Minerva's Diary - A History of Jarvis Collegiate Institute

When war was declared in June, 1812, the usually quiet
town of York was turned into a busy supply depot and
headquarters for the commander of Upper Canada's troops,
General Isaac Brock. Two months later Strachan arrived in his
new home and subsequently observed, "The bustle and
confusion occasioned by the war has given me little opportunity
of ascertaining the state of the parish, most of the people are at
the lines resisting invasion
By October he was sufficiently organized to publish the
following advertisement in the York Gazette:
E btYCATtON.
Subscriber
or 'he Schoot'
the P •blic 'h«t
Seminary open the receetbn of Pupil'.
Rate ü.f appevrti bed by the t rußeet,
Common Edvcaoon 6 per •
g 130.
Anrtouq (0 Cit-end the rdv.atace. o{hiø
3.1bscrtber % ili even abate fome.hit of the abdVQ
to the poore•. Inhabitant', provtded they kee •
their ChtiJrrn next clean. tod Cupply them wit
prone r Book f S B Scho lars Other
tri(t are charg:d ten pounds per
JOHN STRACHAN.
Commander-in-Chief of the U.S. forces, claiming that a delayed
acceptance would only indicate Dearborn's approval of his
soldiers' plundering. In order to avoid such incrimination, the
General signed. The school and numerous residences were thus
spared from the torch, but many public buildings, including the
Library and Legislature were less fortunate. The Americans
continued to occupy the town for eleven days.
With increased fighting on the Great Lakes in 1814,
Strachan had little time for teaching. Finally, in 1815 the Battle of
York ended, and at last the master could concentrate his efforts
on the school.
000ber to, t' 1 a. The two-storey schoolhouse was built in 1816 from timbers cut in the forest just north of
College Square. It was located on the corner of Newgate (Adelaide) and Church Streets.
Courtesy: John Ross Robertson Collection.
The opening of the school in 1812 was advertised in the
Upper Canada Gazette on October 10th.
Courtesy: Canadian Library Association.
A record enrolment of fifty that year forced the new
master to move his class into a reconverted barn on the southeast
corner of King and Yonge Streets.
On the evening of April 26, 1813, fourteen vessels
containing 1,700 undisciplined Americans sailed into what is now
Toronto Harbour. When they attacked the next morning,
Strachan capitulated immediately to General Dearborn,
In April, 1816, Strachan received $3,000 for the purpose of
erecting a more suitable schoolhouse on College Square, a sixacre
block bounded by Newgate (Adelaide), Hospital (Richmond),
Nelson (Jarvis) and Church Streets. The building was to
be erected 100 feet from both Church and Newgate Streets. The
rest of the block, which was to serve as a playground, was filled
with huge pine stumps, white clover and small ponds. Through
the middle of it ran a shallow creek where water collected after
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