadians wish to be themselves: there are few things
they dislike so much as being taken for 'Americans."' 34 In Traquair's opinion, the first
great blow to the New France tradition occurred when the Church of Notre Dame on
Place d'Armes was rebuilt in "a bastard American Gothic." 35 American Beaux-Arts
buildings were "designed in an emotional vacuum"; with McKim, Mead and White's
Bank of Montreal in mind, Traquair humoured whether "bank managers should wear
togas to suit their Roman banks." 36 At the same time he acknowledged that Canadians, as
much as their southern neighbours, were a commercial people and that it was to "our
commercial buildings that we must look for a true expression of our national character":
skyscrapers were "not economical" but "often very beautiful. " 37
Facing the combined challenge of Beaux-Arts education and modern technology,
Nobbs was also unable to adopt a clear position towards American architecture.
In private he shared his concern over a Beaux-Arts takeover with his fishing partner
and regular correspondent Bertram Grosvenor Goodhue. However, he had also
learned to admire Charles McKim's "rarefied classic" 38 while working in England. He
welcomed the opportunity to write in journals such as the American Architect and the
AIAfoumal. To British readers, Nobbs mentioned that "far more cultural unity (outside
the realm of political ideals) exists between Canada and the United States as between
Canada and England. It is probably of far greater significance to us .. . that the country
is situated on the North American continent. than that it is within the hegemony of
the British Empire." 39 He stressed the North American businesslike quality of Canadian
hotels, railway stations, and office buildings, which he favoured over British fussiness. 40
At the same time idealistic and pragmatic, polemical and constructive, writings
by Capper, Nobbs, and Traquair betray many contradictions. They loved to denounce
Montreal's cultural backwardness. However, they refused to put "scholarship and
tradition in the waste paper basket, " 41 and seem to have been content with its stable
social order, even taking delight-especially in Traquair's case-in Canada being "one
of the most conservative countries in the world." 42 Their discourses were sometimes
inconclusive: Nobbs, for instance, could only stress to British readers that "beyond the
practicality and roof making," Canadian architecture was still "a polite fiction" : to English
eyes it was "very American, while to American eyes it often appear[ed] a little English." 43
ACCUMATING THEIR BRITISH BACKGROUND TO A NEW CULTURE, Capper and his successors
were undoubtedly major public figures in Montreal and beyond. Their intellectual
integrity and energy are still exemplary. Between the two world wars, Nobbs' endorsement
of Garden City ideals and Traquair's advocacy of regionalism complemented each
other. 44 Today, architects in Canada and elsewhere stress the notions of "urbanity,"
meaningful design precedents, and regional identity; they certainly can find stimulation
from the first three holders of the Macdonald Chair of Architecture.
Isabelle Gournay is an associate professor in the School
of Architecture at the University of Maryland in College
Park, Maryland. She is the author of ErnBst CormiBr and
the UnivBrsiti dB Monttial I ErnBst ConniBr et I'Universiti
dB Montreal (Montreal: CCA. 19901.
64
SSAC BULLETIN SEAC 21:3

NOTES
Stanley Brice Frost, McGill University for the Advancement
of Learning. val. 2, 1895-1971 (Kingston and
Montreal: MeGill-Queen's University-Press, 1984),
351-52.
2 Manreen Capper. "S.H. Capper: Founder of the
School of Architecture (1896) McGill University,
Quebec" (student paper, McGill University, Blackader­
Lanterman Library of Architecture and Art, 1979),
provides an excellent introduction to Capper's life
and career. For biographical information on Nobbs
and Traquair by John Bland, and a complete list of
their writings. including unpublished texts for lechues,
see Irena Murray, ed. , Percy Erskine Nobbs
and His Associates: A Guide to the Archive and
Ramsay Traquair and His Successors: A Guide to
the Archive (Montreal: McGill University, Blackader­
Lanterman Library of Architecture and Art, 1986).
For their significant pedagogic contributions, see
Norbert Schoenauer. "McGill's School of Architecture:
A Retrospection," McGill School of Architecture and
Urban Planning: Prospectus (Montreal: McGill University,
School of Architecture, 1987), 3-28, and
StewOJt Henbest Capper: First Macdonald Professor
of Architecture (Montreal: McGill University,
School of Architecture, 1996). A close friend of
Nobbs, Traqnair had also worked for Capper in Edinburgh.
Connections between Capper and Nobbs
are not well documented, but it is certain that their
paths crossed. A substantial tribute to Traquair is
long overdue; in particular, it would be worth exploring
whether his affiliation with Free Masonry had
an impact on his thinking and writing.
3 Percy Nobbs, "Ramsay Traquair, Han. M.A. (McGill) ,
F.R.I.B.A. , On His Retirement from the Macdonald
Chair in Architecture at McGill University," journal
of the Royal Architecturallnstitute of Canada [hereafter
RAIC journal)16, no. 6 (June 1939): 147.
4 In addition to Nobbs, the most significant Scottishborn
practitioners in Montreal during this period
were Andrew S. Taylor, Robert Findlay, and John
Smith Archibald, who had moved to Montreal in
1883, 1885, and 1893 respectively.
5 No architecture program existed in Edinburgh at
the time. Born of English parents within greater
London in 1896, Capper was 10 when he moved to
Edinburgh, where he became "Dux" (head boy) at
the Royal High School. In 1880 he was awarded a
Master of Arts with first-class honours in the Department
of Classical Literature. Eleven years later he
resumed his connections with the University of
Edinburgh as a lecturer, and later as an examiner
for the Department of Art History and Archaeology.
6 J.M. Bumsted, The Scots in Canada (Ottawa: Canada
Historical Association, 1982), 5. The great Scottish
immigration boom of 1901-14 mostly benefitted
Ontario and the West. In 1881, Scots comprised
4o/o of Quebec's population; in 1921, 2.7o/o.
7 Capper lectured on Spanish architecture at McGill
and contributed short notes to J. Lacoste's photographic
survey Masterpieces of Spanish Architecture
(New York: F.A. Stokes, 1909).
8 For a broader perspective on Capper's Beaux-Arts
training, which resulted in part from a short stay in
John Burnet's Glasgow office, see David Walker,
"Scotland and Paris: 1874-1887," in John Frew and
David jones, eds., Scotland and Europe: Architecture
and Design. 1850-1940, St Andrews Studies in the
History of Architecture and Design II ((St Andrews:
University of St Andrews ], 1991), 15-40. Back in
Edinburgh, Capper, who, according to Alexander
Patterson in the journal of the Royal Institute of
British Architects [hereafter fRIBA), 3rd series, 33
{24 january 1925): 201, was "never a brilliant
draughtsman," worked for George Washington
Browne, then practiced shortly with his Beaux-Arts
classmate Frank Worthington Simon (1862-1933),
who would later design the Manitoba Legislative
Building in Winnipeg (1913-20). Because he wanted
to be allowed to practice and in spite his preference
for Montreal's climate over that of Britain, Capper.
who never married, accepted the first Chair of Architecture
at the University of Manchester, where he
built the Whitworth Laboratory in 1909. He resigned
in 1912. In 1914 he moved to Egypt, where he
served in the British Army. At the time of his death
in 1925 he was Chief Press Censor for the Ministry
oflnterior, in Cairo.
9 For instance, Capper "was called upon at the very
outset of his career in McGill to deliver the annual
university lecture," according to Maureen Capper
("S.H. Capper," 3). In 1899 he was elected to the
Royal Canadian Academy.
10 Nobbs' London lecture on Canadian architecture at
the time of the 1924 British Empire Exhibition resulted
in a small book, Architecture in Canada, and
articles in fRIBA , The Builder, Architects' journal
and Architectural Review.
11 It is worth noting that, in February 1918, Traquair
contributed to the new progressive French-Canadian
review Le Nigog.
12 Letter, Gerald Baldwin Brown, Professor of Fine Arts,
University of Edinburgh, to Principal William Peterson,
McGill University, 12 April1913, reproduced in
Murray, Ramsay Traquair and His Successors, 10.
13 According to Schoenauer, Stewart Henbest Capper,
8, "The building was operated on a cooperative basis,
which was similar to the 'common interesf practice,
peculiar to Scots law, whereby ownership of the
different flats contained in a single building conveyed
certain rights to proprietors over every part of the
building in addition to the flats they owned .... Ramsay
Garden ... was intended to lure men of professional
standing and their families back to the Old Town."
See also The Builder 65 (19 August 1893): 13-16,
and Academy Architecture 5 (1893): 67; Margo
Johnston, "Ramsay Garden, Edinburgh," journal
and Annual Report: The Scottish Georgian Society
for the Study and Protection of Scottish Architecture
16 (1989): 3-19; and Murdo MacDonald, "Place
Work Folk: Patrick Geddes and Edinburgh,"
Rassegna 17, no. 64 (1995): 48-51. Other works by
Capper are: in Edinburgh, a villa with decorative
half-timbering at 34 Inverleith Terrace; in Glasgow,
an orphanage in the "Scotch Domestic" style, published
in The Builder 63 {30 July 1892): 89; in Blairboyle,
Perthshire, model worker houses (mentioned in
Robert Naismith, "Dash of Genius on City Skyline,"
The Scotsman, 23 December 1991.
14 Ramsay Traquair, "Industrial Housing and City
Planning," Montreal Daily Star, 1 February 1919,
15, and 15 February 1919, 14.
15 Robert Morriss, "Urbanization and Scotland," in
W.H. Fraser and R.J. Morriss, eds., People and Society
in Scotland, val. 2, 1830-1914 (Edinburgh: John
Donald, 1990), 91. In "The Planning of Three European
Cities," McGill University Publications, series
13, no. 9 {1926): 12, Traquair stated that Edinburgh's
industrial districts were "ugly, drab and hopeless,"
a "huge slum in prospect."
16 See Michael Simpson, Thomas Adams and the
Modem Planning Movement (London: Mansell, 1985).
17 See Annick Germain, Les mouvements sociaux de
refarme urbaine a Montreal au toumant du siec/e,
Collection les cahiers du CIDAR 6 (Montreal: Universite
de Montreal, Departement de sociologie,
Centre d'information et d'aide a Ia recherche,
1984); Susan Wagg, Percy Erskine Nobbs: Architect.
Artist, Craftsman (Kingston and Montreal: MeGill­
Queen's University Press, 1982), 45-57; and Jeanne
Wolfe and Hannah P. Shostack, "The Town Planning
Movement in Montreal, 1900-1941" (typescript,
McGill University, School of Urban Planning. 1979-80).
18 Percy Nobbs, "Montreal and Town Planning,"
Supplement to the McGill News, December 1928, 12-
17. See also Percy Nobbs, "Suburban Community
Planning, Montreal," McGill University Publications,
series 13, no. 7 (1926): 5-22. In the end, Nobbs' Act
was not passed; his efforts were finally rewarded in
1941, when he was appointed as advisor to the
new Montreal City Planning Commission. Nobbs'
views were also echoed and analyzed in Frenchlanguage
publications; see, for example, "Developpement
rationnel des centres urbains: M. Percy Nobbs
donne une interessante conference sur ce sujet au
college Victoria, " Le Canada, 15 avril1926, 2.
19 The reporfs frontispiece indicated that "The Council
of the Board of Trade commends this Report to
those interested ... without, however specifically
approving of the implied recommendations of the
report as to financing." On the report and its implications,
see Marc Choko, Les Habitations jeanne­
Monee (Montreal: Editions Saint-Martin, 1995), 20-27.
20 "PQAA President's Address," Canadian Architect
and Builder [hereafter CAB)13, no. 9 (September
1900): 174-75.11 is interesting to note that the notion
of "character'' was a major tenet in academic training
at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts.
21 Walker, "Scotland and Paris: 1874-1887," 35. According
to Maureen Capper ("S.H. Capper," 3), Capper's
opening lecture at the Renaissance Club- a gathering
of young architects, art students, and amateurs
he had helped found in 1899-was on Scottish
Baronial architecture.
22 See Peter Savage, Lorimer and the Edinburgh Craft
Designers (Edinburgh: Paul Harris, 1980), and
Deborah Mays, ''Lorimer in Perspective," fRIBA 97
(December 1990): 25-28. On differences between
the Baronial Revival and the vernacular revival
sponsored by Lorimer, see Frank Walker, "National
Romanticism and the Architecture of the City," in
George Gordon, ed., Perspectives of the Scottish City
(Aberdeen: Aberdeen University Press, 1985), 125-59.
23 Percy Nobbs, "Present Tendencies Affecting Architecture
in Canada," RAJC journal 7, no. 9 (September
1930): 315. For Nobbs' early ideas on Canadian architecture,
see Kelly Crossman, Architecture in Transition:
From Art to Practice, 1885-1906 (Kingston and Montreal:
MeGill-Queen's University Press, 1987), 122-35.
24 See Ian Gow, "Sir Rowand Anderson and the National
Art Survey of Scotland," Architectural History 27
(1984): 543-54. Traquair's interest in the decorative
arts, which resulted in his extensive study of
Quebec silverware, was triggered by his Irish-born
mother Phoebe, a major figure in the Scottish Arts
and Crafts movement. On the collaboration between
Phoebe and Ramsay Traquair, see Elizabeth Cumming,
Phoebe Anna Traquair (Edinburgh: Scottish National
Portrait Gallery, 1993), 41-42. Briefly mentioned in
John Gifford, Colin McWilliam, and David Walker,
Edinburgh (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1984), 570,
580, Traquair's Edinburgh works-the First Church
of Christ Scientist on Inverleith Terrace (1910-11)
and the Mackenzie House {1910), a boarding school
in the same district--

Morisset and Luc Noppen, "A Ia recherche d'identites:
usages et propos du recyclage du passe dans !'architecture
au Quebec," and France Vanlaethem, ''Modernite
et regionalisms dans !'architecture au Quebec:
du nationalisms canadien de Percy Nobbs au nationalisms
canadien-fran~ais des annees 1940," in
Luc Noppen, ed., Architecture, forme urbaine et
identite collective (Sainte-Foy and Sillery, Que:
cELAT [Universitii Lavai)/Septentrion, 1995). 11-125
and 157-77.
27 Henry B.M. Best," 'The Auld Alliance' in New
France," in Stanford Reid, ed., The Scottish Tradition
in Canada (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart,
1976), 15. Scottish implant was facilitated by the
physical and cultural kinship between Scotland
and Quebec and by their equally harsh climates,
comparable desires of political and cultural individualization
within the British Empire, and awareness
of powerful neighbours south of their borders
whose domination they feared. It was eased by the
presence of an influential Scottish business community
in Montreal and by the long tradition of intellectual
kinship between France and Scotland.
28 Ramsay Traquair, "The Canadian Type," Atlantic
Monthly 131 (June 1923): 821.
29 Ramsay Traquair, The Old Architecture of Quebec:
A Study of the Buildings Erected in New France
from the Earliest Explorers to the Middle of the Nineteenth
Century (Toronto: Macmillan, 1947), 1.
30 Ramsay Traquair, "The Caste System of North
America," Atlantic Monthly 131 (March 1923): 422.
It continued: "They keep themselves separate from
the English but the two nationalities live side by
side on very excellent terms, only emphasized by
occasional little squabbles."
31 Percy Nobbs, "Canadian Architecture," in Adam
Shortt, ed., Canada and its Provinces (1914-17;
Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1966), 12:674.
32 Stewart Henbest Capper, "The American Tall Building,"
CAB 11 , no. 1 (January 1898): 5-7, discussed
in Crossman, Architecture in Transition, 80-84; and
"The American Tall Building from a European
Point of View," Engineering Magazine 14 (November
1897): 239-52, discussed in Sarah Bradford Landau
and Carl W. Condit, Rise of the New York Skyscraper,
1865-1913 (New Haven: Yale University Press,
1996), 275-76.
33 Ramsay Traquair, "Women and Civilization," Atlantic
Monthly 132 (September 1923): 291. Traquair's
homosexuality was probably not entirely foreign to
such anti-feminism.
34 Traquair, "The Canadian Type," 825, 826.
35 Traquair, Old Architecture of Quebec, 2.
36 Ramsay Traquair, "How to Understand Architecture,"
lecture given to the Art Club of Montreal in 1919
and the St. James Literary Society in 1920, p. 9.
McGill University Archives, Traquair Papers,
M.C.3089, c.l.
37 Traquair, "Architecture and Democracy," Canadian
Bookman, n.s., no. 4 (October 1919): 12 (review of
the eponymous book by Claude Bragdon).
38 Percy Nobbs, "Address by Prof. Percy E. Nobbs," in
Alfred Stone, ed., Proceedings of the Forty-First
Annual Convention of The American Institute of
Architects (Providence, R.I.: Freeman, 1907), 149.
39 Percy Nobbs, "The English Tradition in Canada,"
Architectural Review 55 (June 1924): 238.
40 George Taylor Hyde, Nobbs' partner for 34 years,
was a Montrealer trained at MIT who practiced for
five years in Pittsburgh. Their firm's commercial
work, such as the new Birks Building on Phillips
Square and the Drummond Medical buildings derived
directly from American precedents. In the teens,
this "Americanness" began attracting some young
Scottish architects. They came to Montreal, where
work permits were easier to get than in the United
States, to train in large firms headed by Americantrained
practitioners and run along American lines.
For instance, Alfred Lochead (1888-1972) worked
for Ross and Macdonald, and james Steel Maitland
( 188 7 -1982) designed a skyscraper in the Tudor
Gothic style for Brown and Vallance.
41 Nobbs, "Present Tendencies Affecting Architecture
in Canada," 314.
42 Traquair, "The Canadian Type," 822. According to
Vanlaethem ("Modemite et regionalisms dans !'architecture
au Quebec," 172), Nobbs was "much more
open to change than Traquair and his French Canadian
friends and disciples."
43 Percy Nobbs, Architecture in Canada (London:
Royal Institute of British Architects, 1924), 9, 11.
44 By the 1940s, Garden City ideals had become acceptable
to lower-middle class French Canadians, as
demonstrated by a development designed by a former
student of Nobbs, Samuel Gitterman. See Marc
Choko, Une ciU!-jardin a Montreal: la cite-jardin du
tricentenaire, 1940-1947 (Montreal: Editions du
Meridien, 1988).
This article derives from a lecture given at the 1994
meeting of the Society of Architectural Historians. I
would like to thank Annmarie Adams, the session's
co-chair, as well as, in Edinburgh, David Walker
and Deborah Mays of Historic Scotland, Robert
Morriss, and Robert Naismith, who generously
shared his research on Capper with me; and, in
Montreal, Guy Besner, Irena Murray, David Rose,
Fran~oise Roux, France Vanlaethem, and Laurier
Lacroix.
66
SSAC BULLETIN SEAC 21 :3

Teaching the History of
Architecture at McGill, 1896-1903
Introduction
One hundred years ago-and with the blessing of the Province of Quebec Association
of Architects (PQAA)-a Department of Architecture in McGill University's Faculty of
Applied Science (Engineering) was established to provide a professional studies
program in architecture. After a brief apprenticeship, and passing the "Professional
Practice" exam, graduates were accepted by the PQAA, the B.Sc. Arch. being considered
the equivalent to passing the compulsory architectural examinations taken by tutorship
candidates seeking admission to the profession. This paper outlines the teaching of
one particular field, architectural history, during the first years of McGill's architecture
program.
l
n 1896, Stewart Henbest Capper (1859-1925) was appointed Macdonald Professor of
Architecture, head the new architectural program. A graduate of the University of
Edinburgh with a Master of Arts degree, Capper had spent one session at Heidelberg
University and studied at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris before apprenticing with
Sir George Washington Browne (1854-1939) in Edinburgh. In 1891, Capper became an
Associate of the Royal Institute of British Architects, and immediately commenced an
architectural practice; he also undertook a teaching assignment at his alma mater in
Edinburgh.
In addition to being a capable architect, Capper was an acknowledged
scholar and a good teacher and administrator. He was well-travelled and, besides having a
good knowledge of classical Greek and Latin, was also fluent in French, Portuguese,
Spanish, and German, knew some Italian, and mastered Arabic toward the end of
his life.
After arriving at McGill, Capper organized a four-year course in architecture.
The first year was preparatory, with all science and drawing courses taken jointly
with engineering students. Architectural courses were introduced only in the second
year, including "History of Architecture" ("from the Heroic age to the reign of Queen
Anne") and "Theory of Architecture," a complementary course to History in which
students learned composition, the orders of architecture, and elements of architectural
effects. Many civil engineering students enrolled in History of Architecture, and for a
while it was a mandatory course for them.
History of Architecture (mainly Italian, Spanish, French, and English Renaissance)
continued in third year, and in the fourth year "History of Art" was introduced.
In the final year students took "Domestic, Public and Ecclesiastical Architecture," a
course dealing with the historic evolution of architectural styles, complemented by
requirements and problems of a contemporary nature. "Building Construction and
Design," "Drawing," "Modelling," and several engineering and service courses
rounded out the curriculum. 1
At the outset there were only two full-time teachers, Capper, the director,
and Henry F. Armstrong, a lecturer. With few students enrolled full-time, all architectural
subjects, including History of Architecture, were the responsibility of Capper.
Armstrong taught "Descriptive Geometry," drawing, lettering, and modelling. The
arrangement of having history taught by the director, usually a professional architect
who designed and built buildings, continued for more than five decades; in fact, several
of these teachers, including Capper, became renowned historians in their own
right. Appointed in the 1950s, Peter Collins was the first architectural historian hired
at the school with the main responsibility of lecturing on architectural history.
by Norbert Schoenauer
21 :3 SSAC BULLETIN SEAC
67

Capper's "History of Architecture"
Capper delivered his inaugural address at McGill shortly after his arrival in Montreal.
In it, he underlined the importance old buildings have in the study of history:
Architecture is the great "object lesson" of history. Without its eloquence of storied stone, history
would be shorn of its most poetic, its most impressive and often times its only witness; it would
sink to the dull prose of the half forgotten chronicler. 2
Today, the scope of Capper's history lectures at the School of Architecture
can only be assessed from the text and reference books he selected for his courses and
from the exam questions listed in the annual calendar of the Faculty of Applied Science.
Although enrollment in the school was small, with the addition of engineering and
part-time students, as well as several tutorship candidates who registered for exams
held by the profession, Capper's lectures had a sizeable audience. However, the small
number of students in studio courses such as "Design" ensured a close contact between
teacher and students, an ideal pattern for studio training.
The textbooks for Capper's history courses were T. Roger Smith and John
Slater, Architecture, Classic and Early Christian (1882); T. Roger Smith and E.J. Poynter,
Architecture, Gothic and Renaissance (1888); T.C. Hamlin, History of Architecture
(1898); William J. Anderson, The Architecture of the Renaissance in Italy (1895), and
Reginald T. Blomfield, A Short History of Renaissance Architecture in England (1900).
His reference books were James Fergusson, History of Architecture (1893) and History
of Modern Architecture (1891), Russel Sturgis, European Architecture (1896), John A.
Gotch, Early Renaissance Architecture in England (1901), and Reginald T. Blomfield,
A History of Renaissance Architecture in England (1897). The textbook for "History of
Art" was G. Baldwin Brown, The Fine Arts {1891} . 3
For 1899-the year the first students graduated from McGill's architecture
program-a sense of the curriculum can be derived from examinations in some of the
courses. In Capper's History of Architecture, for example, second-year students had to
answer five out of seven questions:
1. Annual Calendar of McGill College and University:
Session 1899-1900 (Montreal. 1899), 117-18.
2. "Architecture in the University," Canadian Architect
and Builder 9, no. 11 (November 1896): 179.
3. Annual Calendar of McGW College and University:
Session 1903-1904 (Montreal. 1903), 160-61.
Scholarly books acquired for the library by Capper in
1898 included Claude Sauvegeot, Pa/ais, chiiteaux,
hotels et maisons de France du XV' au XV/It' siec/e,
4 vols. (1867), Karl J.F. Schnaase, Geschichte der
Bildenden Kiinste, 7 vols. (1843-64), Gottfried Semper,
Der Stil in den technischen und tektonischen Kiinsten,
2 vols. (1860-63), Karl Boetticher, Tektonik der
He//enen (1844-52). Viollet le Due, Dictionnaire
roisonne du mobi/ier fran

7. a comparison of 16th century architecture in England with that of France;
8. a brief account of Inigo Jones, estimating his influence upon architectural development in
England;
9. an account of St. Paul's Cathedral (London);
10. a brief comment upon the "Old Colonial" style of architecture in America, noting any specially
characteristic fea.tures and discussing its adaptability for modern domestic work. 5
Capper also lectured on the evolution of housing: an Arts-and-Crafts domestic
architect prior to coming to McGill, he designed a "Model Workmen's Dwelling" in
Blairhoyle, Perthshire, restored several historic buildings in Old Edinburgh, and built
Ramsay Garden on the steep slope of Castle Hill in Old Edinburgh (see figure 4, p. 62). In
a fourth-year exam, identified as "Architecture," students had to answer four of these six
questions:
1. Contrast the requirements of modern domestic planning with those accepted in the "Palladian"
style of last century, pointing out the resulting characteristics in external architecture.
2. The Elizabethan mansion is generally held to be the earliest Renaissance Architecture of England.
Consider the truth of this view as respects planning.
3. Sketch the ground plan of a Pompeian house of the more important class, and note how far the
type may be held to survive in modern times.
4. Write a note upon the "Old Colonial" style, its historical derivation, and its suitability to modern
requirements.
5. Trace the history of the "hall" in domestic architecture, and discuss its applicability to modern
planning.
6. Estimate the influence of Inigo Jones on English domestic architecture, mentioning some of his
works. 6 On Thursday morning, 30 April1899, George Taylor Hyde and Norman M.
McLeod passed the above fourth-year three-and-a-half-hour exam given by Capper, a
test that also entailed the submission of sketch plans for a five- to six-bedroom suburban
house. Both Hyde and McLeod graduated that year. (Years later, Hyde entered into a
long-lasting professional partnership with Percy Erskine Nobbs (1875-1964), who succeeded
Capper as director of the school in 1903; Nobbs and Hyde came to be known
for their beautiful Arts-and-Crafts-inspired homes in the Montreal area.)
Early students in architecture at McGill received a thorough education in the
architectural history of "the great eras of European civilization," but-as was customary
at the time-had little exposure to indigenous buildings of the Orient or Africa, let
alone the Americas. Buildings and architectural details of the classical period, the
Middle Ages, and the Renaissance era were studiously memorized. It is doubtful
whether many of today's students would pass Capper's exams of nearly hundred years
ago. Today, such detailed knowledge of historic buildings is no longer considered important,
but at a time when architectural practice often entailed design in the
so-called "revivalist styles," it was essential.
Conclusion
While knowledge in all fields has increased at a phenomenal rate during the 20th century,
the length of time allocated to formal education has unfortunately not kept pace. Indeed,
the opposite has often been true. For example, with the introduction of Cegep
(College d'enseignement general et professionnel) education in Quebec in 1967, the
two first years were lopped off McGill's then-six-year course in architecture, to be
given at the Cegep level. In my opinion, the two Cegep years seem not to be academically
equivalent to those previously taught at the university level.
In addition to the reduction of the full curriculum from six to four years,
"History of Architecture" was further short-changed over the decades in order to free
up time for such essential new subjects as Computer Aided Design (CAD). At present
only two history courses are mandatory, though students are also required to take one
of the several optional history courses. Theoretically, it is possible for architecture
students to take history in only three terms out of eight. Capper's admonishment that
"Architecture is the great 'object lesson' of history" does not seem to carry much
weight a hundred years after these words were first uttered at McGill University.
5. Ibid .. 346-47.
6. Ibid. , 349-50.
Norbert Schoenauer, William C. Macdonald Emeritus
Professor of Architecture at McGill University, was
director of the School of Architecture from 1972 to 1975.
His most recent publication is Arts and Crafts and Art
Nouvsau Dwsllings (Montreal: McGill University School
of Architecture, 1996).
21:3 SSAC BULLETIN SEAC
69

'Archi-ettes' in Training:
The Admission of Women to
McGill's School of Architecture'
During the first week of June this year, the School of Architecture at McGill
University was visited by its first woman graduate, Catherine Mary Chard Wisnicki
(figure 1). She was invited back to Montreal by her alma mater as part of the school's
centennial celebrations-except for a period in the 1950s, Chard Wisnicki has lived in
Vancouver since the late 1940s-to receive an honourary Doctorate of Science. 2 A pioneer
of British Columbia Modernism and one of the country's first women architecture professors,
Chard Wisnicki's contributions to the profession in Canada have long been
neglected. Her momentous graduation from McGill in 1943 was the culmination of
the debate over the admission of women as architecture students at the university 3
The Debate
The controversy had inspired a flurry of internal correspondence as early as 1918,
when Juliana Dallaire of Moose Creek, Ontario, sent the following request to the
university:
Kindly send me the calendar of the University and please tell me if it is possible to study
landscape gardening, perspective, inside decoration and work in white and ink in the
University. Also [if] it is necessary to pass examinations.
Yours truly
Juliana Dallaire 4
An optimistic university registrar, J.A. Nicholson, replied to Dallaire's request. outlining
the necessary qualifications for admission and adding,
So far women have not been admitted to the course in Architecture, but it is just possible under
the changed conditions consequent upon the war that an exception might now be made. 5
Figure 1. Catherine Chard (Wisnicki), first
graduate of McGill's School of Architecture.
(Courtesy of Catherine Chard Wisnickil
by Annmarie Adams
Five years before Dallaire's letter, a request from the Montreal Women's
Club had demanded the admission of women students to a number of faculties at
McGill, underlining the appropriateness of architecture as a woman's career choice:
The Montreal Women's Club of 303 members desires to record its conviction that the time has
now fully arrived, when opportunities for the highest intellectual development must be as open
to women, as they are to men-and therefore calls upon the Principal and Corporation of McGill
University to raise its standard to that of the seat of learning in other lands, and to that of its Sister
Universities in Western Canada, by throwing open all its Faculties to women, as they are to men
students, laying special stress upon the Course in Architecture, which in particular appeals to women. 6
The Club petitioned the university again in 1929, at which time the Faculty
of Applied Science, which then included architecture, justified their rejection of
women students on the grounds that the Department of Architecture was already
overcrowded and that the building was "designed for male students exclusively,"
without "cloak room, common room or rest room." 7 Professor Ramsay Traquair,
who was then director of the school and fiercely opposed to the admission of
women, added to these reasons:
70
SSAC BULLETIN SEAC 21 :3

Much architectural draughting is done at night, the main drawing-room being open until ten
o'clock. The responsibility for the maintenance of discipline in the evening is assumed by the
students themselves. If women students were admitted, it would be necessary to provide staff
supervision during these evening drawing periods, and such supervision would require additional
members of the staff and put the School to extra expense for which it has no funds. 8
It was, however, the "changed conditions" brought about by the Second World
War, rather than the First World War as Dr. Nicholson had presumed, which finally
convinced McGill's administration to admit women students to architecture. The
university may also have been convinced to change its anti-women stance by a surprisingly
modern-sounding letter signed by "Deborah" printed in the Montreal Daily Star
in 1937, which is reproduced here in its entirety:
Sir,-For a number of years application was made annually to the Corporation of McGill University
to open the Department of Architecture to women on the same basis as in arts, law, medicine and
accountancy, in which the qualifications and general standing but not the sex of the applicant are
considered. The last reply received some years ago stated: 'That the accommodation in the Dept.
of Architecture is now taxed to the utmost and that additional students cannot be admitted unless
more room is provided.' As there were only 37 students in the five-year course at the time, it
must have been a very expensive faculty to maintain and it would have seemed more economical
to provide more room and thereby provide for a larger number of students. Several women were
ready to enrol but were obliged to go elsewhere for their training. Our information is that no university
on the American continents which has a dept. of architecture places any sex restrictions
on students, unless it may be Princeton which refuses to admit women or negroes. But now, according
to the report published a few days ago, there are 10 fewer students in architecture than formerly,
thus providing ample accommodation for a limited number of women students and it would be
interesting to know if McGill's ban against women has been removed. The Archives of McGill
showed that neither men nor women were mentioned in its charter, only the generic term, 'students'
and it is therefore doubtful if the university has any legal right to differentiate as to the sex of the
applicants. 9
That same year, a resolution was unanimously passed by the Alumnae Society
of the university to urge the Senate that women should be admitted to architecture. 10
As dean of the Faculty of Engineering, which now included architecture, Ernest
Brown struck a committee to study the matter. This five-member team sent letters of
inquiry to the heads of architecture departments in eight North American universities,
asking six specific questions about the acceptance of women in other schools and in
the profession in general. The responses to these questions, from directors at Toronto,
Manitoba, Harvard, Yale, MIT, Columbia, Pennsylvania, and Texas, provide extremely
interesting reading today.
The only point over which there was any disagreement from the other
schools was on the employment of women architects. Not surprisingly, McGill faculty
members who opposed the admission of women emphasized this question in building
their case for women's continued exclusion. Professor H.H. Madill, head of the school
at the University of Toronto, from which the first woman graduated in 1920, provided
the most "useful" evidence to McGill against the acceptance of women:
The women graduates do have difficulty in obtaining employment, particularly in getting their
first start .... There have been seven women graduates from this school and they have all worked in
offices at various times, but as far as I know there is only one at the present time employed in an
architect's office. Of the others-2 are in interior decorating, 3 are married, and one is unemployed. 11
Madill's statement, in fact, inspired McGill's Professor Chambers, who had composed
the letters to the other schools, to conclude, "for most people, architecture is still a
man's job." 12
Traquair continued to fight the admission of women to architecture at McGill
well into the late 1930s. 13 In fact, at the meeting of the above-mentioned "Committee
on the Admission of Women into Architecture," held in early November of 1937,
Traquair and three of the committee members voiced fierce opposition to women's
1 A shorter and more preliminary version of this paper
will appear in a special edition of ARQ celebrating
the centennial of McGill's School of Architecture.
The research is part of a larger interdisciplinary project
based at the McGill Centre for Research and Teaching
on Women and funded by the Social Sciences
and Humanities Research Council of Canada. I am
especially grateful to the other members of the
research team, Sarali Baker, Jill Trower, and Peta
Tancred, and to Margaret Gillett, who generously
shared her research notes on the history of women
at McGill. The staff of the OAQ was also very helpful
in providing information on its early members.
The term "archi-ettes" is borrowed from notes on
Quebec contributed by Harold Lawson from the
"Provincial Page" of the RAIC fournal17. no. 11
(November 1940): 204.
2 On the awarding of the degree, see Annmarie
Adams and Peta Tancred, "McGill export helped
build B.C. Modernism," The Gazette [Montreal]. 8
June 1996, H5, and Annmarie Adams, "Catherine
Chard Wisnicki to receive honourary degree,"
School of Architecture Centennial Newsletter. summer
1996, 2.
3 The rather stormy debate over the admission of
women is analyzed in Margaret Gillett. We Walked
Very Warily: A History of Women at McGill (Montreal:
Eden, 1981), 317-22.
4 Undated copy of this letter in McGill University Archives
(MUA). There is mention in the Faculty Minute
Book no. 6 (29 September 1909) of an earlier
application for admission in 1909, however, no copy
of this application has been found. On 2 October
1909, the same book records, "Professor Nobbs reported
on the advisability of admitting women to the
course of Architecture. The Faculty decided that it
would not be advisable to do so at the present."
5 Letter of 20 july 1918, MUA.
6 Faculty Minute Book no. 7 (5 May 1913), MUA.
7 Letter of 5 October 1929, MUA.
8 "Extracts from Minutes of October 2, 1929 regarding
'Admission of Women to Architecture,"' MUA.
Traquair's misogynist views were most clearly articulated
in his "Women and Civilization," Atlantic
Monthly 132 (September 1923): 289-96.
9 "Neither Male nor Female" [letter to the editor].
Montreal Daily Star. 11 March 1937, 10.
10 Letter. 14 june 1937, from Nora Morgan McCanlffion
to the Secretary of Senate. MUA.
11 Report from Professor Chambers to Dean E. Brown,
Faculty of Engineering. dated 29 October 1937, 3.
MUA. On the admission of Esther Marjorie Hill, the
first Canadian woman architect, to the University of
Toronto, see "Slowly and Surely (But Somewhat
Painfully): More or Less the History of Women in
Architecture in Canada," Society for the Study of Architecture
in Canada Bulletin 17, no. 1 (March 1992), 7.
12 Report from Professor Chambers to Dean E. Brown,
Faculty of Engineering. dated 29 October 1937,4,
MUA.
13 For more information on Traquair, see Norbert
Schoenauer, "McGill's School of Architecture: A
Retrospection," McGill: Schools of Architecture and
Urban Planning Prospectus (Montreal: McGill University,
1986), 9-13, and the article by Isabelle
Gournay in this issue.
21:3 SSAC BULLETIN SEAC
71

Fig . l - Axonometri( Crowing showing the Broilhwoite Unit
Co 1utru(tion System - Tho sytlom employ' o grid dimention
or 3'-l''
14 Minutes of a meeting of the Committee on the
Admission of Women into Architecture, held 5
November 1937, MUA.
15 Schoenauer, 14.
16 On Bland's profound impact on the school, see
Anne McDougall, "john Bland and the McGill
School of Architecture," Canadian Architect 15 , no.
3 [March 1988): 33-37. Turner apparently also encouraged
women to enter the school; see M.E.T.,
"Women Architects May Soon Be At Work Here,"
Montreal Star, 3 October 1942, and "A Belated Letter,"
RAIC journal 21, no. 12 (December 1944): 288.
17 Biographical information on both Chard Wisnicki
and Scott Holland are included in "New Appointment
Coincides with Special Anniversary," McGill
School of Architecture Newsletter, fall1989, 1-2.
18 This total is based on a number of different graduation
lists available at McGill.
19 These ten architects are janet Shaw Mactavish,
Blanche Lemco van Ginkel, Evanthia Zoumboulidou
Caragianis, Tiuu Tammist O'Brien, Elizabeth Compton
Ross, Christina Poznanska Perks, Doris Droste Steffen,
Anne-Marie Balazs Pollowy, Sarina Altman Katz,
and Malca Tobman Feldman. Dorice Brown Walford
received her Master's from McGill and therefore
does not figu re in this count.
mere presence in the school, even in the face of the positive results sent in by other
schools. Traquair feared that women would prove distracting to the male students, and
added that "women had not the qualities of imagination to make good designers." At
the same meeting, architect P. Roy Wilson stated that women had trouble in "visualising
construction, especially on paper." "They could never command the respect of contractors
or workmen," he added. Professor Chambers stressed the need for women's segregation.
He hoped that if admitted to McGill, women students would be given a separate drafting
room "which [they] would come to consider their own." 14 A similar system, the
committee had learned, had proved successful at the University of Pennsylvania.
Women were finally admitted to McGill not on their own strengths, but on
the administration's growing concern about the shrinking number of students in the
school. At one point, there was even a possibility that the school might close due to
declining enrollment. 15 This threat, combined with the more liberal administrative
policies of John Bland, director of the school from 1941 to 1972, eased women's acceptance
to the sc-hool. Under the acting directorship of Philip Turner during 1939-41, Bland
made the necess ary social and physical changes to ensure women's place in the maturing
institution. As director, he transformed the curriculum from a Beaux-Arts model to one
more firmly based in the tenets of Modernism. 16 Chard Wisnicki's acceptance in 1939
and the admission of a second woman, Arlene Scott (Holland), six months later were
pivotal steps towards Bland's vision of a modern professional school. 17
The Graduates
McGill's School of Architecture counts many illustrious architects among its 39
women students who graduated between 1943 and 1970. 18 Although relatively few of
them stayed to practice in Quebec, these first McGill alumnae made a considerable
impact on the profession there. Of the 18 women registered as members of the Ordre des
Architectes du Quebec (OAQ) prior to 1970, ten received their primary professional
education at McGill. 19
Four major themes have emerged from our interviews with these early graduates
and from the relatively scanty documentary evidence of their time spent as students
at McGill. The first is that an extraordinary number of the women who attended the
school prior to 1970 were outstanding students. They received top marks in their
classes; they won awards; their design projects and drawings from sketching school
were published in national journals; and in some instances, such as Chard Wisnicki,
they wrote or co-authored thematic essays published in the professional press during
72
SSAC BULLETIN SEAC 21 :3

or soon after their graduation (figure 2). 20 Sheila Baillie Hatch (B.Arch. '46), for example,
won prizes for architectural drawing (1942), for the highest standing in second year
(1943), for architectural engineering (1944), and was later awarded one of three medals by
the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada (RAIC). Hanka Rosten Renehan graduated
at the top of her class in 1948, winning the Lieutenant-Governor's Silver Medal, the
Lewis Robertson Prize in design, and the McLennan Travelling Scholarship. Chard
Wisnicki, Blanche Lemco van Ginkel (B.Arch. '45), Rosten Renehan, Ala Mendelsohn
Damaz (B.Arch. '46), Barbara Milne Lambert (B.Arch. '47), and Sarina Altman Katz
(B.Arch. '60) saw their student projects published in national journals (figure 3} . 21
Second, despite the fact that McGill was the last Canadian school to accept
women to its program in architecture, its graduates occupy a number of "firsts" (or
nearly so) for women in architecture. For example, Lemco van Ginkel (figure 4) was
the first woman appointed to a teaching position at the University of Pennsylvania in
1951 (together with Siasa Nowicki), the first woman to be elected as an officer of the
OAQ in 1971 and the RAIC in 1972, the first woman to become a fellow of the RAIC
in 1973, and the first woman appointed as a dean of architecture and landscape architecture
at the University of Toronto in 1980. 22 Chard Wisnicki was the second woman
to register with the Architectural Institute of British Columbia in 1946 and the fourth
to become a member of the Ontario Association of Architects the previous year.
While other studies have presumed that the absence of men in Montreal during
the Second World War provided the ultimate opportunity for women to enter the profession
in Quebec, our research points to the important role played by immigrant
women, particularly from eastern Europe, in Montreal following the war. Of the 18
women registered with the OAQ prior to 1970, 12 were born outside Canada. Seven of
these hailed from eastern Europe. Our working hypothesis, at this point, is that the
cultural backgrounds of the numerous women born in countries where women architects
were already a sizable percentage of the profession by the postwar period gave
them the knowledge, skill, and experience to make it in the male-dominated Montreal
architectural scene. The many women students from eastern European backgrounds
who studied at McGill, we speculate, gained the conviction and confidence to become
architects from their families. "Eastern Europe (and I am told Hungary in particular)
recognized women in the professions much earlier than North America. This led to a
natural acceptance of these fields within the family," commented Anne-Marie Balazs
Pollowy (B.Arch. '60}. 23
This point is cmcial to our ongoing study. We believe that the case for women
architects in the development of Modernism in Quebec was very much contingent on
the influx of women architects from other countries after the war. Among the early
McGill students who may fall into this category are Christina Poznanska Perks of Poland
(B.Arch. '57), Tiuu Tammist O'Brien of Estonia (B.Arch. '58), and Sarina Altman Katz
of Romania (B.Arch. '60) (figure 5). They are all extremely successful practitioners
whose subsequent careers were built on their early experiences of Modernism.
Our fourth theme is related to both the timing of women's acceptance in Canada
(especially Quebec) as professional architects and the presumption in the existing secondary
literature on women architects (in Britain and the United States) that early
women were encouraged to specialize in subfields such as interior design, housing,
and, later, historic preservation. Our initial findings indicate that no such "ghetto"
actually existed in Canada, although women architects were frequently portrayed in
the professional press as experts in these areas. 24 If anything, many early women
graduates of McGill, such as Chard Wisnicki, Lemco van Ginkel, and Barbara Ferguson
(B.Arch. '45) specialized in city planning. 25
CHARD WISNICKI'S HONOURARY DEGREE TillS YEAR IS INTENDED to celebrate the centennial of
the School of Architecture in 1996. Certainly the next century will see an ever-increasing
role for women at McGill and in the profession of architecture. Since the early 1980s,
women have comprised about 50 percent of the incoming students to the school. Despite
this trend, women comprised only 10.7 percent of the profession in 1991. Nonetheless,
Chard Wisnicki encourages today's young women to enter the field. "I anticipate a great
future for women in architecture, particularly in view of all the current upheavals in
society," states Chard Wisnicki optimistically. "It is my contention that women are
awfully good at dealing with upheavals." 26
Figure 2 (previous page, left). Axonometric drawing of a
prefabricated house, from an essay co-authored by E.G.
Faludi and Catherine Chard. !RAIC Journal22, no. 3
(March 1945): 58)
Figure 3 (previous page, centre). Sarina Altman's thesis
project for a music centre. published in Architecture­
Bitiment-Construction 33 (juillet 1960): 39.
Figure 4 (previous page, right). Blanche Lemco (van
Ginkel) at McGill's Surveying Field School, May 1941.
(Courtesy of Blanche Lemco van Ginkel)
Figure 5 (above). This photograph of architects from the
office of Affleck, Dimakopoulos, Lebensold. Architects
includes two of Quebec's earliest women architects. both
of whom emigrated from eastern Europe: Tiuu Tammist
O'Brien (B.Arch. '58), on the extreme left, and Eva Vecsei,
who did not graduate from McGill, third from the left.
(Montreal Star. 16 September 1969, courtesy of Eva Vecsei)
20 See E.G. Faludi and Catherine Chard. 'The Prefabricated
House Industry." RAIC Journal 22, no. 3 (March
1945): 56-62; and Catherine M. Chard. "What is an
Architect?" RAIC Journal 19, no. 2 (Februruy 1942): 30-
33.
21 There are several sources on the sexist nature of architectural
education. On McGill in particular. see
Anne Dmmmond, "Women in the McGill School of
Architecture." unpublished paper, April1978; on
the Canadian schools, see Sarah Baker, "Professional
Architectural Education: Women Articulate
Masculinist Values," paper presented at the Canadian
Women's Studies Association Conference, St.
Catharines, Ontario, May 1996.
22 Personal correspondence from Lemco van Ginkel,
dated 9 July 1993.
23 Personal correspondence from Balazs Pollowy,
dated 23 August 1994.
24 Annmarie Adams, ''Building Barriers: Images of
Women in Canada's Architectural Press, 1924-73,"
Resources for Feminist Research 23 , no. 3 (fall
1994): 11-23.
25 I am grateful to Lemco van Ginkel who pointed out
this trend to us, noting that there was less prejudice
against women in this "new field." Personal correspondence
from Lemco van Ginkel, dated 9 June
1995.
26 Personal correspondence from Chard Wisnicki,
dated 24 January 1996.
Annmarie Adams is an associate professor in the School
of Architecture at McGill University. She is co-author
(with Professor Peta Tancred, Department of Sociology,
McGill University) of the forthcoming book, Re-designing
the Workplace: Canadian Women Architects, 1920-92.
21 :3 SSAC BULLETIN SEAC
73

George Heath MacDonald
(Class of 1911}:
The Story of One Graduate
from McGill University's
School of Architecture
Figure 1. Interior of the Edmonton Carnegie Public
Library; MacDonald and Magoon, arch itects, 1922-23.
{RAIC Journa/ 3, no. 4 1J uly-August 1926): 156)
by Percy Johnson
George MacDonald was one of Edmonton's most prolific architects during the first
half of the 20th century. His career spanned more than half a century and was highlighted
by buildings such as the Edmonton Public Library (figure 1).·1 MacDonald had
returned to Edmonton- where he had worked as a draftsman and student architect
since 1904- following his graduation from McGill's School of Architecture in 1911.
Like other graduates of McGill, he had to adapt his academic training to a location where
building traditions, materials, and processes were different from Montreal. As a student,
MacDonald may well have questioned assignments which to him would have appeared
far removed from the real world. Yet he later humbly recalled the importance of his
formal training at McGill, and the role played by educators such Percy Erskine Nobbsz
74 SSAC BULLETIN SEAC 21 :3

George Heath MacDonald was born in Murray Harbour North, Prince Edward Island,
on 16 January 1882. 3 His roots can be traced to British Loyalist stock in the
United States. At an early age he took a strong dislike to the career options of farming
or lobster trapping, so actively cultivated his ability as an artist. At the age of 16 he
left Murray Harbour North to work as a draftsman with the Dominion Iron and Steel
Company in Sydney, Nova Scotia. It was in Sydney that MacDonald's association
with Herbert Alton Magoon (1863-1941) began, first as a draftsman and ultimately as
a partner.
Influenced by the decline in construction in the Sydney region and a corresponding
increase in the optimism for growth in the Canadian west and the future
provinces of Alberta and Saskatchewan, Magoon and MacDonald made their way to
Edmonton in 1904. MacDonald continued to work as a draftsman with Magoon while
he completed his high school matriculation at Alberta College during the 1904-05 and
1905-06 academic years. At Alberta College, MacDonald was active in football (soccer)
and hockey, and served as the president of the Athletic Association for the 1905-06
term. In a brief biography of MacDonald, the Alberta College yearbook College Echoes
1905-06 noted that "... his hands were to draw the plans of Alberta College, his orders
were to direct its erection; in return, the College was to equip him for his future work." 5
After initially considering the architecture school at Cornell University in Ithaca,
New York, MacDonald decided instead to enroll in what he later referred to as "the
new course at McGill." 6 At McGill he received an education based on the Beaux-Arts
principles popular at the time. 7 He was a member of that transitional generation of
Canadian architects between office-trained practitioners and professionals educated
within the programs then developing at various Canadian universities. MacDonald graduated
from McGill at the age of 29 with a strong mix of office experience and classroom
instruction. While it is difficult to fully assess the importance of MacDonald's student
years at McGill on his future work, some of the recorded events from the time hint at
the school's lasting influence on his later career in Edmonton.
The only extant student drawing by MacDonald is an exercise for a thirdyear
design problem, dated March 1910 (figure 2). Assigning design projects for
hypothetical structures, whether a museum, a stock exchange or, in this case, a clock
tower, had a long tradition in Beaux-Arts architectural training, and is consistent with
the approach taken by many architectural schools, including McGill, during the early
2oth century. MacDonald's drawing, labelled "Design for a Clock Tower, Plans and
Elevations," is the work of an confident and mature draftsperson. Some descriptions
of MacDonald's work in Edmonton newspapers during the 1930s and 1940s state that
MacDonald received honours for his work while a student at McGill, though no concrete
proof of awards has been located ..
While a student at McGill, MacDonald encountered Percy Nobbs, an architect
and teacher he later described as one of the two persons he considered "this
century's pioneer Canadian educators." 6 MacDonald also received practical training
during the summers; in 1908, for example, he worked as a draftsperson in the office of
Edward and WilliamS. Maxwell. That firm's time sheets from November 1901 to
March 1909 record projects for a variety of corporate and individual clients with
which MacDonald was associated. 9 During the years MacDonald spent in Montreal he
also began to develop a strong network of friends and colleagues, which he utilized
throughout his professional career.
The time spent at McGill also introduced MacDonald to the architecture of
Montreal and the surrounding region. Although there exists no record of MacDonald's
travels during his school years, it seems likely that he journeyed to centres in the
American northeast: the striking similarities between the Edmonton Public Library
and the Boston Public Library suggest that MacDonald had studied the latter. 10 It was not
unusual for architects to travel, and for regional architects it was essential to examine
various buildings first-hand if the most up-to-date technological and design solutions
were to be learned. This practice was followed extensively by MacDonald (and many
of his patrons). as demonstrated by the numerous references to on-site examinations of
design solutions in other locations-and the use of other buildings as models-in the
correspondence connected with MacDonald's commissions.
The importance of MacDonald's extensive travels across North America and
his eclectic interests influenced much of his work. He was a founding member of the
Edmonton Art Club, a writer who was commissioned by the federal government to
research and write two texts on early Edmonton history, and an avid traveller and
- ~ ~0] ­
.~~ ·
r ~~
.. ...
Figure 2. George MacDonald, "Design for a Clock Tower,
Plans and Elevations," third-year student design project,
McGill University, March 1910.(Provincial Archives of
Alberta, George Heath MacDonald Collection, #78.11)
1 For a complete description of this and other noted
buildings by MacDonald, see the author's Master's
thesis entitled "The Edmonton Public Library: An
Architectural History of a Carnegie Library Building''
(Montn\al, Concordia University, 1994).
2 Additional, more direct, influences by Nobbs on Edmonton's
architecture include his work on the layout
of tlte University of Alberta campus and tlte design of
its Arts and Medical buildings. his suggestions for the
design of tlte Provincial Legislative Building, and his
recommendation of Cecil S. Burgess as head of tlte
university's new School of Architecture.
3 MacDonald died in 1961. Biographical information
can be found in John Blue, Alberta, Past and Present
(1924), 3:284-85, and MacDonald's obituary in the
Edmonton journal, 3 May 1961,49. While tltis
obituary states MacDonald was bam in 1883, most
sources give 1882 as the year of his birth.
4 Like many other architects of the period, Herbert
Alton Magoon received no formal education in architecture,
having received his training in the offices
of otlter architects. For a sometimes contradictory
account of Magoon's training and background, see
Archibald 0 . MacRae, History of the Province of Alberta
(1912). 2:893-4, and Magoon's obituaries in
the RAJC journal 18, no. 5 (May 1941): 40, and tlte
Edmonton Bu//etin, 1 April1941, 9.
5 Co/lege Echoes 1905-06, 22.
6 Letter from George Heatlt MacDonald to John Bland,
director of the School of Architecture, McGill University,
dated 17 October 1960.
7 For a description of the elements included in an
education based on these principles, see Kelly
Crossman, Architecture in Transition: From Art to
Practice, 1885-1906 (Kingston and Montreal:
MeGill-Queen's University Press, 1987).
8 This description is included in the dedication to
MacDonald's Fort Augustus, Edmonton: Northwest
Trails ond Traffic (Edmonton: Douglas Printing, 1954).
The otlter educator was Dr. John H. Riddell, a founding
member of the Edmonton Public Library Board.
9 William and Edward Maxwell Archive, Canadian Architecture
Collection, Blackader-Lauterman Library of
Art and Architecture, McGill University (Montreal).
21 :3 SSAC BULLETIN SEAC
75

21:.. ;:- .r ~ ~ ::T ( [ · 1u ,~ ~-~ ~ / ·· :- .. .
.')r:t•. - ·"' -: ::T ]7} 1':• lr1ln I
_J \ _~ _:_~ , ·-. MAG00f1 t~ ~~~~ ~ ·- -- f· t.?C h l ' · ~ ~T- •
Figure 3 (left). Proposed house for C.J. Robert, 21st
Street, Edmonton; Magoon and MacDonald, architects,
June 1912. (Private collection)
Figure 4 (right). Drawing of the front facade of the
Edmonton YWCA; Magoon and MacDonald, architects,
c. 1921. (Private collection)
10 For support of this theory, see John Bland. "Overnight
Trains to Boston and New York Made Montreal
'American,"' in Selected Papers from the Society for
the Study of Architecture in Canada, val. 2 (Annual
Meeting, 1977), ed. Christina Cameron and Martin
Segger (Ottawa: SSAC, 1982), 46-64.
11 Various sources state that MacDonald worked in
the United States during the First World War, but
there is no record of duration or location. Since
MacDonald's son Alan Stewart MacDonald was born
in Quebec in 1919, it is apparent that MacDonald
spent some time there that year.
12 The value of building permits issued for Edmonton in
1912 was not surpassed until years after MacDonald's
retirement. Edmonton thus provided very fertile
land for implementing the new ideas learned by
this very recent graduate of McGill.
13 One of the first projects to appear under the new
name of MacDonald and Magoon was the Edmonton
Public Library (1922-23). It merits mention that
this project also involved Marjorie Hill. a recent
graduate from the University of Toronto and Canada's
first registered woman architect.
14 Letter from MacDonald to Bland dated 17 October
1960.
sports enthusiast. During the First World War he worked for the federal government
in Toronto and Montreal supervising munitions. 11 During the Second World War he
designed several municipal aircraft hangers and other airport buildings used on the
northwest staging route to the Yukon.
After MacDonald graduated from McGill University with honours in 1911,
receiving the degree of Bachelor of Architecture, he returned to Edmonton in time to
profit from a period of building growth not equalled until the oil boom of the late 1970s
and early 1980s. 12 His continued association with Magoon was formally recognized in
the partnership Magoon and MacDonald. From the outset it is evident that MacDonald
assumed the role of designer and Magoon, who sought the clients, the job of office
manager. By the early 1920s, however, MacDonald was becoming responsible for
more and more of the managerial tasks as well as continuing in his role as the design
partner in the firm. MacDonald's contributions were recognized with the name of t-Pe
firm being changed to MacDonald and Magoon, beginning in 1922. 13 MacDonald and
Magoon remained partners until Magoon's retirement in 1938.
MacDonald retired in 1958, his career as a licensed architect spanning more
than 40 years. Between 1911 and 1958 MacDonald was involved in more than 180 projects
in Edmonton alone. Much of his work reflects the education he received at McGill,
modulated by the evolving trends in Canadian architecture during the years surrounding
the two world wars. Some Edmonton examples, in addition to the Public Library,
which depict the variety of his work are the numerous houses he designed (figure 3),
the Ruthenian Girls School (1912), the YWCA (1921, figure 4), the Salvation Army
temple (1925), and the buildings for Concordia College (1930).
GEORGE MAcDONALD PRIDED HIMSELF AS A MCGILL GRADUATE. Two years after his retirement
from a career as one of western Canada's most prolific architects, MacDonald received
a letter from the director of his former school. In response to a questionnaire from
professor John Bland, obviously doing research on the role played by McGill on
his career as an architect, MacDonald noted that his schooling at McGill included a
thorough knowledge of construction and of the work of the past, including the necessary utilitarian
courses, [that] provided solid groundwork, lacking somewhat in general educational subjects
such as Latin, which [he believed] would be of value to the student. 14
Like other graduates from McGill University's School of Architecture, MacDonald
never forgot the training he received while a student in Montreal.
Percy Johnson is a Montreal-based architectural historian
and doctoral candidate at I'Universite Laval. He was
responsible with Laura E. Dent for the compact-disc
inventory which accompanies Mosha Safdia, Buildings
and Projacts. 1967-1992 (Montreal and Kingston:
MeGill-Queen's University Press, 1996).
76
SSAC BULLETIN SEAC 21 :3

• Noppen, Luc et Lucie K. Morisset. La presence
Anglicaine a Quebec: Holy Trinity Cathedral
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1995. 191 p., illus, refs, biblio, indexes.
ISBN 2894480415, 28,95 $.
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de Ia Culture et des Communications du
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des eglises a Quebec: foi et patrie.
Quebec: Publications du Quebec, 1996. ix, 182
p., illus, refs, biblio, index. ISBN 2551166462.
• Simard, Luc, red. Du Cap au Rivage : promenade
dans Jes rues de Quebec. Quebec: Ville de
Quebec, [1994). 65 p., illus, refs, index. ISBN
2920860771.
• Noppen, Luc et Lucie K. Morisset. Lieux de
culte situes sur le territoire de fa ville de Quebec.
Rapport prepare pour la Ville de Quebec, Service
rle l'urbanisme, Division du Design urbain et du
patrimoine, aoiH 1994.
• Noppen, Luc, red. Architecture, forme urbaine
et identite collective. Les Nouveaux Cahiers du
CELAT, n° 12. Sillery, Que.: Editions du Septentrion,
1995. 267 p., illus, refs, biblio. ISBN
2894480393.
Claude Bergeron, Gaetan Desmarais. Marc Grignon. Nathalie
Hamel. Daniel Le Couedic. Sophie Mascolo. Guy Mercier, Lucie
K. Mmisset. Marie·Claude Rocher et France Vanlaethem.
• Lambert, Serge et Eugen Ked!. La Gaspesie.
Quebec: Publications du Quebec, 1994. 272 p.,
illus, refs, index. ISBN 2980295213, 75,00 $.
• Hillier, Malcolm, trad. Gisele Pierson. Couleur
et jardin. Montreal: Editions Flam.marion, 1996.
160 p., illus, index. ISBN 2890771458.
• Vaillancourt, Veronica, red. La revitalisation
des regions rurales : Je patrimoine comme outil.
Ottawa: Heritage Canada, 1995. 30 p., illus.
ISBN 0888140967, 25 $.
• Vaillancourt, Veronica, ed. New life for Rural
Regions: Taking a Heritage Approach. Ottawa:
Heritage Canada, 1995. 30 p., illus. ISBN
0888140967, $25 paper.
• Fulford, Robert. Accidental City: The Transformation
of Toronto. Toronto: Macfarlane Walter
& Ross, 1995. 225 p., illus, refs, index. ISBN
0921912919, $26.95.
A refl ection on Toronto. and a discussion of urban planning
generally.
• The Heritage Directory, 1996/Le Repertoire du
patrimoine, 1996. Ottawa: Heritage Canada,
1995. 380 p., index. ISBN 0888141084, $40 paper.
• Roos, Arnold E. A Bibliography of the History of
Canadian Science and Technology/Une bibliographie
de l'histoire de fa science et de la technologie
au Canada. Ottawa: Canadian Science
and Technology Historical Association/Association
pour l'histoire de la science et de Ia technologie
au Canada, 1995. x, 272 p. ISBN 0968025803,
$35 paper (available from CSTHNAHSTC, 758 Holt
Crescent, Ottawa K1G 2Y7).
Includes substantial sections on architecture (pp. 24-47) and
urban history (pp. 54-72).
• Raguin, Virginia Chieffo, Kathryn Brush and
Peter Draper, eels. Artistic Integration in Gothic
Buildings. Toronto: University of Toronto Press,
1995. xiii, 348 p., illus, refs, biblio. ISBN
0802004571, $65 cloth; 0802074774, $24.95 paper.
This collection of essays by an international group of scholars
resulted from the conference "'Artistic Integration in Early Gothic
Churches:· held at York University.
• Jackson, Anthony. Reconstructing Architecture
for the Twenty-First Century: An Inquiry into the
Architect's World. Toronto: University of Toronto
Press, 1995. x, 224 p., illus, refs, index. ISBN
0802006356, $50 cloth; 0802075843, $17.95 paper.
• Baird, George and Mark Lewis, eels. Queues,
Rendezvous, Riots: Questioning the Public in Art
and Architecture. Banff, Alta.: Walter Phillips
Gallery, The Banff Centre for the Arts, 1995.
176 p., illus, refs. ISBN 0920159729, $35 cloth.
Contributors include Dennis Adams. George Baird, Marik
Boudreau with Martha Fleming and Lyne Lapointe, Elizabeth
Diller and Ricardo Scofidio. Vera Frenkel, Daniel Hermant,
johanne Lamoureux. Mark Lewis. Rodolfo Machado and jorge
Silvetti. Andrew Payne, Regine Robin. jeff Wall, and Dan Graham.
• McArthur, Glenn and Annie Szamosi. William
Thomas, Architect, 1799-1860. Archives of Canadian
Art. Ottawa: Carleton University Press,
1996. xvii, 149 p. , illus, refs, indexes. ISBN
0886292867, $40 paper; 0886292840, $60 cloth.
An exhibition based on the illustrations in this book will be held
at the Market Gallery. Toronto. from 1 March to 6 july 1997.
Quoi
de
neuf
)
•
21:3
SSAC BULLETIN SEAC
77

What's
new
•
In
•
print
• Shadbolt, Douglas. Ron Thorn : The Shaping of
an Architect. Vancouver: Douglas & Mcintyre,
1995. viii, 165 p., illus, refs, index. ISBN
1550544128, $50.
• Carter, Brian, ed. Works: The Architecture of
A.J. Diamond, Donald Schmitt and Company,
1968-1995. Documents in Canadian Architecture.
Halifax: TUNS Press, 1995. 148 p. , illus, biblio,
index. ISBN 0929112318, $29.95 paper.
• Murray, Irena Zantovska, ed., with Laura E.
Dent, Marilyn Berger and Percy Johnson. Moshe
Safdie: Buildings and Projects, 1967-1992. Canadian
Art Collection, Blackader-Lauterman Library
of Architecture and Art, McGill University.
Montreal and Kingston: MeGill-Queen's University
Press, 1996. 332 p., illus, refs, biblio, indexes,
CD-ROM inventory. ISBN 0773515100, $65 paper.
• Cuthbertson, Brian. Lunenburg: An Illustrated
History. Halifax: Formac, 1996. vi, 66 p., illus,
biblio, index. ISBN 088780358X, $16.95 paper.
• James, Terry and Bill Plaskett. Buildings of Old
Town Lunenburg. Halifax: Nimbus, 1996. vi, 82
p., illus. ISBN 1551091534, $29.95 cloth.
• Varkaris, Jane and Lucile Finsten. A Museum
Becomes Parliament's Second Home/Un musee
devient la 2• demeure du Parlement, 1916-1920.
Ottawa: Library of Parliament/Bibliotheque du
Parlement, 1996. 52 p., illus, biblio. ISBN
0660599680.
• von Droste, Bernd, Harald Plachter and
Mechtild Rossler, eds. Cultural Landscapes of
Universal Value: Components of a Global Strategy.
Jena (Germany) and New York: Gustav Fischer
Verlag, in cooperation with UNESCO, 1995. 464
p., illus, refs. ISBN 3334610225 (Fischer];
1560814349 [VCH Publishers].
• Larsen, Knut Einar, ed./red. Nora Conference
on Authenticity in Relation to the World Heritage
Convention: Proceedings/Conference de Nora sur
l'Authenticite dans Je cadre deJa Convention du
Patrimoine Mondial: Compte-Rendu. Trondheim,
Norway: Tapir Publishers for UNESCO World
Heritage Centre/Centre du Patrimoine Mondial,
Agency for Cultural Affairs Oapan)/Direction des
Affaires Culturelles (Japon), ICROM, and/et
UNESCO, 1995. xl, 427 p., illus, refs, biblio,
participants. ISBN 8251914167.
Canadian authors include Christina Cameron and Herb Stove!.
• McKendry, Jennifer. With Our Past Before Us:
Nineteenth-Century Architecture in the Kingston
Area. Toronto: University of Toronto Press,
1995. x, 242 p., illus, refs, glossary, biblio, index.
ISBN 080207474X, $29.95 paper.
• Colvin, Howard. A Biographical Dictionary of
British Architects, 1600-1840. Third edition. New
Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1995.
1,264 p., refs, index. ISBN 0300060912, $75US.
• Rybczynski, Witold. City Life: Urban Expectations
in a New World. Toronto: HarperCollins,
1995. 256 p., refs, index. ISBN 0002550628.
• Pressman, Norman. Northern Cityscape: Linking
Design to Climate. Yellowknife: Winter Cities
Assn., 1995. xv, 244 p., illus, biblio. ISBN
0969876106.
• Tzonis, Alexander, Liane Lefaivre and Richard
Diamond. Architecture in North America Since
1960. Boston: Little, Brown, 1995. 312 p., illus,
refs, index. ISBN 0821222287.
• Myers, Barton, ed. by Stephen Dabney, intro by
John R. Dale. Barton Myers: Selected and Current
Works. Master Architect Series 3. Mulgrave,
Victoria, Australia: Image Pub. Group, 1994. 256
p., chiefly illus, refs, index. ISBN 187549815X.
• Delany, Paul, ed. Van couver: Representing the
Postmodern City. Vancouver: Arsenal Pulp
Press, 1994. 296 p., illus, refs. ISBN 1551520028.
• Livesey, Graham, Michael McMordie and
Geoffrey Simmins. Twelve Modem Houses, 1945-
1985. From the Collections of The Canadian Architectural
Archives. EVDS Architecture Series, No.
1. Calgary: Aris Press and University of Calgary
Press, 1995. 64 p., illus, refs, biblio. ISBN
1896683002 [Aris]; 1895176727 [UCPress].
$11.95 paper.
• Fraser, Linda M., comp., Kathy E. Zimon, ed.,
intro by Rhodri Windsor Liscombe. McCarter
and Nairne, Significant British Columbia Projects:
An Inventory of the Collection at the Canadian
Architectural Archives, University of Calgary
Library. Canadian Archival Inventory Series:
Architectural Records, No. 2. Calgary: University
of Calgary Press, 1995. xiii, 194 p., indexes. ISBN
1895176646; ISSN 1195-8960, $21.95 paper.
• Fraser, Linda M., comp., Kathy E. Zimon, ed.,
intro by Michael J. McMordie. The Arthur Erickson
Architectural Drawings: An Inventory of the
Collection at the Canadian Architectural Archives
at The University of Calgary Library, Part II. Canadian
Archival Inventory Series: Architectural Records,
No. 1. Calgary: University of Calgary Press, 1993.
xv, 583 p., indexes. ISBN 1895176514; ISSN
1195-8960, $34.95 paper.
Part I of The Arthur Erickson Architectural Drawings has not been
published, but the text on diskette is available to recipients of
Part II , upon request. One other inventory project in this series,
The Ron Thom Architectural Drawings, is under way.
78
SSAC BULLETIN SEAC
21 :3

• Noble, Allen G. and Richard K. Cleek. The Old
Barn Book: A Field Guide to North American
Barns and Other Fann Structures. New Bmnswick,
N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 1995. xii,
222 p., illus, refs, index. ISBN 0813521726.
• Denhez, Marc and Stephen Dennis, eds. Legal
and Financial Aspects of Architectural Conservation.
Toronto: Dundurn Press, 1995. 248 p., illus,
index. ISBN 1550022504, $24.99 paper.
• Adams, Annmarie. Architecture in the Family
Way: Doctors, Houses, and Women, 1870-1900.
McGill-Queen's/Hannah Institute Studies in the
History of Medicine, Health and Society. Montreal
and Kingston: MeGill-Queen's University Press,
1996. xii, 227 p., illus, refs, biblio, index. ISBN
0773513868, $39.95 cloth.
• Henley, Brian. The Grand Old Buildings of
Hamilton. Hamilton: The Spectator, 1994. 115
p., illus. ISBN 0969846002, $13.95.
• Papers of the Western Association of Architects,
1884-1889. Microform. New York: Norman
Ross, 1995. Four 35rnm reels, indexes, $300US.
• Reinventing Practice: The 1994 RAIC Conference
Proceedings. Ottawa: RAIC, 1995. 39 p., illus.
ISBN 0919424368.
• Duncan, George W.J. Early Houses of Richmond
Hill and Vicinity. Richmond Hill, Ont.: Richmond
Hill Historical Society, 1995. 56 p. , illus. $15 +
$2.50 postage from Richmond Hill Historical
Society, P.O. Box 61527, 9350 Yonge Street,
Richmond Hill, Ont., L5C OC9.
• Mays, John Bentley. Emerald City: Toronto
Revisited. Toronto: Viking, 1994. xxi, 355 p., illus,
refs. ISBN 0670853569.
• Perez-GOmez, Alberto and Stephen Parcell,
eds. Chora: Intervals in the Philosophy of Architecture.
Chora Series, vol. 2. Montreal and Kingston:
MeGill-Queen's University Press, 1996.
ISBN 0773514074, $24.95 cloth
• Ashenburg, Katherine. Going to Town: Architecturol
Walking Tours in Southern Ontario. Toronto:
Macfarlane Walter & Ross, 1996. xvi, 252 p., illus,
glossary, index. ISBN 0921912951, $23.95 paper.
• Sutnik, Maia-Mari. Edouard-Denis Baldus:
Heliogravures: Selections from "Les Principaux
Monuments de la France." Toronto: Art Gallery of
Ontario, 1994. 16 p., illus, refs. ISBN 1895235057.
• Jester, Thomas J., ed. Twentieth Centul]' Building
Materials: Histol]' and Conservation. New
York: McGraw-Hill, 1995. 352 p., illus, refs.
ISBN 0070325731, $50US.
• Segger, Martin and Douglas Franklin. Exploring
Victoria'sArchitecture. Victoria: Sono Nis, 1996.
336 p., illus, refs, biblio, index. ISBN 155039066X,
$31.95 paper.
• von Baeyer, Edwinna. A Selected Bibliography
for Garden Histol]' in Canada. Rev. ed. Ottawa:
Parks Canada, Canadian Heritage, 1994. 71 p. Cat.
No. 62-192/1994E; ISBN 0662214196, no charge.
• The Fountain Foundation. Downtown Hamilton:
The Heart of it All. Hamilton: The Foundation,
(1995] . 120 p., illus. ISBN 09210553x.
• Jenner, Michael. The Architectural Heritage of
Britain and Ireland: An Illustrated A-Z of Terms
and Styles. London, Eng. : Michael Joseph, 1993.
320 p., illus, indexes. ISBN 0718135172.
• Mayo, James M. The American GrocelJ' Store:
The Business Evolution of an Architectural
Space. Westport, Conn. : Greenwood, 1993. xviii,
286 p., illus, refs, index. ISBN 0313265208.
• McGreevy, Patrick V. Imagining Niagara: The
Meaning and Making of Niagara Falls. Amherst.
Mass.: University of Massachusetts Press, 1994.
xii, 193 p., illus, refs, index. ISBN 0870239163.
• Witzel. Michael Karl. The American Gas Station.
Osceola, Wise.: Motorbooks International, 1992.
160 p. , illus, refs, index. ISBN 0879385944.
• Peterson, Murray and Robert J. Sweeny.
Winnipeg Landmarks. Winnipeg: Watson & Dwyer,
1995. 63 p., illus. ISBN 092048607X, $14.95.
• Curl. James Stevens. Encyclopredia of Architecturol
Tenns. London, Eng.: Donhead, 1993. xii, 352
p., illus, biblio. ISBN 1873394047, $85.00US cloth.
• Mathieu, Jacques et al. Espaces-temps familiaux
au Canada aux XVIr et XVIIr siecles. Sainte­
Fay, Que.: Centre intemniversitaire d'etudes
quebecoises, 1995. 90 p., illus, refs. ISBN
2921926008.
• Finley, Gregg and Lynn Wiggington. On Earth
as it is in Heaven: Gothic Revival Churches of
Victorian New Brunswick. Fredericton, N.B .:
Goose Lane Editions, 1995. 230 p., illus, refs,
biblio, index. ISBN 0864921756, $39.95 paper.
THESES
• d'Orgeix, Emilie-Marie de Thonel. "Evolution
du dessin d'architecture militaire (XVI•-xviii").
Esthetique et systeme de codification academique
du dessin militaire et leurs applications par les
ingenieurs militaires royaux envoyes en Nouvelle­
France a l'epoque coloniale (1608-1759)". These
de doctorat, programme d'histoire, Universite
Laval. 1995.
21:3
SSAC BULLETIN SEAC 79

• Carnell, Monique M. "The Life and Works of
Maritime Architect J.C. Dumaresq (1840-1906)."
MA thesis, Department of History, University of
New Brunswick, 1993.
PERIODICALS
• Caufield, Jon. "The Growth of the Industrial
City and Inner Toronto's Vanished Church
Buildings." Urban History Review 32 (March
1995): 3-19.
• Gottfried, Herbert. "The Machine and the
Cottage: Building. Technology, and the Single­
Family House, 1870-1910." !A: The journal of
the Society for Industrial Archaeology 21, no. 2
(1995): 47-68.
• Choko, Marc H. "Le 'boom' de immeubles
d'appartements a Montreal de 1921 a 1951". Urban
History Review 23 (novembre 1994): 3-18.
• Comeau, Michelle. "Les grands magasins de Ia
rue Sainte-Catherine a Montreal : des lieux de
modernisation, d'homogeneisation et de differenciation
des modes de consommation". Revue
d'histoire de la culture materielle 41 (printemps
1995): 58-68.
• Wood, Elizabeth. "Jardin du Centre canadien
d'architecture: Transient Beauty at the Crossroads/
Ia beaute (transversale)". ESPACE 31 (spring/
printenips 1995): 6-10.
• Fleming, John A. "The Anglo-American Influence
on French-Canadian Furniture after 1760."
Antiques 148, no. 2 (August 1995): 192-99.
• CRM [Cultural Resource Management, U.S.
National Park Service]18, no. 8 (1995).
Twentieth century heritage issue.
• La review d'architecture ARQ 91 (juin 1996).
Ce numero sur le theme du patrimoine moderne a ete publie
avec Ia collaboration de DOCOMOMO Quebec.
• Grace, Kevin Michael. "Monument to God, or
Douglas Cardinal? The Ottawa architect condemns
an addition to his Red Deer church (St. Mary's)
as philistine and racist." Alberta (Western) Report
22, no. 26 (12 June 1995): 41.
• Andrighetti, Rick. "Facing the Land: Landscape
Design in Canada" (from the 19th century to the
present). The Canadian Architect 39, no. 8 (August
1994): 13-19.
• Ehrentraut. Adolf W. "Cultural Nationalism,
Corporate Interests and the Production of Architectural
Heritage in Japan." Canadian Review of
Sociology & Anthropology 32, no. 2 (May 1995):
215-42.
• Fulford, Robert. "Modern-Day Ruin: In downtown
Toronto, a little architectural treasure has
risen from the ashes of one of the worst development
fiascos of the 1980s." Toronto Ufe 29, no.
10 (July 1995): 45-7.
• Aspinall, Jane, Larry McCallum and Alec Ross.
"Made to Measure: Three new library buildings
put patron needs first" [Central Branch, Vancouver
Public; Boys & Girls House, Toronto Public;
Douglas Library, Queen's University]. Quill &
Quire 61, no. 5 (May 1995): 14-15, 25 .
• Fetherling, Douglas. "Writing Homes: ... People
are working to preserve the former homes of
Canadian writers/Residences d'ecrivains: ... des
gens s'efforcent de preserver les anciennes maisons
d'ecrivains canadiens." Imperial Oil Review/
Revue de l'lmperiale 78, no. 415 (winter/hiver
1994): 16-21.
• McNeil, Peter. "Designing Women: Gender,
Sexuality and the Interior Decorator, c. 1890-
1940." Art History 17 (December 1995): 631-57.
• Grace, Kevin Michael. "When Open Spaces
Meet Closed Minds: A Globe [and Mail] columnist
looks down her nose at Calgary architecture."
Alberta (Western) Report 21, no. 45 (24 October
1994): 16.
• Adams, Annmarie. "Building Barriers: Images
of Women in Canada's Architectural Press, 1924-
73." Resources for Feminist Research 23, no. 3
(fall1994): 11-23.
• du Prey, Pierre de la Ruffiniere. "Anatomy of
an Ideal Villa" [Chiswick Villa]. Queen's Quarterly
101, no. 3 (fall1994): 623-9.
• Bennett, Gordon. "Commemorative Integrity:
Monitoring the State of Canada's National Historic
Sites." ICOMOS Canada Bulletin 4, no. 5
(1995): 6-8.
• White, Kayce. "The Nine Best Houses in B.C."
Vancouver Sun, 15 April1995, E13.
To mark the AIBC's 75th anniversary. a panel of members
selected nine houses they considered the best in B.C.: Nichol
house, Sidney, Samuel Maclure, 1925; Barber house, Vancouver,
Ross A. Lort, 1936; Porter house, West Vancouver, ).C.H. Porter,
1948; D.H. Copp house, Vancouver, Ron Thorn, 1951; Smith
house, West Vancouver, Arthur Erickson, 1965; Merrick
house, West Vancouver, Paul Merrick, 1970s; Jardine house,
Kamloops, Dalla-Lana/Griffin, 1986; Smith O'Donaldson
house, Lions Bay, Peter Cardew, 1980s; Barnes house,
Nanaimo, john and Patricia Patkau, 1992.
• Carney, George 0. "Grain Elevators in the
United States and Canada: Functional or Symbolic?"
Material Culture 27, no. 1 (spring 1995):
1-24.
80
SSAC BULLETIN SEAC
21 :3

• Wyllie, Robin H. "The Schoolhouse in Nova
Scotia: A Study of Influences on the Evolution
of Schoolhouse Design in Nova Scotia, 1850-
1930." Nova Scotia Historical Review 14, no. 2
(1994): 41-60.
• Benn, Carl. "The Blockhouses of Toronto: A
Material History Case Study." Material History
Review 42 (fall1995): 22-38.
• "Architect of Boom: Moshe Safdie's Library
Opens This Month." Vancouver Magazine 28,
no. 3 (May-June 1995): 60-5, 78+.
• Stelter, Gilbert. ''The Architect and the Community:
W. Frye Col will and Turn of the Century
Guelph." Historic Guelph 33 (September 1994): 5-34.
• "Historical Research in the [U.S.] National
Park Service," CRM 17, no. 5 (1994) [supplement].
• Woolsey, G. Brian. "The Mouse that Roared:
Rediscovering Partnerships for New National
Historic Sites." CRM 17, no. 8 (1994): 5-9.
• Rogers, Jerry L. "Canadian/US Cultural Resources:
Broadening Horizons." CRM 17, no. 3 (1994): 27.
• The Journal of Urban Design (ISSN 1357-4809)
is a new international scholarly journal on theory,
research, and practice in urban design. The journal
will contain 5-6 refereed articles in each of the
three issues to be published per volume. Subscriptions
are $38US. Contact Carfax Publishing at
P.O. Box 25, Abington, Oxfordshire, Great Britain
OX14 3UE; or at 875-81 Massachusetts Ave.,
Cambridge, MA 12139.
With a Little Help From Our Friends
Sincere thanks go to the following members
who generously assisted with the SSAC's Annual
Conference in Quebec City:
Joyce Sowby
Trudy Cowan
France Gagnon-Pratte
Luc Noppen
Electronic Media
• Directory of Canadian Design Since 1945. Interactive
database. Toronto: Design Exchange,
1994-. Aussi disponible en franr,;;ais.
This comprehensive multimedia database on the history, theory,
and practice of Canadian architecture, landscape architecture,
fashion and graphic. interior, industrial and theatre design is
being prepared by the Design Exchange with the support of the
federal government. the Canada Council, and the McDonald
Stewart Fotmdation, with equipment donated by Apple Canada Inc.
Currently based at the DX Resource Centre in Toronto. the

HISTORIC SITES AND MONUMENTS BOARD
RESEARCH PAPERS
Research papers on Canada's architectural and
landscape heritage are prepared for the Historic
Sites and Monuments Board of Canada by the
National Historic Sites Directorate of Parks Canada.
Copies of these "Agenda Papers" are available for
research purposes by contacting the Directorate,
c/o Canadian Inventory of Historic Building,
Ottawa K1A OMS. Recent subjects include:
• November 1993
Hucker, Jacqueline. "Decorative Mural Painting
of Castle Kilbride, Baden, Ontario," 1993-23.
De Jonge, James. "Former Hoover Farmstead,
Haldimand County, Ontario," 1993-24.
Graham, Fern. "Province House, Halifax, Nova
Scotia," 1993-26.
Ricketts, Shannon and Katherine Spencer-Ross.
"Former Methodist Chapel, Philipsburg,
Quebec," 1993-28.
Mills, Edward. "Sun Sing Theatre, Vancouver,
British Columbia," 1993-29.
Clerk, Nathalie. "Theatre Rialto, Montreal,
Quebec," 1993-30.
Mattie, Joan. "The Runnymede Theatre,
Toronto, Ontario," 1993-31.
Clerk, Nathalie. "Theatre Outremont, Montreal,
Quebec," 1993-32.
Mills, Edward. "The Stanley Theatre, Vancouver,
British Columbia," 1993-33.
Mattie, Joan. "Eglington Theatre, Toronto, Ontario,"
1993-34.
Mills, Edward. "Vogue Theatre, Vancouver,
British Columbia," 1993-35.
Fulton, Gordon. "Benny Farm [Housing Complex],
Montreal, Quebec," 1993-37.
Goodspeed, Rhona. "Post Office, Greenspond,
Newfoundland," 1993-38.
Ricketts, Shannon. "Lambton House, Borough of
York, Ontario," 1993-39.
Dunn, Brenda and Maxwell Sutherland. "Fort
Anne National Historic Site, Annapolis Royal,
Nova Scotia," 1993-46.
Johnson, Dana. "Historic Marysville [District].
Fredericton, New Brunswick," 1993-47.
Cossette, Jocelyne et Jean-Claude Parent. "Manoir
Mauvide-Genest, Saint-Jean, ile d'Orleans,
Quebec," 1993-48/49.
• June 1994
Mattie, Joan. "St. John's Anglican Church, Gagetown,
New Brunswick," 1994-02.
Spencer-Ross, Katherine. "Greenock Church,
St. Andrews, New Brunswick," 1994-03.
Goodspeed, Rhona. "Le Centre d'art de Levis,
Levis, Quebec," 1994-04.
Graham, Fern. "St. Anne's Chapel of Ease,
Fredericton, New Brunswick," 1994-05.
Clerk, Nathalie. "Oratoire Notre-Dame dumont
Saint-Joseph, Carleton, Quebec," 1994-06.
Fulton, Gordon. "Rosamond Woolen Company
Mill Complex, Almonte, Ontario," 1994-07.
Johnson, Dana. "Niagara-on-the-Lake Golf
Course, Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario," 1994-08.
Proulx, Jean-Pierre et Kate MacFarlane. "Le
Monument Lefebvre, Saint Joseph's College,
Memramcook, New Brunswick," 1994-14/14A.
Mattie, Joan. "Telegraph Office, Whitehorse,
Yukon," 1994-15.
Fulton, Gordon. "Claybank Brick Plant, Claybank,
Saskatchewan," 1994-16.
Mills, Edward. "Seager Wheeler's Maple Grove
Farm, Rosthern, Saskatchewan," 1994-17.
Johnson, Dana. "McMaster Hall/Royal Conservatory
of Music Building, Toronto, Ontario," 1994-18.
Clerk, Nathalie. "Maison Stanley, New Richmond,
Quebec," 1994-19.
Doull, Ian. "Annapolis Royal Historic District,
Annapolis Royal, Nova Scotia," 1994-20.
McConnell, David. "The 'Diefenbunker': The
Central Emergency Government Headquarters at
Carp and Continuity of Government," 1994-24.
Ricketts, Shannon. "Sharon Temple, East Gwillimbury,
Ontario," 1994-30.
• November 1994
Wright. Janet. "Christ Church, Hope, British
Columbia," 1994-32.
MacFarlane, Kate. "Canadian Pacific Railway
Station, McAdam, New Brunswick," 1994-33.
Hucker, Jacqueline. "Prince of Wales Fort
[Manitoba]: A History, Documentation and
Analysis of the 20th Century Repairs to the
Outer Walls," 1994-34.
Doull, Ian. "Former Railway Station,
Kensington, Prince Edward Island," 1994-37.
Mills, Edward. "Seager Wheeler's Maple Grove
Farm, Rosthern, Saskatchewan," 1994-38.
Maitland, Leslie. "St. Luke's Anglican Church,
Gondola Point, New Brunswick," 1994-43.
MacFarlane, Kate. "Christ Church Cathedral,
Fredericton, New Brunswick," 1994-45.
Russell, Hilary. "The Margaret Laurence Home,
312 First Avenue, Neepawa, Manitoba," 1994-46.
Mattie, Joan. "The Leaskdale Manse [Ontario]:
Home of Lucy Maud Montgomery, 1911-26,"
1994-47.
de Fort-Menares, Anne M. "Sir William Mackenzie
House, Nelson Street East (Highway 48), Kirkfield,
Ontario," 1994-48.
Ricketts, Shannon et al. "The Built Environment:
Changing Directions in Federal Commemoration,"
1994-50.
Clerk, Nathalie. "Cadre et criteres pour I' evaluation
des pares et jardins historiques," 1994-51.
Spencer-Ross, Katherine. "St. John's Anglican
Church, Lunenburg, Nova Scotia," 1994-52.
Doull, Ian. "Commemoration of Rural Historic
Districts," 1994-53.
Vincent, Elizabeth. "Admiralty House, Mount
Pearl, Newfoundland," 1994-54.
82
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21 :3

Passfield, Robert W. "Commemorating Engineering
Achievements," 1994-55.
Vincent. Elizabeth. "Internment Camp B/70, Ripples.
New Brunswick," 1994-57.
• July 1995
Wylie, William. "The Brilliant Suspension
Bridge, near Castlegar, British Columbia," 1995-1.
Johnson, Dana. "No.2 Mechanics' Volunteer
Company Engine House (now the Saint John
Firefighters' Museum), 24 Sydney Street, Saint
John. New Brunswick," 1995-2.
Maitland, Leslie. "Christ Church Royal Chapel,
Tyendinaga Mohawk Territory. Ontario," 1995-6.
Fulton, Gordon. "Gravelbourg Ecclesiastical
Buildings, Gravelbourg, Saskatchewan," 1995-7.
MacFarlane, Kate. "Former L.J. Shickluna Service
Station, Port Colborne, Ontario," 1995-8.
Hucker, Jacqueline. "St. John the Evangelist
Anglican Church, Stirling. Ontario," 1995-9.
Hucker, Jacqueline. "Glanmore (Hastings County
Museum). 257 Bridge Street East, Belleville,
Ontario," 1995-10.
Goodspeed, Rhona. "St. Patrick's Hall, 12
Queen's Road, St. John's, Newfoundland,"1995-12.
Clerk, Nathalie. "Jardins de Metis, Grand-Metis,
Quebec," 1995-15.
"Clarification of Commemorative Intent:
Bellevue House National Historic Site [Kingston,
Ontario]." 1995-16.
Fulton, Gordon. "Powell River Townsite Historic
District, Powell River, British Columbia," 1995-17.
Mills, Edward. "Chinese Cemetery. Harling
Point, Oak Bay, British Columbia," 1995-18.
Piedalue, Gisele. "Faubourg Quebec, Le Vieux
Montreal." 1995-19.
DeJonge, James. "Cultural Resources on the
Weiland Canals," 1995-22.
Parent, Jean-Claude. "L'edifice principal des installations
de culbutage de Ia mine Atlas a East
Coulee, Alberta," 1995-24.
Mills, Edward. "Chinatown Historic District,
Victoria, British Columbia," 1995-30.
Hucker, Jacqueline. "The Ewen Cattle Barn, 7071
No. 9 Road, East Richmond, British Columbia,"
1995-32.
Doull. Ian. "Grand-Pre [Nova Scotia] Rural Historic
District." 1995-33.
Fulton, Gordon. "Victoria Hall, 68 King Street
East, Hamilton, Ontario," 1995-34.
Maitland, Leslie. "Hatley Park/Royal Roads Military
College, Col wood, British Columbia," 1995-35.
Payment. Diane P. "Lagimodiere-Gaboury 'Homestead.'
Saint-Boniface, Manitoba," 1995-36.
MacFarlane, Kate. "Cruickston Park Farm,
Cambridge, Ontario," 1995-37.
Spencer-Ross, Katherine. "St. Andrews, New
Brunswick [Historic District]." 1995-38.
Roos, Arnold E. "Pooley's Bridge, Ottawa, Ontario,"
1995-39.
lfflf:ITAS
RRmrms
UEI1IISIBS -
.,
SOCIETY OF ARCHITECTURAL HISTORIANS
50th ANNUAL MEETING -APRIL 16-20, 1997
LORD BALTIMORE HOTEL - Baltimore, Maryland
General Chair: Richard Longstreth
CALL FOR PAPERS
Local Chair: Therese 0' Malley
Members and friends of the Society of Architectural Historians are invited to submit
abstracts (maximum length 250 words/one page) before 10 November 1996 for the
session listed below. Abstracts should be sent directly to the chairpersons of the session
(see below) or, for open sessions, to the SAH office in Chicago. The content of the
proposed paper should not have been previously published and should not have been
previously presented to any but a small or local audience. In the abstract, which will be
held in confidence, the author should succinctly state the problem and summarize the
argument that will be presented in the paper. Applicants should include home and
work addresses, telephone and fax numbers, and institutional or firm affiliation, if any.
Abstracts of accepted papers will be prepared for distribution at the meeting. The
author must prepare and send a finished copy of the accepted paper to the session chairperson
by 15 March 1997. Applicants may submit only one abstract for consideration
for the 1997 meeting; multiple submissions by one person to different sessions or to the
same session will render those submissions invalid. No one may be involved with
more than one session, either as leader or as speaker.
Reshaping the Canadian City: The Impact of American Modernism to 1967
While modern architecture in Europe and the United States developed through an
exchange of ideas between the two, the arrival and subsequent establishment of
International modernism in Canada was largely filtered through the American example.
Canadian business practices, established in the 19th century, encouraged this situation
of architectural hegemony: American rather than Canadian architects were favoured
for the most important commissions. Nowhere was the paradigm of American influence
more apparent than in the context of the post-Second World War Canadian city.
This session will consider the role of American modernism on the development of
the Canadian metropolis, focusing on how American models were received and
interpreted by Canadian architects. While the direct impact of Canadian projects by
American-based architects (such as Mies van der Rohe and I.M. Pei) is one avenue
of consideration, we also encourage writers to examine how these projects may have
led t,o a transmission of ideas through the principal/associate relationship of American
architects and their Canadian collaborators. The influence of American planning
theories on the reshaping of the Canadian city and the development of the suburb is
another potential area of investigation. Just as we solicit papers that examine the
flowering of American modernism in Canada, to encourage a line of development
we also invite papers exploring the earlier influence of modern American architectural
and planning models in the 1920s and 1930s, and examinations of critical
shifts in Canadian architecture around the time of Expo '67. We are also interested
in proposals that consider the place of education in the importation of modernism,
as seen through the return of Canadian students from American schools such as liT,
MIT, and the GSD at Harvard.
Chaired by Cammie McAtee and Michele Picard, Centre Canadien d'Architecture/Canadian
Centre for Architecture, 1920 rue Baile, Montreal. Quebec H3H 2R6;
fax (514) 939-7020; e-mail cammie@cca.qc.ca.
21 :3
SSAC BULLETIN SEAC 83

THE SOCIETY FOR THE STUDY OF ARCHITECTURE IN CANADA
SOCIETE POUR L 'ETUDE DE L'ARCHITECTURE AU CANADA
P.O. BOX2302, STATION D/C.P. 2302. SUCC. D
OTTAWA. ONTARIO K1P5'MS
ISSN 0228-0744