More Street-Art Finds

Back to the Garden

When I started this blog I mentioned that one of the few existing properties or institutions explicitly bearing the Nanny Goat Hill name is a community garden at the northeast corner of Laurier West and Bronson avenues.

Anyone who visits the garden will notice that the plots are ringed and divided by retaining walls of varying height and some apparent age. These stone barriers, buttressed here and there by slatherings of concrete, once defined property boundries and held within them an infill of topsoil. This allowed lawns to be cultivated around erstwhile houses, atop of what was, by nature, a rugged limestone bluff. What do we know about those original properties? Let's start with Goad's insurance map for 1878 and try to picture the corner (indeed the whole block) in it's heyday.

after Goad, 1878 — sheet 44, block 271

The stone house (shown in blue) at #571 Maria (now Laurier W., lower left corner) sits on what is now the upper level of the NGH garden. The gap to its right corresponds to the garden's lower level. The house was built on a prestigious bluff — the land to the north and east of it slopes downhill, from 78 metres ASL down to 72, a drop of about 20 feet across the block in both directions.

Notice the wooden (grey) shed-and-stable to the upper right of the house (the stable is the larger section marked with and "X" — it's the only one on the block). Notice that this out-building is as large, or larger than the rest of the actual houses on the block. Finally, notice that most of these latter houses are built of wood, (yellow) and only a handful of brick (red). A lone stone house at Bay and Maria isn't much larger than the rear wing of #571. Oh, and one more notice — 571's outbuilding is downhill and at some remove from the "house on the hill" a version of the "upstairs/downstairs" principle. It seems the property straddled the block, backing onto Slater Street.

The previous paragraph thoroughly flogs the notion that by 1878, block 271 was a dramatic example of a prestige gradient emerging as old Upper Town spread southward, morphing into a newer, more working-class Centretown. But who was the laird of that lofty lot at the west end of later-to-be Laurier?

There's a bit of a numbering discrepancy between the maps and the directories. What Goad calls "571 Maria", A.S. Woodburn calls "575" — both in 1875 and 1884 (Goad would eventually go with 575 as well). Woodburn's intent is very clear when he lists the same resident in both years at 575, followed immediately by "Concession st intersects" — it's the house on the corner, occupied, he tells us, by "Clemow Francis, coal mercht etc".

 Francis Clemow, 1821-1902

"Coal mercht etc" doesn't quite address the scope of Mr. Clemow's life and eventual career in business (water, gas and eventually electricity) and politics (culminating in a senate seat). Of course, "Clemow" and "Powell" (Francis's wife Margaret) are well known street names in Ottawa's Glebe neighbourhood, roughly a mile to the south. According to the late Christa Zeller Thomas...

Two of the Glebe’s most fascinating streets surely are Clemow and Powell avenues, because they are not just exceptionally good-looking (wide boulevards, grand old homes, plenty of trees) but also because they exude an aura of influence and prestige. Even without knowing anything about the men and women behind these two names, one can easily surmise that they were part of Ottawa’s elite. But reading about Francis Clemow, the family patriarch, I find that counting him among Ottawa’s early “in” crowd is almost an understatement: the man was such a wheeler and dealer, so “firmly entrenched in the sinecures of the city corporation,” as John Taylor observed in his illustrated history of Ottawa, that it seems as though he had a hand in a great many of the city’s affairs...

Please read Ms. Thomas's account of Clemow's wheeling and dealing here. Interestingly, she states — "In 1847, Francis Clemow married Margaret Powell of the Perth Powells [...] and thus the association of Clemow and Powell began. The couple lived in a mansion, “Hill and Dale”, on Maria Street (now Laurier Avenue)." And if "Hill and Dale" doesn't perfectly describe the hilltop house at Concession and Maria, with a "dale" behind it, running down toward Slater Street, well I don't know what does.

Although the couple owned property in the Glebe, the Might Directory for 1901 shows the Clemows living at Hill and Dale until at least 1901. Francis would die in 1902 and Margaret in 1907. The 1909 Might Directory lists their daughter, Miss Adelaide "Ada" H. Clemow, living alone in the house (by that time a Laurier W. address.) She and her cousin would eventually develop the Clemow/Powell Glebe property. She died in 1931, still at the family mansion. If you're curious, a discussion of the Glebe land (PDF, City of Ottawa) can be viewed here.

Miss Ada Clemow

But back to Centretown — one thing you should know about the buildings shown on the Goad map at the top of the page... every last one, including "Hill and Dale" has since been demolished.

*     *     *

Through the late 19th century and into the 20th, Centretown Ottawa continued to grow around the Clemow house. Here is Goad's take on block 271 from his 1912 reprint series, and OMG SINCE WHEN IS THIS AN INDUSTRIAL PARK???

after Goad 1912, sheet 44

This corner of sheet 44 shows block 271 east of the Clemow mansion. Not only is it well taken-up by (mostly) small wooden houses, many sporting brick veneer, but almost a third of the land east of Hill and Dale is given over to light industry. We see the G.E. Kingsbury ice-houses at 458 Slater (grey, upper left) and to its right, the Ottawa Electric Company's lumber yard. Whether the OEC was producing lumber or consuming it, I'm not sure, but let's face it, the stuff was everywhere back then. Facing onto Bay, whatever stood there before has been replaced by a seven-house brick row and, at #200, the R. Irving soda water factory — a stable attached to the rear of the building suggests they delivered their product straight from the bottling plant. Did they even have zoning back then?

Check out the generous lot at 553 Laurier, the one with the little wooden house and the stable out back. This property will eventually become the lower level of the NGH garden.

For whatever reason(s), Goad shunted the Clemow house onto the adjoining sheet for this series. Map 46 picks up from where #44 left off — here's a detail...

We can see 575 Laurier, solid, stony and symmetrical, with a wooden conservatory running off its west side — perfect for tea or evening drinks in summer. We also notice that the stable/coach-house/garage has been reconfigured slightly over the decades. Did someone spring for a motor car along way? If you enlarge the image and squint, you can see a six-foot high stone wall separating the estate from the rest of the block. And an eight-foot high stone wall along Slater. If you're curious as to where these walls met, stand between the two Victorian brick houses at 467 and 475 Slater and look directly across the street facing the graffiti wall.

Speaking of which — notice how Goad has drawn the Nanny Goat escarpment — on the west side of Bronson (north of the red brick "Fleck House") but not on the east behind the Clemow residence. He seems to be indicating a gentler slope at Hill and Dale, not the severe drop we now see at the Techwall graffiti/retaining concrete structure.

*     *     *

A parting shot from 1965 shows Hill and Dale with one foot in the grave and the other on a banana peel. I've outlined the land that would become the Nanny Goat Hill Community Garden in green.

via geoOttawa

The "dale", and the light industry directly east thereof, has given way to the Ottawa Technical High School playing field. A new retaining wall casts its sharp shadow along the south end of the basketball courts. A handful of the original working-class houses still face onto Laurier (upper right) while the Clemow house, its conservatory torn down, sits in a parking lot. It will soon disappear, as will the walk-up apartment block next to it. This flat-roofed building with its distinctive rear light-well (no, not a chimney shadow) was built some time before 1928 and demolished circa 2000. It made way for the lower NGH garden.

By way of a post-script, notice the apartment tower casting shade across Laurier near the bottom of the photo. Those are the Stonecliffe Apartments at 175 Bronson Avenue. Their lot was once the home of Ottawa businessman and mayor, C.T. Bate — a lost exemplar of Ottawa's historic "Bate Houses." Again, a story for another time.

584 Maria (in blue), across the street from the Clemows — Goad, 1878

Mind the Gap — Block 261

In addition to debate about how to revive the Sparks Street Mall (and no, I don't think special events or a zip-line are the answer), Albert and Slater Streets have been getting their names in the news of late. These latter two are presently choked with bus traffic which will, we are told, will largely disappear when the Confederation Line of our new LRT starts to run. That launch date, as you've likely heard, has been moved back — from Victoria Day 2018 to the end of November, which is to say December, which is to say early in 2019 — which is to say in the dead of next winter.

Conversation about making the Albert/Slater corridor safer, less polluting and more inviting has thus-far focused on the Mackenzie Bridge to the east and the descent toward Lebreton Flats in the west (between the Nanny Goat and Cathedral Hills). For example, see Jon Willing here.

There is a third part of this corridor that may or may not warrant attention as part of what is a significant piece of planning for the future of the city core. In keeping with the time I spend with my nose buried in Charles Goad's insurance maps, may I present block 261, as featured on Goad's map 44...

Looking south across block 261—  the two grey-roofed buildings are no longer standing.

Goad applied a system of map and block numbers to his volumes. In neither case are those numbers fraught with any great meaning — rather, their value lies in the fact that he assigned them consistently over the years. Block 261 in 1878 was the same patch of ground so-designated in 1912. This helps makes his oeuvre a damned bloody joy to work with.

Block 261, as portrayed above in an already dated image adapted from Google's Street View, was and is bounded by Albert and Slater on the north and south, and Lyon and Bay on the east and west. Set in a bit of a valley between Old Upper Town / Cathedral Hill and Centretown/ Nanny Goat Hill, block 261 represents a transition from Upper Town commerce and poshness to a mix of white and blue-collar residences. Or rather it did. Only one house of Victorian-era provenance remains of the block — the gambrel-roofed house at 388 Albert which I've already mentioned here. The twin walk-ups at 408 and 414 Albert (corner of Bay) date from either the late 1920s or early '30s and were preceded by a commodious brick house and its side yard, the one clearly "posh" house ever built on the block.

Goad 1878 shows block 261 with its eastern half largely built up with modest houses and its western half vacant. By 1912, the rest of #261 had been filled in by a couple of brick-on-wood singles, a 4-row and a five row.

A handful of aerial photos at geoOttawa help us understand #261's development through the 20th century. A grainy image from 1928 show us a block largely identical to that portrayed by Goad sixteen years previous. With some squinting and imagination one can even see the old house at the corner of Albert and Bay. Sadly, 261 is not included in the imagery for 1958. By 1965, the houses between 388 and 408 had been razed and their lots were biding time as a car-park. Also by that year, a low-slung concrete office building had taken over the south-west quarter of the block, again displacing several homes.

By 1976, most of the houses on the east end of the block had been replaced by parking, while the relatively new office building had been rear-adjoined to a similar structure filling in the 388-408 Albert gap, as it appears in the photo above. 261 would remain thus-configured, at least until 2015. Then, at some time between 2015 and 2017, the two low-slung office buildings were demolished, leaving the block as we see it today, three-quarters vacant.

Two snapshots — aerial photos of block #261 from 1965 and 2017...

More than half of the present vacant space is designated as "400 Albert" (per geoOttawa), suggesting a single owner, which in turn presages development, sooner or later. At the time of writing I don't who plans to do what — we'll all find out soon enough, and my approval or lack thereof won't do much (anything, let' face it) to temper that course of events. I do however think that as we discuss the eastern and western gateways to the Albert/Slater corridor, we should devote some time and attention to the gaping question-mark in its middle.

Later...

The latest information I can find on the proposed development of this block cites Broccolini Construction as the developer and a 27-storey apartment tower as the intended project. Folks facing the site (Centretown Place at 400 Slater) will be watching the space with interest dread.
See an Ottawa Citizen article from the fall of 2015 here.

As of late 2017 the project was still being described as "in preconstruction". I wonder if the upcoming tunneling of the E-W limb of the CSST sewer project along Slater Street is in any way affecting Broccolini's construction schedule.

Let us know what you...

Glass Houses and a Brutal Chameleon

258 Argyle Avenue, east of Bank Street

This is how one glues a brutalist concrete cuboid onto the side of a century-old baronial-style church. The method calls to mind a golem wearing a jumper with bunnies printed on it — incongruous but actually quite likeable. Prominent front and angled corner balconies, applied to a two-stage facade soften the street-side impact. Stone (or is that "stone"?) cladding and verdigris accents play Zelig to the Centretown United Church, originally Stewarton Presbyterian, a thin slice of which can be seen along the right hand edge of my photo. The rooftop forest is, of course, the sweet green icing on the cake.

The morning sun cuts across this Google Street View image of the corner of Argyle and Bank. From the street, Centretown United Church seems a good deal larger than #258 — here we can see that the two buildings are a fairly even match for size. If a lion and a tiger got in a fight, who do you think would win?

Remarkably, the lot at #258 seems to have had no permanent building on it prior to the present apartment block, built some time during the 1990s (per aerial photos). The crane looming in the background is associated with the construction of the "SoBa" condominium tower (Brad J. Lamb Realty). The SoBa ("south on Bank") is going up on an interesting piece of "lost" Ottawa real estate...

Goad, reprinted 1912 — I've indicated the position of 258 Argyle in red type.

Here, Goad shows us the extensive Scrim greenhouses, across Catherine Street street from the bustling Grand Trunk rail-yard / linear industrial park what-have-you, now the Queensway. Charles Scrim lived at 240 Argyle, just to the right of the "AV" in Avenue. His widow was listed at that address in the 1923 City Directory. The house now serves as the Embassy of Afghanistan. The business was passed down to an employee and continues to operate from it present location on Elgin Street.

The Ottawa Journal, March 1907

Give me your jumbled masses...

"The boxes, damn it!" 

Grandma, The American Dream, Edward Albee 1961

Please don't get me wrong. I love this stuff as much as the next guy, maybe more — but yes, boxes for boxes' sake. Let's stop pretending there's any serious reason why a house should look this way.

I realize that this snow and slush can make anything look like the prelude to a warm bath and a razor blade, but 291 and 293 Lyon North are actually quite dashing in summer.  According to Google Street View, #293 (on your right) went up some time before April 2014 while 291 was likely completed over the summer of 2016.

Each house replaced a perfunctory brick-on-wood two-storey abode, both original to the site and both built (from what I can glean) very close to 1900. You can see them here — Goad (1902) listed 293 as a one-and-half because of its Mansard roof-line.

I say "houses" but these are multi-unit rental buildings. As described online, #291 consists of ten (yes, ten) units while the number in 293 is not presently specified.

stickers seen

Hollywood North

Welcome to Hollywood North, please excuse our snow. The Might Directory didn't list 233 Nepean in 1923 but some dodgy aerial photography seems to have captured it in '28, so let's say mid-twenties, inter bella and all that jazz.*

As walk-ups shrank, they shed their Edwardian encumbrances. Two and three-storey apartment blocks popped up all over Ottawa, often with minimal styling save some combination of glass-block to light the stairwell, and nods to deco/moderne in the form of corner windows and/or decorative brick courses, kept very clean and simple.

The Hollywood took a different tack, name-checking southern California's nexus of glamour, and appending mission-style fixtures (clay[?] tile, a rounded door arch) to what is otherwise a brick shoe-box. Was the stepped parapet meant to be read as an Aztec shout-out? Fusty window lintels are long gone, while the concrete sills echo the building's foundation, faux sandstone rebranded as faux adobe. Even the paving-stone effect surrounding the door frame is, on close inspection, thoroughly modern concrete, molded and dyed.

The Hollywood seems to have been the first house built on this spot, a saucy piece of infill tucked between two 19th century dwellings.

*Caveat to self — I'm finding ever more instances whereby not being listed in the City Directory isn't the same as not existing. The next post will offer an example.

A bare bear...

...seen here freezing its (their?) tits off, standing guard outside the Soho on Lisgar. Apparently one of a set created by Spanish artist Eladio de Mora ("dEmo").

245-251 Nepean

This property was depicted as a vacant lot on Goad's 1878 (sheet #38), then shown as an all-wood row ten years later, making these houses at least 130 years old. Two units have been fitted with rear dormer windows and one with a skylight. The original summer kitchens and rear sheds have been variously modified over the years. The siding, I assume, is not original. There seems to be a plaque, must check that out — also give the siding a poke. All in all, the building seems well-maintained, from the outside at least.

It would be a fair guess that these were built as working-class homes. Woodburn doesn't mention them for 1884, narrowing our construction date window to '84-'88.  Polk & Woodburn 1890-'91 does list the houses and gives us a good idea of their original demographic.

245 John Wilson, carpenter
247 John O'Connell, foreman — Church Brothers
249 Elizabeth Killeen, widow of James
251 Archibald McArthur, driver

Mr. O'Connell's employers, Thomas and William Church, operated a planing mill on the southwest corner of Kent and Lisgar (Goad indicates a fire there, with "scattered wood" in October of 1898). I don't know what Mr. McArthur drove but horses were likely involved. It goes without saying that Elizabeth Killeen was a widow, otherwise she would have been known formally as Mrs. James Killeen (and not listed at all).

Regarding these names in general and Killeen in particular — while most of Bytown's first Irish residents lived in Lower Town or, for that matter, on the banks of the Canal they helped build, many were living in this part of Centretown by the latter decades of the 19th Century.  Indeed, I've found evidence of an Irish settlement on Somerset west of Bank at a time when the surrounding land was still deserted. More on that later. Of course, 245-251 Nepean was a stone's throw from what was then the heart of Ottawa's Irish Catholic community, St. Patrick's Church (now Basilica) at Nepean and Kent — completed in 1875.

*     *     *

Later—
I was able to check out that plaque this AM, the one next to the door of #247. It reads...

c. 1889 Quinn's Row

A classic and simple design in clapboard.

This row was built for Patrick Quinn,

and is the only surviving 19th Century

working class terrace in Centretown.

Designated Heritage Property

Well there you go — I thought it looked oldish. "Circa 1889" does narrow things down a fair bit, though it makes us wonder why Goad portrayed the row as a fait accompli in January of the previous year. It wouldn't be the first time I've seen a heritage plaque slightly at odds with a Goad map.

Patrick Quinn was likely the contractor of that name, listed by Woodburn (1884) as living at 352 Nepean (since demolished). Sadly, the only news mentions I can find for Mr. Quinn involve run-ins with the law — assault (on a woman) and aggressive attempts to "borrow" money from various residents of Metcalfe Street.

Quinn's Row is mentioned in a Heritage Ottawa newsletter from 1986 (pdf).

Oh, and the siding? Definitely vinyl — it wiggles.

92 Empress

A small house on a tiny lot uses heavy, bracketed cornices and confident window treatments to make a big statement. Its appearance on the Goad maps indicates construction some time between 1888 and 1912, while the Might Directory lists occupancy in 1909 (Charles T. Lawson, v.p. Thos Lawson & Sons Ltd, casting and molding). #92 may have been built in tandem with the larger double block next door — note the identical lintel-over-basement-window masonry.

140 Bronson Avenue

This 140 Bronson sits on a triangular patch of ground at the southwest corner of Slater Street, wedged into the base of the Nanny Goat cliff. You can see how it abuts the back-yard retaining wall of the of the old Alexander Fleck mansion just uphill at 593 Laurier West.

The steep grade of Bronson Avenue as it runs down to Slater required that #140's concrete foundation be poured in stepped levels — I count three across this facade. I wonder how well that base is grounded to the bedrock below, given that the north (to your right) side of the building slumps a tad, as evinced by some cracking brickwork and the slightly misaligned window frames. There has to be some scree and back-fill under there. This part of the Nanny Goat limestone grades into patches of glacial till, so at least Leda clay isn't an issue.

This vertiginous Google shot shows the relative positions of the Fleck house (left of center, signature cupola, busy roof-lines) and #140 (right of center, mostly flat roofs, improvised massing). Note the long peak-roofed section toward the back of the building. Aerial photos at geoOttawa give 140 Bronson a construction date some time after 1928. The escarpment continues on the east side of Bronson to become the Tech Wall graffiti wall.

Catherine Boucher (@bearswim on Twitter) adds  "...And providing some affordable housing. Leased from the City by @CCOChousing after Mike Harris killed the social housing programs. Built to be a furniture warehouse during WWII. Turned into (furnished) apts after the war."

42 Primrose Avenue

on the Southeast corner of Arthur

This little charmer does a good job of hiding behind its trees and shrubbery in summer, which is a shame for us. I believe this is what's called a "four-square" plan. They appeared in the US in the 1890s and were popular through the 1910s and 20s. Many Ottawa examples are smaller than their American counterparts and often dispense with the full-width front verandah typical of the style. Some four-squares (if indeed that is the correct term) in Old Ottawa East/South are positively tiny.

Goad 1912 shows an older house in this spot facing Arthur, scrunched up next to #9 (extant) so this one replaces the original structure. #42 doesn't appear in Might 1923, so it would have been built during or after that year.

388 Albert Street

The Albert/Lyon/Slater/Bay block (#261 per Goad, sheet 44) was roughly half built-upon by 1878 — with small-to-medium houses, most of wood, a few brick-on-wood. The original #388 was a wooden one-and-a-half, almost certainly front-gabled. It had a rear summer kitchen with rear sheds attached. Ten years later Goad would depict the same house as a two-storey, with sheds reaching back to the rear property line.

By 1912, Goad shows the house in its present configuration — a two-and-a-half-storey gambrel with a two-storey front bay window and two-storey flat-roofed rear extension, all brick-veneered. The boxy front room is a later, cringe-worthy add-on. It's likely that the present house incorporates the original 19th Century structure.

The A.S. Woodburn Directory for 1875 (pg. 19) notes "Sparks George, laborer" at this address — was he related to Nicholas? By 1884, Woodburn lists "Sparks Abraham, of Sparks & Edey, carpenters and builders". They sound like they could do renos.

The 1875 date gives the house (in whatever form) an occupancy history of at least 143 years. It's now one of only three buildings (all domestic) left on an otherwise empty block. Like they say, "Watch this space" — it just might do tricks.

See Good Eats here.

Oh Hey, it's Another Map

With my left foot on the mend I've finally been able to scope out the neighbourhood in person. And with a fresh Borg implant in my right eye I can actually make out the contour lines on geoOttawa's interactive map of the city — hence the following...

This map covers much of same area as Goad's did in the previous post. The brown contour lines are calibrated in metres above sea level (ASL) — all contours, including the light brown "minor" lines, are two metres apart. As always, click on the image to view large.

You can see two yellow patches on the map. They don't exactly match the yellow areas on Goad's map but they are related. The lower patch is that part of Nanny Goat Hill which rises beyond 80 metres ASL.  The upper patch is Parliament Hill, where the elevation reaches the 80 metre mark just north of Wellington Street — think of the embankments directly behind the stone and iron fence. Three minor contours looping across the Parliamentary front lawn confirm that the Centre Block is built on an 86 metre ASL plateau. No other ground on this map reaches, let alone exceeds an 80 metre elevation.*

The red triangle demarks this walker's subjective impression of all that is NGH, its shape roughly echoing the "yellow tongue" we saw in the last post. The lower right corner of this triangle sits  at the northwest corner of Dundonald Park, where a gentle rise that began near Bank Street flattens off noticeably. The top corner, as we've already seen, sits at the junction of Bronson and Laurier Avenues. On the west... well, that cliff is hard to ignore. And as to the bottom left corner, things do start to drop away somewhat around Empress and Arthur — by the time you reach Somerset and Booth, it's all downhill with a vengeance.

Oh, and I think I figured out where that "Nanny Goat Hill" restaurant whatever thing used to be, back in the '70s — it looked bigger back then.

*For a list of significant Ottawa elevations, check out Wikipedia here.

Before the Bowery

The Bowery, promotional image via Richcraft

Less than a week after I moved into my new apartment, a flyer landed in my mailbox suggesting that I move again, into a newer, larger and more prestigious building. Prestigious, edgy, hip, whatever — what is one to make of a condo tower named after one of New York City's most notorious skid rows, lately gentrified? I checked out the flyer (which included the above rendering), noted the floor-to-ceiling windows (I'll bet the view is awesome) and realised that I could move in immediately if I withheld condo fees and stopped eating.

The Bowery (from Frisian/Dutch bouwerij = a building) by Richcraft — "NYC come to Ottawa" — sits at 255 Bay Street, facing west. Its somewhat T-shaped footprint straddles the block between Gloucester and Nepean Streets. I first noticed the site excavation in the spring of 2015 as I cycled past en route to Tech Wall. Construction was well under way the following year.

Architect's renderings like the one above can be forgiven some license when they portray a building's surroundings. In this case, a bit of adjoining built heritage has been glossed over. Notice the shrubby trees tucked into the indent at the base of the tower. A similar clump is hinted at on the far side of the tower's main entrance. Neither planting exists, but something older has been preserved in their stead.

Here's a photo of the southeast corner of Bay and Gloucester, followed by the northeast corner of Bay and Nepean.

Bayscorner Grocery, 245 Bay St.

Ricardo's Pizza, 267 Bay St.

Cosmetic details aside, they're like peas at either end of the same pod. Were these two stores built at the same time? Were they the first permanent structures on this piece of land? And were they both purpose-built as "corner" stores?* Let's see what the records have to say.

*     *     *

The earliest Goad Maps at my disposal appear to date from 1878 — or at least a sheaf of undated individual sheets have been tipped into a folder labeled "1878". The block bounded by Bay, Gloucester, Nepean and Lyon (then "Sally"**) is found on sheet #42. As of the assumed date, Goad shows the block halfway built-up with simple houses, a mix of singles, doubles and rows, some of wood, some of brick, and a few brick-on-woods. One-and-a-half and two-storey construction is the norm. A few houses have simple front verandahs, most have summer kitchens out back, and beyond that, a tangle of wooden stables and sheds. I see none of the Victorian turrets, conservatories and cross-gables that would signal wealth or prestige. Those houses were built further north and closer to the cliffs. If you view this image at full size, you can just make out the widths of the pine sidewalks, five and eight feet.

The block under discussion is #264, directly above the word "Bay

Neither store has been built yet. Nor indeed have many of the houses. Notice the square wooden shed at the corner of Gloucester and Bay — the eventual home of Bayscorner. The numerous, small orange/yellow houses on this plan were also made of wood, while brickwork is shown in red. Notice St. Patrick's Irish Catholic Church (extant, completed 1875), built of stone in block #255 facing onto Kent. The associated orphanage (block #254) was also built by 1878, as was the Catholic school (evidently rebuilt, currently St. Patrick's adult school, ESL and computer). The orphanage grounds are now the site of Centennial Towers at 200 Kent, a 15-storey glass box with a cruciform footprint, built in 1965 — I'm sure it was the cat's meow at the time.

My next set of records date to 1912. Here's Goad again, this time with a closeup of block #264.

Infill is denser and sheds, if anything, more rife. The Bay/Nepean shed has been replaces by a small one, set back from the roads. Houses have been built on Bay, constructed of wood with brick veneer. The present building at the corner of Bay and Nepean shows up here, making it over 100 years old. I have to believe that its twin across the block showed up shortly thereafter. The building at Nepean displays a signature angled doorway, suggesting to me that it was purpose build as a storefront — a drugstore in this case. The street numbering suggests an apartment above the store and a second address (2 storey) in the rear (?), facing on Bay.

The Might Ottawa city directory for the same year lists this strip of Bay Street thus...

So, we know that Clarence H. Lewis was our druggist and that #s 249, 251 and 259 were occupied. Directly across Nepean a Mrs. Rose Ventura sold fruit, while across Gloucester, a nameless Chinese person or persons plied the laundry trade. It's noteworthy that Mrs. Ventura (likely a widow) warranted a listing by name despite her gender and probable Mediterranian heritage while the "Chinese" was reduced to an adjective and a function.

Might 1914 lists druggist Lewis as having moved to 245-'47 Bay so yes, the Bayscorner building was built within two years of its Nepean Street twin. The nameless Chinese were still washing clothes on the north side of Gloucester and Mrs. Ventura still sold fruit south of Nepean. The following year another Chinese laundry had taken over the original drugstore location at 267 Bay — the older laundry at 239 was apparently still in business.

FF to the present, Bayscorner could making a killing on those Bowery residents if they play their cards right. As for Ricardo's pizza, I don't know how long they've been in business, but sitting right next to a new condo tower can't be all bad, can it? And what's not to love about their green pepper, mushroom and onion mascot?

*Almost, yes-ish, and probably.
**Possibly Sarah "Sally" Olmstead, wife of Nicholas Sparks, widow of Philemon Wright Jr.

An Old Yellow Tongue

...seen sticking up lewdly from the bottom left.

This is part of a map prepared by Charles E. Goad for his 1878 Ottawa Insurance Plans. Unlike his detailed "Goad Maps" which portray individual buildings, it's a contour map, great for spotting stuff like hills, our current obsession. Let's get oriented...

The signature footprints of the Parliament buildings are hard to miss. Of course, the Centre Block shown here was destroyed by fire in February, 1916 and replaced over the following decade. Only the Parliamentary Library (the round part overlooking the cliff) remains from that original structure.

Though I've cropped this map to focus on Ottawa west of the Rideau Canal, two features along that rudely clipped right margin are notable. The vacant plot east of Elgin Street and south of Laurier Avenue (here called "Maria") is Cartier Square, where the Drill Hall would be built a year after his map was prepared. The marching field to the west of that building is now the City Hall campus.

One block north of Cartier Square, a small watery-blue finger pokes into the image. This was the western half of a turning basin carved into the Rideau Canal to accommodate the larger boats carrying cargo to warehouses and coal bins on what is now the National Arts Centre property. This artificial pond extended from  the northeast corner of now-Confederation Park, across the Canal into the now-Shaw Centre conference halls. When the Canal was first built, this area was a swampy "beaver meadow". Indeed, early military engineers toyed with the idea of turning the land now occupied by Confederation Park and the Lord Elgin Hotel into a reservoir — this was well before anyone though that "Fort" Bytown might grow into a city of any size.

The southern and western edges of the map are as Goad intended. Neither edge corresponds with Ottawa's city limits at the time and each discrepancy tells it's own story.

When Charles Goad prepared this set of maps, Ottawa (officially) extended as far south as Gladstone Avenue (then called "Ann"). Goad chose to cut things off well north of that, at Lisgar Street. Ottawa's "suburban" development would soon reach south, across Stewarton and into the Glebe, but as of 1878 this was waste ground with marshy tendencies, ill-suited to cultivation and sparsely populated. By whatever agreement between Goad and the City Fathers, these fields were deemed not yet worth documenting.

Contrast this with Goad's western boundary, where rail lines serviced the lumber mills of the Chaudiere Islands and spurred the growth of LeBreton Flats, Mount Sherwood, and Rochesterville. These developments, paired with a dynamic topology, compelled Goad to extend his map past the then city limit of Bronson Avenue (formerly the "Concession Road").  Where is this Concession Road on our map?  It runs northward through the yellow, tongue-shaped feature jutting up from the bottom-left. And whose yellow tongue is that? It's the Nanny Goat's, stuck half-in and half-out of then-Ottawa.

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With its festive hues, one would expect a colour key to accompany this map but such is not the case — perhaps Goad anticipated later black & white reproductions? Instead, we are told the following...

Contour lines 70', 85', 100', 115', 130' and 145' above datum  (lowest sill at the Rideau Canal locks)

That is to say that there's an interval of 15 feet (4.6 metres) of elevation between contours, where the reference point ("datum") is 0 feet at the sill of the canal's lowest lock on the shore of the Ottawa River. And if you squint really hard, you can just make out those elevations, scrunched up against their respective contours. Let's use the yellow areas to compare Nanny Goat Hill with another feature we all know well.

We aren't helped by Goad's draftsman's ones, which look like his fours, nor his threes resembling his fives. Still, some head-twisting (and squinting) confirm that the Nanny Goat formation sits at 130 feet above datum, at no point rising above 145 feet. Compare this flattened, yellow acreage with Parliament Hill — whose tight contours describe a lop-sided but distinct cone, surging up toward the Centre Block.

We tend to think of Parliament Hill as something that happens north of Wellington Street, but Goad's map reminds us of its true extent and of its roundness. Emerging from the valley levels of Laurier West and Slater, the hill rises toward a gentle southeast flank (pale blue), where construction (the LRT) and gas-line installation (a certain fashionable restaurant) still unearth skeletons left over from Bytown's first boneyard.

Climbing higher, a patch of yellow tells us that the Parliamentary front lawn matches the elevation of the Nanny Goat plateau, as it partly encircles an eggshell-coloured table-land, this last rising above 145 feet and creating a dais for the Centre Block.

Goad saw no reason to extend his 1878 maps as far as Somerset Street, but as Centretowners know, the ground south of that roadway falls off quite sharply. The old cartographer  has drawn (most of) the Nanny Goat's triangular mesa, sitting at a not-insignificant elevation of between 130 and 145 feet and matching that of the Parliamentary lawn. We should note that Goad depicts this elevation as exceeding that of Sparks/Bronson cliff, Nepean Point and Rideau Falls. The Nanny Goat was not a hill to be sneezed at.

That which isn't

Look into the void.

This post finds me well-installed in my new digs, with one leg sadly propped on my desk à la Jimmy Stewart in Rear Window thanks to a crippling attack of gout. For the time being, my computer will have to stand in for Stewart's honking big telephoto lens as I explore my new surroundings from the confines of my apartment, Thus availed with long hours to over-think the whens and wheres of Nanny Goat Hill, a perhaps odd plan occurs to me.

Fans of CSI and Dexter will easily pick out the "void" on the left side of the (obviously staged) blood-spatter field in the above photo. The blood "shadow" bears the clear outline of a sturdy hunting knife, since removed from the scene — a telling piece of negative evidence, as it were.

So. what if we could infer the boundaries of Nanny Goat Hill by delineating that which it isn't — a "Nanny Goat Void"? For example, if NGH lies immediately to the west of the downtown core (which apparently it does) then we can arguably set the eastern edge of NGH alongside the core's western edge. We've already somewhat established that NGH lies around an axis running from Bronson at Somerset, north to Bronson at Laurier. By identifying all the neighbourhoods surrounding this strip of land, we should be able to delineate a void in their midst and that void, roughly, will be Nanny Goat Hill.

Of course, this plan is iffy from the get-go. Neighbourhoods come and go — sometimes they overlap or even sit one inside the other. Nor are they always carved in geopolitical stone. Some boundaries are more obvious than others — Downtown is definitely south of the Ottawa River just as Overbrook certainly looks like it's north of the Queensway. A neighbourhood may be a designated "study area" or part of a business improvement zone, but neither necessarily respects local, traditional borders.

No matter,  let's give this a shot, starting with our aforementioned downtown core. Ottawa's version of a finance and admin district. Wikipedia may not be the final word in all things but it can be a good place to gather (indeed shape) consensus. Here we are told that Ottawa's finance-and-admin district is bounded by the Ottawa River, the Rideau Canal, Gloucester Street and Bronson Avenue.

Ouch. If the core extends as far west as Bronson, does it shoulder Nanny Goat Hill right up against the cliff in Dow's drawing (see previous post)? I've always thought of Bank Street as the core's western edge, given how much of the property past Bank was once residential. Or is that just me living in the past? Of course, we must concede that the core has expanded westward. Still, I'd like to suggest a compromise boundary somewhere between Percy Street and Bay Street. Bay in particular marks much of the current transition from hotels and offices on its east side, to a burgeoning forest of apartment towers beyond. And Percy has some intriguing topology worth checking out.

Chinatown offers NHG a clear and convenient southern boundary — as long as we define Chinatown strictly as a Somerset Street business district rather than a somewhat more nebulous "ethnic" neighbourhood. And while we're talking about hills, notice how all the land south of this Chinatown strip slopes predictably downward — something else for us to get back to.

Heading west, Chinatown abuts Little Italy, which extends north along Preston Street, from Carling Avenue towards LeBreton Flats reaching into the very shadow of Nanny Goat's cliffs. When I first moved away from home, some school-friends and I shared an apartment just north of Somerset at 80 Spruce Street (#2, where for one glorious winter, sex, LSD and Ouija boards reigned supreme). Our building sat near the bottom of a steep climb running from Preston Street uphill to Rochester, then Booth... and beyond, to the edge of a plateau. That plateau (or a part thereof) features the old St. Vincent Hospital at Cambridge North and Primrose. The hospital itself overlooks a cliff that's contiguous with Dow's Nanny Goat Cliff. Surely this modest acreage must be part of NGH.

So far our map of NGH features a question mark to the east, Somerset Street to the south and a jagged escarpment to the west. But any hope for our "if not this then that" criterion falls flat as we turn northward.

Abutting the Ottawa River, the Supreme Court /LAC grounds north of Wellington were the site of Upper Town, Bytown's original posh-toff enclave. Well-removed from the Lower Town rabble east of the Canal, the cliff-side portion of Upper Town nevertheless became the first Ottawa neighbourhood to suffer wholesale obliteration at the hands of the Feds as the "Parliamentary Precinct" expanded westward.

The land immediately south of Wellington slopes down from Parliament Hill, and again from a proud outcrop at the west end of Sparks Street. We can sense the drama of this arrangement by walking south along Bronson from Sparks, descending a steep bank until we reach the corner of Slater. Ahead of us looms the "Techwall" graffiti wall. Behind this concrete retaining structure, the northern tip of a great Centretown plateau rises along the western end of Laurier Avenue.

This NGH thing is starting to come together — in the shape of a flat-topped hill.

Jimmy Stewart is eager to explore his neighbour(hood).

Caprice

The Ottawa Journal,  February 24 1971

This whimsical drawing of a boy climbing Nanny Goat is the work of "Dow", who was for many years the in-house go-to illustrator at The Ottawa Journal. I was introduced to him by a friend with a Yorkshire accent, which led me to misunderstand that "Del" was a cartoonist at the Journal in addition to the man who signed his work "Dow". But no, there was no Del, just Dow.

I can't find any biographical notes on the man and somehow I'm not surprised. Dow (I never learned his real name) was not a prized ornament at social gatherings. Pale-skinned and scrawny, he looked to be past his best-before date by the time we met. His gaze was furtive, his gait a hunched scurry. Long, thinning (once blond?) hair framed a bespectacled face dominated by a nose so distorted and bulbous (rosacea?) that even the charitable viewer would wonder "Can't they can just cut the damned thing off?" I can picture him climbing aboard a Bank Street bus wearing a grimy trench-coat, though this last detail may be a false memory.

Appearance notwithstanding. Dow was a gift to the Journal and to the people of Ottawa. Almost every day one, sometimes two of his drawings would give pause and make thousands of us smile. Dow wasn't interested in skewering politicians, or anyone for that matter. His subjects were most often local "human interest" stories. Dow was sharp observer of people — his quick, sure lines rendered his characters with kindness and affection, often mid-gesture. Shoulders would pivot, glances were bewildered, smiles knowing —  children ran and cars screeched, objects flew through the air. Dow's little pictures always drew the reader's eye to whatever story he'd been asked to illustrate. And after you'd read the story, you would always go back to his drawing and nod. And like I said, smile.

The above drawing (taken from the Journal's "Be Heard" feature) illustrates the ideas that 1) there were indeed goats on the hill and that 2) the area's northwestern escarpment was and is a climb best left the young and the athletic, or to goats. Regarding item #1, anyone who has seen John Taylor's Ottawa, An Illustrated History will remember the lovely period watercolor he chose for the cover. It shows several head of cattle being driven past Parliament Hill and toward the Dufferin Bridge on their way to the Byward Market. If we once had cattle on the east end of Wellington Street, goats on the west end shouldn't surprise us.

Unlike so many of Ottawa's place names therefore, "Nanny Goat Hill" recognises neither royalty nor  peerage nor community prominence. It simply recalls a farm animal scampering up and down a cliff.

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I first met with the "Nanny Goat Hill" name some time in the mid-to-late 1970s. This was when Sunday brunch was still considered a cutting-edge fashion statement, a see-and-be-seen affair — eggs Benedict, croissants and fruit salad, servers scurrying to refill bottomless café au lait, mimosas and, for the truly piss-elegant, a Kir Royale or two.

Every so often, the in crowd would decamp en masse to the next hot venue. This migration typically played out over three weekends. The avant garde would sniff out the new bistro or whatever on the first Sunday, the Beautiful People would flock to it on the second, and the sad-sack wannabes would trickle in on the third.

It was in the prelude to one such hejira that a friend and brunch avant-gardiste invited me to tag along and sample the Sunday scene at a new restaurant... something something Nanny Goat Hill something whatever. The eatery had opened in a newly completed commercial building on the north side of Somerset, not far from Bronson (a bit west of, I think) and set on an actual slope. I can't find the building any more. Did it burn down? At any rate, my friend judged the food, the decor and the clientele to be blandness incarnate and not worth a second visit. I had to agree.

Not long afterward, a handful of us were invited to what became known as "Stephanie's Human Curry Luncheon" at her townhouse just off Island Park Drive (a peculiar story for another time). Well settled in at a long teak table, we looked forward to our main course, getting rather too sloshed on Beaujolais Noveau as the early winter sun streamed into the dining room. Someone mentioned "that Nanny Goat Hill restaurant" — "Why yes, we've been there" my friend piped up. flashing me an eager smile, "and trust me, don't bother!" Conversation turned to the restaurant's peculiar name as Stephanie wafted into the room, uncorking a crisp Chardonnay ("to sober us up") and pointed out that "it's a real name. The hill. It's called that." Which, frankly, was more than anyone else present that day could offer.

If this anecdote seems as pointless as it is gratuitous. well that's my point. Between Dow's drawing of a cliff, the position of the Nanny Goat Hill Community Garden at the corner of Bronson and Laurier, and that of an erstwhile restaurant on Somerset Street, the whereabouts of our neighbourhood is drifting into focus.

On the other hand,  the conversation at Stephanie's luncheon demonstrates that compared to, say Rockcliffe or Barrhaven or even Old Ottawa East, most Ottawans had/have little idea of what a Nanny Goat Hill is, nor as the francos among us might say, ce que ça mange en hiver. Well, we have all winter to find out.

Rise and Fall and Rise

In Advance of the Broken Skull — date, artist unknown

For many us, the word "hill" calls up the image of a roughly conical land-form, like a mountain but smaller. Or a breast, but larger. It might be topped with blueberry bushes, possibly interspersed with thrills. Or we could think of something to be climbed, both and down — a more subjective, functional definition. Our illustration does a fair job of wedding the two, even as some of us wonder why anyone would dig a well at the top of a hill.

In time, we'll encounter settings in which people do dig well on top of hills, or on hillsides. Nonetheless, some authors argue that the first line of Jack and Jill  subverts the expectation of finding water at the bottom of a hill to signal its young audience that they are being told a nonsense story, an airy froth in which a little boy can crack his skull open on a rock, then run home to be healed with no more than a bandage of brown paper soaked in malt vinegar.

On first hearing that Ottawa has a "Nanny Goat Hill", many people will forgivably picture a cartoon hill, topped not by a well, or by berry-bushes, but by a grass-munching goat, her udder close to bursting with milk soon to be turned into rounds of cheese, each bearing a label with a picture of a cartoon hill, topped not by a well...

Nanny Goat Hill is no such thing. If there was a goat, she's long gone. Nor is there a cartoon cone with a pinnacle to which one can confidently point and say "there a goat once stood, her udder close to bursting...".

But if the measure of a hill is in the climb, try walking (or cycling) up Somerset Street West, from Little Italy, up through Chinatown to Bronson Avenue. And should a cliff be your criterion, consider the limestone escarpment overlooking LeBreton Flats. Fall off that and no amount of brown paper or vinegar will goat-herd your brains back into your skull.

What are we to make of this "hill" sans peak, sans goat, with half of its flanks unaccounted for? It has no Wikipedia entry and its name only appears on Google Maps appended to a vest-pocket community garden at the west end of Laurier Avenue. Historically, newspapers hardly mention it. And still, it's a thing...

...une chose

Two Small Things

Deux choses...

"So." — as everyone has taken to saying before saying anything worth saying — this is a blog about the history and geography of a small, loosely defined Ottawa neighbourhood, affectionately named "Nanny Goat Hill". There are two things you should know about that which follows.

Thing One: After some twenty-two years, I'm moving from my apartment in Ottawa's "Golden Triangle" to one just west of the downtown core, close to if not actually within the bounds of said  Hill — a loosely defined place, as I was saying. I look forward to learning as much  as I can about my new home-base and I might as well share my findings with the handful of people who care about such things.

Thing Two: I've lately become obsessed with photographing houses. I hope to include many such pictures in this blog, but over the past summer I've gone more or less blind, this thanks to a matched pair of very agressive cataracts. Surgery is scheduled for this winter, so here's looking forward to looking forward again.

D. Chouinard