© 2017, 2021, Christian Cassidy
Place: Bon Accord Building / Mitchell Fabrics / Main Street Project
Address: 635 - 645 Main Street, 185 Logan Avenue
Constructed: 1906 - 07
Architect: John D. Atchison
The now single-storey Bon Accord block stands as a testament to Arthur M. Fraser's protest against property taxes.
Fraser, (1852 - 1948), was born and raised in Scotland. In 1876, he became a lawyer in London, England and the following year married Mary Gordon. He was likely the same Arthur M. Fraser who was a board member of the London-based Land Corporation of Canada which sold land for subdivision along the CPR line in Western Manitoba and near Regina.
In 1898, Fraser moved to Winnipeg with his wife and family, which would eventually include ten children. They lived at 166 Donald Street.
Fraser quickly became known as a well-to-do property owner, likely something he began dabbling in while on the board of the Land Corporation of Canada. He also became a director of the Standard Trusts Company when it was created in 1902. By 1905, his property portfolio consisted of more than a dozen pieces of land that included 400 feet of frontage along Main Street.
Fraser was an outspoken political activist both in favour of temperance and against taxation. His lengthy letters to the editor appeared regularly in daily papers and often called out those in positions of power for their beliefs and policies.
Fraser began to develop some of his higher profile properties between 1905 and 1907
Permits were granted for the five-storey Bon Accord building, the Men's Own Block - a five storey hostel with assembly hall to the east of the Bon Accord at 226 Logan Avenue, and a 16-storey office building at Main Street at McDermot Avenue. (The latter was never built - you can read more about that in Robert's post at The Common.)
The five-storey, brick and reinforced concrete Bon Accord Building was constructed in 1906-07.
Architect John D. Atchison, (also see), designed the mixed-use building with multiple retail units on the main floor, with offices and at least one residential floor on the upper levels.
Tenants started advertising in the block in March 1907 but a powerful rain storm that July caused extensive water damage the top floor of the building. It also poured through the stairwells and elevator shaft and ran right down to the basement. As a result, there was a delay in new tenants moving in until late summer.
Initial retail tenants included a clothing store, pawn shop, department store and a Chinese goods store. The following year, the Quebec Shoe company opened and was a retail presence there for a decade.
The offices were a combination of real estate companies, insurance agents, accountants and the likes of J. D. MacArthur, a well known contractor. The Gospel Church occupied suite 106 for many of the building's early years. In 1930, the Communist Party called it home.
The residents who lived on the second floor were mostly working class with occupations such as elevator operators, CPR employees, bridge builders, Eaton’s clerks and stenographers. The 1911 census lists 62 people living on the second floor alone, many of them families.
There were some well-to-do tenants. People like Robert Tate, president of Canada Loan and Realty Company, and Fraser himself who lived with his family and a nanny on the fourth floor.
Address: 635 - 645 Main Street, 185 Logan Avenue
Constructed: 1906 - 07
Architect: John D. Atchison
Mr. and Mrs. Fraser ca. 1930s
The now single-storey Bon Accord block stands as a testament to Arthur M. Fraser's protest against property taxes.
Fraser, (1852 - 1948), was born and raised in Scotland. In 1876, he became a lawyer in London, England and the following year married Mary Gordon. He was likely the same Arthur M. Fraser who was a board member of the London-based Land Corporation of Canada which sold land for subdivision along the CPR line in Western Manitoba and near Regina.
In 1898, Fraser moved to Winnipeg with his wife and family, which would eventually include ten children. They lived at 166 Donald Street.
Fraser quickly became known as a well-to-do property owner, likely something he began dabbling in while on the board of the Land Corporation of Canada. He also became a director of the Standard Trusts Company when it was created in 1902. By 1905, his property portfolio consisted of more than a dozen pieces of land that included 400 feet of frontage along Main Street.
Fraser was an outspoken political activist both in favour of temperance and against taxation. His lengthy letters to the editor appeared regularly in daily papers and often called out those in positions of power for their beliefs and policies.
Top: Gospel Hall Winnipeg.com
Bottom: Nov. 13, 1906, Manitoba Free Press
Fraser began to develop some of his higher profile properties between 1905 and 1907
Permits were granted for the five-storey Bon Accord building, the Men's Own Block - a five storey hostel with assembly hall to the east of the Bon Accord at 226 Logan Avenue, and a 16-storey office building at Main Street at McDermot Avenue. (The latter was never built - you can read more about that in Robert's post at The Common.)
The Bon Accord, far right, ca. 1918, (Virtual Heritage Winnipeg)
The five-storey, brick and reinforced concrete Bon Accord Building was constructed in 1906-07.
Architect John D. Atchison, (also see), designed the mixed-use building with multiple retail units on the main floor, with offices and at least one residential floor on the upper levels.
Tenants started advertising in the block in March 1907 but a powerful rain storm that July caused extensive water damage the top floor of the building. It also poured through the stairwells and elevator shaft and ran right down to the basement. As a result, there was a delay in new tenants moving in until late summer.
The offices were a combination of real estate companies, insurance agents, accountants and the likes of J. D. MacArthur, a well known contractor. The Gospel Church occupied suite 106 for many of the building's early years. In 1930, the Communist Party called it home.
The residents who lived on the second floor were mostly working class with occupations such as elevator operators, CPR employees, bridge builders, Eaton’s clerks and stenographers. The 1911 census lists 62 people living on the second floor alone, many of them families.
There were some well-to-do tenants. People like Robert Tate, president of Canada Loan and Realty Company, and Fraser himself who lived with his family and a nanny on the fourth floor.
A unique feature of the building was the 700-person Bon Accord conference hall that could be entered from the Logan Avenue entrance. It was likely on the third floor of the building as street directories usually list no tenants on that level. (Both the Bon Accord and neighbouring Men's Own buildings had halls.)
The hall was initially given over to Mrs. Bridget Sherbinin who also ran the Stranger's Rest Mission further north on Main Street with her husband, Rev. Michael Sherbinin.
The location at Bon Accord, (referred to sometimes as the Sherbinin Mission), was a place where "...young men who were in great distress, without friends, without money to buy a meal or a place to sleep” could go to find refuge. It is also where Sherbinin accepted donations of clothing and other materials for the poor.
Interestingly, a mission of some sort would be an almost continuous presence in the building until the late 1980sand starting again in 2020.
The mission's presence in the building was thanks to Mary Fraser, Arthur Fraser's wife. She was a devoutly religious woman who devoted much of her spare time, when not raising ten children, time to missions working with the poor.
Shortly after arriving in Winnipeg, Mary was the founder of this city's chapter of the Travellers' Aid Society. A division of the YWCA, it offered shelter and comfort to stranded and destitute travellers, especially women and families who were the victims of abuse or at risk of falling into the sex trade.
Due to her prominent place in this movement and oration skills she sat on committees and shared the stage at times with the likes of Nellie McClung.
It is unclear how long the mission operated from the building. By 1911 the hall contained the offices of the Sunshine Fund, another YWCA charity. The hall was also used by churches as a temporary location and sometimes as a commercial exhibition space.
The building appears to have been successful, though Fraser was an unhappy man and became more vocal in his anti-tax crusade.
In March 1922, FRaser co-founded and served as the first president of the Winnipeg Taxpayers' Association. Members appeared as delegations at various civic and school board meetings offering advice on how ot to spend money. He also became known for his long - sometimes a quarter of a page - letters to the editor railing against taxes and tax policy.
Fraser routinely appealed the assessment on his properties and made the Bon Accord his centrepiece of his anti-tax battle. He felt not only that the assessed value was too high, but that the system used by the city to come up with that value was "illegal". Rather than using a combination of property value and net revenue to arrive at assessed value, he and his lawyers argued that the city should only tax based on gross rental revenue.
In 1926, Fraser found a sympathetic ear in provincial Justice Galt who heard his appeal. Galt shocked the city when he agreed with Fraser's argument and lowered the assessed value of the Bon Accord building from $75,000 to $18,000.
The city appealed that decision all the way to the Supreme Court of Canada. The court, however, said it did not have the jurisdiction to hear the case. In the end, the wording of the city's property tax bylaw was strengthened and the Bon Accord's original assessment was reinstated.
This infuriated Fraser who claimed it was an illegal act by the city. He continued to fight the battle of the building's assessment in hearings in subsequent years and pointed out the injustice in many letters to the editor.
In 1928, Fraser announced that his family, (the children were grown by now but two daughters remained at home), were moving back to England. The Free Press quoted an unnamed real estate agent as saying his departure: “...will be a distinct loss to the ranks of investors who have shown their faith in the future of the city.”
It was announced that Fraser sold the Bon Accord in 1932 for the sum of $75,000 to Mrs. Matilda Wilson, a widow. Wilson moved into the former Fraser home in suite 407 of the block but died less than two years later.
The building's sale might not have not been completed or it resorted back to Fraser after Wilson's death as he again sold the building in 1935, this time for just $35,000, to builder Frank Lount. It was announced at the time of the sale that the top four storeys of the building would be dismantled to leave just the main floor with mezzanine and the basement.
It is unclear if the dismantling was a condition of sale by Fraser - a final "screw you" to the city for the high assessment. The lower sale price and the fact that Lount made no public comments about the removal of the floors leads me to believe that it was a condition of sale.
Fraser couldn't help but send one last letter to the editor which appeared in the December 9, 1935 Winnipeg Tribune. With it, he included before and after photos of the Bon Accord as an “…illustration of what the present system of assessment and taxation is doing in Winnipeg, razing its buildings and ruining its property owners.”
The dismantling, which cost about $8,000, began in the last week of April 1936.
The use of the Bon Accord name pretty much disappeared after the elimination of the top floors. The various storefronts on the main floor developed independently and over time didn't even appear as if they belonged to the same building.
The 1940 Henderson Directory shows that there were five main floor units: the Oak Theatre; New Main Café; J. Mindess and Co. Jobbers (a clothing store); Shorty’s Billiards parlour; and an empty space. In 1944, that void became Mindess, Gilfix and Malt, forerunner to Mitchell Fabrics. Also around 1944 the pool hall became Union Gospel Mission.
The Oak Theatre first began advertising in January 1939 and was located at number 645. It formed a cluster of theatres near the intersection with the Starland and Rex across the street.
It was a neighbourhood cinema that showed second-run films and could be leased out by local speakers and preachers. The exact number of seats it had is unknown but it must have been small considering the limited height of the main floor.
The New Main Café, a Chinese restaurant, first appears in the Henderson Directory of 1932. An early owner was Wong Jim Quong.
The café's fate mirrors the fortunes of that section of Main Street. In the 1930s and 1940s it could be a rough place. but it took a drastic downward spiral in the 1950s.
It seems that the management, likely the Pang family, allowed illegal drinking to take place in the basement level which led to many gruesome incidents.
In 1955, a group purchased pop upstairs then went down to mix it with rubbing alcohol. The party soon took to the streets and ended with the murder of August Flatfoot on Higgins Avenue.
In 1959, a man who had been drinking in the basement came upstairs and punched 73-year-old William Kmet of Fraserwood, MB, a patron in the café, in the head. He died of a brain hemorrhage.
Later that year, another assault in the basement left a man with a broken finger and needing 28 stitches.
The café's name comes up numerous times in newspaper articles related o court cases involving murder, assaults, theft and prostitution until it was finally closed down in 1962.
Union Gospel Mission has had a presence in Winnipeg since they opened at 637 Main Street in 1933.
The organization's international headquarters was based in St. Paul, Minnesota and had missions in Canada, Great Britain, and the U.S.. The first head of the Winnipeg mission was Edward C. Clarke who had previously established missions in Buffalo, N.Y. and Erie, Pennsylvania.
Union Gospel was open 24 hours a day, seven days a week and offered meals, a place to sleep, and spiritual guidance. They relocated within the building to unit 645 in 1944.
The mission were a fixture in the space until around 1980 when they moved to their present home on Princess Street.
It was fabric store Mitchell Fabrics that outlasted all of the other tenants.
The roots of the store go back to a wholesale jobbers (clothing and textiles) run by Samuel Mindess and Frank Gilfix. Their partnership appears to have formed in 1906 when they had an office on the second storey of the Bon Accord Building.
The business moved to 619 Main Street after the deconstruction of the upper floors of the building but returned to the Bon Accord around 1943.
When Mendel Mitchell of Reinland, Manitoba returned from World War II, he settled in Winnipeg and went to work for what was then called Mindess, Gilfix and Malt. He became a partner with Frank Gilfix in 1947 and the store was renamed Mitchell and Gilfix.
The name Mitchell Fabrics first appears in the 1961 Henderson Directory. Later that decade, Mitchell began expanding into neighbouring retail units until they occupied the entire building. It is unclear when he bought the building outright. (For more about the history of Mitchell Fabrics.)
It was announced in February 2017 the Mitchell Fabrics would close by the end of the year.
Related:
My photo album of the Bon Accord Block
A look back at Mitchell Fabrics West End Dumplings
The last days of business for Mitchell Fabrics
The Logan Avenue entrance features the block's original name
The hall was initially given over to Mrs. Bridget Sherbinin who also ran the Stranger's Rest Mission further north on Main Street with her husband, Rev. Michael Sherbinin.
The location at Bon Accord, (referred to sometimes as the Sherbinin Mission), was a place where "...young men who were in great distress, without friends, without money to buy a meal or a place to sleep” could go to find refuge. It is also where Sherbinin accepted donations of clothing and other materials for the poor.
Interestingly, a mission of some sort would be an almost continuous presence in the building until the late 1980sand starting again in 2020.
Mar. 6, 1904, Winnipeg Tribune
The mission's presence in the building was thanks to Mary Fraser, Arthur Fraser's wife. She was a devoutly religious woman who devoted much of her spare time, when not raising ten children, time to missions working with the poor.
Shortly after arriving in Winnipeg, Mary was the founder of this city's chapter of the Travellers' Aid Society. A division of the YWCA, it offered shelter and comfort to stranded and destitute travellers, especially women and families who were the victims of abuse or at risk of falling into the sex trade.
Due to her prominent place in this movement and oration skills she sat on committees and shared the stage at times with the likes of Nellie McClung.
It is unclear how long the mission operated from the building. By 1911 the hall contained the offices of the Sunshine Fund, another YWCA charity. The hall was also used by churches as a temporary location and sometimes as a commercial exhibition space.
Apr. 5, 1927, Winnipeg Tribune
The building appears to have been successful, though Fraser was an unhappy man and became more vocal in his anti-tax crusade.
In March 1922, FRaser co-founded and served as the first president of the Winnipeg Taxpayers' Association. Members appeared as delegations at various civic and school board meetings offering advice on how ot to spend money. He also became known for his long - sometimes a quarter of a page - letters to the editor railing against taxes and tax policy.
Fraser routinely appealed the assessment on his properties and made the Bon Accord his centrepiece of his anti-tax battle. He felt not only that the assessed value was too high, but that the system used by the city to come up with that value was "illegal". Rather than using a combination of property value and net revenue to arrive at assessed value, he and his lawyers argued that the city should only tax based on gross rental revenue.
In 1926, Fraser found a sympathetic ear in provincial Justice Galt who heard his appeal. Galt shocked the city when he agreed with Fraser's argument and lowered the assessed value of the Bon Accord building from $75,000 to $18,000.
Apr. 9, 1926, Winnipeg Tribune
The city appealed that decision all the way to the Supreme Court of Canada. The court, however, said it did not have the jurisdiction to hear the case. In the end, the wording of the city's property tax bylaw was strengthened and the Bon Accord's original assessment was reinstated.
This infuriated Fraser who claimed it was an illegal act by the city. He continued to fight the battle of the building's assessment in hearings in subsequent years and pointed out the injustice in many letters to the editor.
In 1928, Fraser announced that his family, (the children were grown by now but two daughters remained at home), were moving back to England. The Free Press quoted an unnamed real estate agent as saying his departure: “...will be a distinct loss to the ranks of investors who have shown their faith in the future of the city.”
The Frasers didn't make it as far as England. Instead, they ended up in Montreal where John kept an interest in at least some of his local properties and contributed more lengthy letters to the editor at assessment time.
Apr. 17, 1935, Winnipeg Tribune
It was announced that Fraser sold the Bon Accord in 1932 for the sum of $75,000 to Mrs. Matilda Wilson, a widow. Wilson moved into the former Fraser home in suite 407 of the block but died less than two years later.
The building's sale might not have not been completed or it resorted back to Fraser after Wilson's death as he again sold the building in 1935, this time for just $35,000, to builder Frank Lount. It was announced at the time of the sale that the top four storeys of the building would be dismantled to leave just the main floor with mezzanine and the basement.
Dec. 9, 1935, Winnipeg Tribune
Fraser couldn't help but send one last letter to the editor which appeared in the December 9, 1935 Winnipeg Tribune. With it, he included before and after photos of the Bon Accord as an “…illustration of what the present system of assessment and taxation is doing in Winnipeg, razing its buildings and ruining its property owners.”
The dismantling, which cost about $8,000, began in the last week of April 1936.
Bon Accord, right, showing different storefronts, ca. 1966 (Warkentin)
The use of the Bon Accord name pretty much disappeared after the elimination of the top floors. The various storefronts on the main floor developed independently and over time didn't even appear as if they belonged to the same building.
The 1940 Henderson Directory shows that there were five main floor units: the Oak Theatre; New Main Café; J. Mindess and Co. Jobbers (a clothing store); Shorty’s Billiards parlour; and an empty space. In 1944, that void became Mindess, Gilfix and Malt, forerunner to Mitchell Fabrics. Also around 1944 the pool hall became Union Gospel Mission.
Jan. 14, 1939, Winnipeg Tribune
It was a neighbourhood cinema that showed second-run films and could be leased out by local speakers and preachers. The exact number of seats it had is unknown but it must have been small considering the limited height of the main floor.
The Oak Theatre closed in 1962.
The café's fate mirrors the fortunes of that section of Main Street. In the 1930s and 1940s it could be a rough place. but it took a drastic downward spiral in the 1950s.
It seems that the management, likely the Pang family, allowed illegal drinking to take place in the basement level which led to many gruesome incidents.
In 1955, a group purchased pop upstairs then went down to mix it with rubbing alcohol. The party soon took to the streets and ended with the murder of August Flatfoot on Higgins Avenue.
In 1959, a man who had been drinking in the basement came upstairs and punched 73-year-old William Kmet of Fraserwood, MB, a patron in the café, in the head. He died of a brain hemorrhage.
Later that year, another assault in the basement left a man with a broken finger and needing 28 stitches.
The café's name comes up numerous times in newspaper articles related o court cases involving murder, assaults, theft and prostitution until it was finally closed down in 1962.
Mar. 24, 1934, Winnipeg Free Press
Union Gospel Mission has had a presence in Winnipeg since they opened at 637 Main Street in 1933.
The organization's international headquarters was based in St. Paul, Minnesota and had missions in Canada, Great Britain, and the U.S.. The first head of the Winnipeg mission was Edward C. Clarke who had previously established missions in Buffalo, N.Y. and Erie, Pennsylvania.
Union Gospel was open 24 hours a day, seven days a week and offered meals, a place to sleep, and spiritual guidance. They relocated within the building to unit 645 in 1944.
The mission were a fixture in the space until around 1980 when they moved to their present home on Princess Street.
645 Main Street ca. 1991 (Warkentin)
Through the 1980s, number 645 was home to the Indian and Metis Pentecostal Church and Mission. It was then briefly an outreach centre for the Indian and Metis Friendship Centre.
Sept. 5, 1956, the Jewish Post
It was fabric store Mitchell Fabrics that outlasted all of the other tenants.
The roots of the store go back to a wholesale jobbers (clothing and textiles) run by Samuel Mindess and Frank Gilfix. Their partnership appears to have formed in 1906 when they had an office on the second storey of the Bon Accord Building.
The business moved to 619 Main Street after the deconstruction of the upper floors of the building but returned to the Bon Accord around 1943.
Nov. 28, 1966, Winnipeg Tribune
When Mendel Mitchell of Reinland, Manitoba returned from World War II, he settled in Winnipeg and went to work for what was then called Mindess, Gilfix and Malt. He became a partner with Frank Gilfix in 1947 and the store was renamed Mitchell and Gilfix.
The name Mitchell Fabrics first appears in the 1961 Henderson Directory. Later that decade, Mitchell began expanding into neighbouring retail units until they occupied the entire building. It is unclear when he bought the building outright. (For more about the history of Mitchell Fabrics.)
It was announced in February 2017 the Mitchell Fabrics would close by the end of the year.
It was announced in September 2018 that the Main Street Project was set to purchase the building for $2.6 million. The cost was underwritten by a $2 million grant from the federal government and a capital campaign involving private funders. It allowed the organization, created in 1972, to relocate from its 2,100 square foot home on Martha Street to a space of more than 36,000 square feet.
Renovations began in July 2020 and the 120-bed emergency shelter opened on December 15, 2020.
Renovations began in July 2020 and the 120-bed emergency shelter opened on December 15, 2020.
Related:
My photo album of the Bon Accord Block
A look back at Mitchell Fabrics West End Dumplings
The last days of business for Mitchell Fabrics
The Logan Avenue entrance features the block's original name
That is not what it looks like. This is a fake picture.
ReplyDeleteGreat readd thankyou
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