Village of Yorkville

Village of Yorkville

Once crossed by an ancient aboriginal trail (Davenport Road), the area known today as Yorkville was first permanently settled by those of European descent in the early 1800s. The Red Lion Inn, one of the first buildings in the area, was a stagecoach stop and vital gathering place. Economic growth was spurred by brick-making and brewing industries established from the 1830s.

The community was linked in 1849 to the City of Toronto by H.B. Williams’ horse-drawn omnibus service. In 1853 it was incorporated as the Village of Yorkville. Despite annexation by the City of Toronto in 1883, Yorkville remained a quite community of predominantly middle and working-class people well into the 20th century.

Yorkville Village. Photo by Elena

In the 1950s, artists and actors transformed the area into a thriving arts community. By the mid to late 1960s, Yorkville become famous for its “hippies”, folk music, and coffee houses. Redevelopment has since altered much of the old incorporated Village. Still, streets north of Yorkville Avenue, west of Avenue Road (now part of the Annex), and east of Yonge Street now part of South Rosedale retain much of their 19th and early 20th century character.

Yorkville Town Hall

Designed by William Hay, one of Toronto’s most important early architects, the Yorkville Town Hall was built by William McGinnis, and opened on this site in 1860, fronting onto Yonge Street and Collier Street. High Victorian in style, it was constructed of local “white” (yellow) bricks with red and blackened brick trim, and boasted three stained glass rose windows that illuminated a third-floor public hall seating 500.

In its second-floor Council Chamber, local politicians debated, among other things, “the running at large of Pigs and Swine and Poultry”, the planking of sidewalks and the “prevention of immoderate driving”. In 1861, the privately owned horse-drawn Toronto Street Railway commenced service from the Town Hall to the St. Lawrence Market. After the clock was completed in 1889, the Town Hall’s bells sounded the working day and rang for fire alarms.

Coat-of-arms on the Yorkville Fire House. Photo: Elena

After annexation in 1883 ended Yorkville’s village government, the Council Chamber was used as a public library. The building also housed the Yorkville Company of the York Rangers, the Naval Club, and the offices of the Toronto Street Railway, and had space for community use.

The Yorville Town Hall was destroyed by fire on November 12, 1941. All that remains is the carved stone coat-of-arms, since mounted on the Yorkville Fire House.

Yorkville Public Library. Yorkville Branch, Toronto Public Library. Photo: Elena

Yorkville Toronto Public Library

Yorkville Branch, Toronto Public Library 1907. Yorkville Branch is the Toronto Public Library’s oldest building, the first of four libraries constructed with a 1903 grand from the Carnegie Corporation. It replaced the Library’s first branch, “Northern”, which had opened in the former Yorkville Town Hall in 1884, only one year after Toronto’s annexation of Yorkville and the introduction of free library service to the city. This building was designed by City Architect Robert McCallum in Beaux-Arts style, thought to give an appropriate seriousness to a civic structure. Typical of many Carnegie libraries, it is marked by a broad flight of steps leading to a raised single storey, and by strong symmetry and classical details best seen in the imposing central entrance with its columned portico. Constructed of yellow bricj with Ohio sandstone, Yorkville Branch was renovated and expanded in 1978 (City of Toronto Inventory of Heritage Properties).

Ancient Trail Binawiigo Bimikawewin

Beneath the winding course of Davenport Road lies hidden an ancient trail created by Aboriginal peoples. The trail linked their settlements with hunting and fishing grounds, and with trade routes that tied this region to the upper Great Lakes, the Atlantic coast, and the Midwest.

Between the Humber and the Don Rivers, the ancient footpath avoided difficult terrain by weaving along the foot of the escarpment that is one of Toronto`s most distinctive geological features. It was the shoreline of 13,500-year-old glacial Lake Iroquois, forerunner of much smaller Lake Ontario. This meandering route, at odds with the city`s rectangular street grid, now connects us with the distant past.

Stroll in the Parkette of Davenport Road to learn more about Davenport Road`s evolution into a city street.

The Yorkville old City Hall. Photo: Elena