336 William Avenue - Boulton Motors Building

 © 2026, Christian Cassidy

Place: Boulton Motors / Little Brown Jug
Address: 336 William Avenue (Map)
Constructed: 1927
Architect: J. N. Semmens
Contractor: Borrowman and Jamieson
Cost: $50,000

336 William Avenue is a relative newcomer to its surrounding neighbourhood of former factories and warehouses that date back to the late 1800s or early 1900s.

This land was likely vacant until the current building was constructed on it, as street directories show no addresses between 330 William Avenue and Hargrave Street (then known as Charlotte Street) until it was built in 1927.

It was likely a side yard or the forecourt for the neighbouring 328/330 William Avenue, which, despite its appearance, was constructed in 1912. It was home to Plewes Automobile Company, a local sales agent for REO motor vehicles, then a dealer for the Waterloo Manufacturing Co., makers of farm tractors.

When Waterloo Manufacturing relocated to Portage la Prairie in 1919, the building and this land sat empty through the 1920s.

In 1927, the Robert J. Henderson Manufacturing Co., a garment maker on Bannatyne Avenue, funded the construction of the current $50,000 building at 336 William Avenue.

In its original configuration, the building measured 60 by 100 feet, was one and a half stories tall, and considered "absolutely fireproof" due to the use of steel trusses, Fort William brick, and a concrete floor.

The architect was John Nelson Semmons (also see). He was a prolific architect with dozens of buildings to his name. By this point in his career, he had designed about a dozen Winnipeg schools, including Daniel McIntyre Collegiate Institute, and the St. John's Library.

The contractors were Borrowman and Jamieson. The firm was established in 1925 by experienced engineers L. F. Borrowman and Charles Jamieson. Their work as partners to this point included a major expansion of the Grace Hospital on Preston Street (see above) and Mulvey School.

The Grace expansion brought architects Semmons and Borrowman together with Jamieson months before the construction of 336 William. 

Robert J. Henderson had a deal in place before construction started to lease the building to the newly formed Boulton Motors, which had signed a contract to be the Winnipeg distributor of U.S.-owned but Canadian-manufactured Gotfredson Trucks.

Gotfredson specialised in heavy-duty trucks with capacities of one to five tons used in industries such as cargo transportation and construction. They also made taxis, small buses, and fire engines. It first entered the Manitoba market in 1923 with a corporate-owned dealership on Rupert Avenue.

Boulton Motors Ltd.'s manager was Albert S. Boulton, who was also president of City Dray Co., a local moving company. 

Gotfredson ran into financial difficulty in 1929, and while it didn't completely disappear, the large-scale truck manufacturing ended. As a result, Boulton filled the gap by signing up as the Manitoba distributor for Diamond T trucks in 1930. 

June 4, 1932, Winnipeg Free Press

Boulton Motors moved to Princess Street in 1932, and a long list of vehicle-related firms moved through this space. 

It started in 1934 with Julius S. Siefried's Service Garage, Monarch Motor Sales from 1938 to 1948, and Red River Motor Coach Lines, Through the 1950s. In the 1960s, various auto repair and body shops came and went.

October 19, 1968, Winnipeg Free Press

In 1968, the building became a wallcovering showroom for the adjacent Western Paint that lasted into the 1990s. (The company is nearing 120 years in business!)

There were some shorter-term tenant such as Evelyn Seida's Shaw (art) Gallery, and an antiques and collectibles store. through the early 2000s, it was home to DesignType, a print shop and graphic design place.

The building was empty by 2015, when Brian Scharfstein and Pam Cipryk, who own Canadian Footwear at the end of the block, bought the building.

A chance meeting in the parking lot between Scharfstein and Kevin Selch led to the building being upgraded and the establishment of Little Brown Jug Brewing Company, which officially opened in April 2016. (You can read more about how this came about in this Free Press story.)

345 Donald Street - Herzig Building / Manitoba Savings Office Building / Giant Tiger

  © 2026, Christian Cassidy

Place: Herzig Building / Manitoba Savings Office Building / Giant Tiger store
Address: 245 Donald Street, (Map)
Constructed: 1926
Architect: Pratt and Ross

Contractors: James Reid (excavation), Wallace and Aikins Ltd. (construction)
Cost: $57,000

Streetscape ca 1915. Knox Church bottom right. (McInnis postcard collection)

In May 1926, New York-based developer B. H. Herzig purchased land at the northeast corner of Donald Street and Ellice Avenue. The lot was home to the third iteration of Knox Presbyterian Church until it sold the property in 1914 to fund the construction of its present building overlooking Central Park. 

Herzig, who had been coming to Winnipeg for years, usually to attend fur auctions, said this was the first year where he felt the city's future prospects and the low cost of land were the right combination to purchase. He said: "There is no limit to the money which we will put into our proposed building so long as the property will give an equitable return for the investment.". Ideas he floated included a hotel, apartments or commercial block.

March 9, 1926, Winnipeg Tribune

In the first week of September 1926, a $37,000 building permit was issued to Herzig's newly created Donald Realty Corporation and local real estate firm Aronovitch and Leipsic for a single-storey with full basement block designed by local architects Pratt and Ross.

It would be constructed of brick and concrete and measure 117 x 120 feet. James Reid began excavation right away and Wallace and Aikins Ltd. began construction by the end of the month.

Given Herzig's hope for the lot, the building may have been constructed so that additional floors could be added later, something not uncommon at the time.

February 11, 1927, Winnipeg Tribune

The first business to open here was Gibson's Bowladrome on January 6, 1927 in the basement level, which was numbered 351 Donald Street. It was a 20-alley bowling parlour with a lunch counter and confectionery store, and the third bowling venue owned and operated by Charlie Gibson.

As the building was still under construction, only eight alleys opened that night. This was just enough to serve the two bowling leagues that had registered to use the space.

Gibson's sons, Leslie, Ray, and Ormee, took over the bowling chain in 1958 and ran it until the last brother died in 1972. The Bowladrome was closed by 1974. 

July 3, 1928, Winnipeg Tribune

The anchor tenant of the building, which took up 8,000 square feet of the main floor, was the Province of Manitoba Savings Office, which opened on April 1, 1927.

The bank was established by the province in 1920 with the motto "Conducted to foster the thrift and welfare of the people". Its deposits were used mainly to fund rural and agricultural loans where credit was tougher to come by. (Ontario and Alberta also had provincial banks for much the same purpose.)

It opened two branches in Winnipeg, one downtown and one in the North End, as well as in Brandon, Portage, Stonewall, Dauphin, and Ethelbert. The downtown branch was on the main floor of the Lindsay Building. It got a good deal by moving, as it paid $1,250 per month for its new $8,000 square feet versus $964 per month for 3,857 square feet at its old location.

By 1924, the Provincial Savings Office boasted 24,000 depositors, more than $9 million on deposit, and a surplus of $60,000. By the start of 1927, it had 37,000 depositors and $15 million on deposit.

April 28, 1932, Winnipeg Tribune

Manitoba's Savings Office closed abruptly in February 1932. A government committee that looked into the closure identified six men, including two Conservative MLAs, a Conservative MP, and the provincial organiser for the Conservative party, who spread rumours that the bank "was broke" and urged friends and colleagues to withdraw their cash.

The rumours spread rapidly through rural communities and created a run on the bank, causing its temporary closure. It never reopened.

The committee found that the bank was not broke. Any transactions, its liquidity, and the government credit backing it up in case of an emergency were all within legal parameters. It seems the Conservatives were merely trying to embarrass John Bracken's Liberal-Progressive coalition government.

Within days of the closure, the accounts of its depositors were transferred to private banks and nobody lost any money.

The Savings Office took up just 8,000 of the main floor's 15,000 square feet. The rest was a series of little shops; three along Donald Street and four along Ellice Avenue.

Over the years, these contained small businesses such as a pharmacy counter, tailor, jeweller, taxi dispatch office, pet shop and millinery.

The Cave supper club opened in 1935 in the old Savings Office and some of the retail shop space. The club was owned by Max King and was notable for its cave-like interior using burlap covered with plaster and mood lighting. King opened a Cave in Vancouver and Edmonton a couple of years later.

There was a local house orchestra and nightly floor show, but the Cave did not bring in many top acts like other supper clubs in the city. Its fare more often resembled that of a vaudeville show than a night club.

One July 1942 offering included Shirley Bush, military tap dancer, Wilfrid Dubois, juggler, and the De Sylva Twins dance duo. Singer and comedian Hattie Noel appeared at the Cave in January 1941 and was so popular that she was booked for a two-week stay the following year.

The imported floor shows trailed off due to the difficulty in booking travelling acts during the war. It was then left to local singers and musicians to take up the slack.

A fire destroyed the interior of the Cave in December 1944. The other businesses in the building, Ida McCullough's millinery shop and the Bowladrome, got smoke and water damage. The club was renovated and reopened a few months later.

The Cave's lease was not renewed, and it closed in May 1947.

July 31, 1947, Winnipeg Tribune

In late 1947, Investor's Syndicate (now IG Wealth Management) moved its head office to the building and took up the entire 15,000 square foot first floor with the exception of a little storefront for Ray Hamerton's musical instrument shop. The  A. L. Patterson art studio joined the Bowladrome in the basement.

In 1956, Investors began construction on a custom-built office building on Broadway and vacated 345 Donald in late 1957.

November 15, 1959, Winnipeg Free Press

In 1959, another provincial government agency, this time the Manitoba Liquor Control Commission, leased the entire main floor of the Herzig Building to be its only downtown liquor store, replacing a much smaller one on Fort Street. It would also be home to the MLCC's liquor enforcement inspectors.  

Manitoba Liquor Control Commission Store No. 2, as it was officially known, opened on November 16, 1959, and caused instant traffic chaos. The agency intended to purchase a neighbouring service station lot, but that deal fell through at the last minute. As a result, the store had no customer parking.

Liquor shopping at that time was much quicker than today, as there was no store to browse around. You walked in, wrote what you wanted on a slip, brought it to the counter, and someone fetched it from the back for you.

It was immediately found that customers were not going to pay for parking in a commercial lot a block or two away for a five-minute transaction. Instead, they parked in loading zones, double-parked on the street, or circled the block endlessly waiting for a meter to open up.

The city was unimpressed by the gridlock that had been created. In early 1960, it converted the dozen parking meters nearest the store to 15-minutes only. This angered other retailers near the intersection whose customer required more time in their stores.

The MLCC began planning for a new "self-serve" liquor store in the area in 1973. Continued parking woes and a doubling of its lease rate meant that the Herzig Building was not in consideration. It instead chose a former service station site a block away at Ellice and Hargrave and designed it with eleven customer parking spots out front. It opened on September 3, 1974.

August 6, 1975, Winnipeg Tribune

The next major tenant opened in June 1975 and took up the whole main floor and basement. 

In the early morning of March 11, 1975, a fire started in the floor below a beauty salon in a two-storey building at Portage Avenue and Colony Street. It made its way into the neighbouring United Army Surplus Sales and created a small inferno. Three businesses were completely burned out, and several others suffered smoke and water damage.

Owners Ned and Fred Begoch vowed to rebuild at the Portage and Colony site and the new store opened in March 1978. They operated both stores, plus a third in Garden City Square that opened in 1985, through to 1986 when the 245 Donald Street location closed.

Crystal Palace sign, December 1996. (City of Winnipeg Archives)

When United Army Surplus closed, the building was ready for another reset. 

Crystal Palace Snooker Lounge and Deli was created in 1981 at 299 Kennedy Street. It moved into larger premises at 345 Donald in late 1985, and by February 1986 was hosting the Manitoba Open snooker championship.  

An early owner was Henry Nogiec, who was well-known in the Canadian snooker community and at times represented Manitoba at national events. By the early 1990s, the owners were Ron Brown and Wayne Clisy.

Crystal Palace closed around 1996.

 

October 19, 1985, Winnipeg Free Press

Long-time Toronto discount retailer The BiWay (later shortened to BiWay) arrived in Winnipeg in late 1985 with stores at Richmond West Shopping Centre, Cottonwood Shopping Centre, and Garden Oaks Shopping Centre. By July 1986, it had six Winnipeg stores, including 345 Donald Street.

Canadian retail conglomerate Dylex Corporation, the parent company of BiWay, filed for bankruptcy protection in 1995. This meant the closure of all of its Western Canadian stores, including Winnipeg's eleven. The company continued on for a while under new ownership, but by 2001 the few remaining BiWay stores around Toronto also closed.

Biway took up a large section of the main floor of the building, but shared it with Manitoba Justice's Youth Correctional Services offices.

The Horseshoe in 1999 (2 Ply Collective on YouTube)

The Horseshoe Cabaret opened in the BiWay space on May 22, 1997. It boasted a 41.5-metre-long bar and $50,000 worth of cedar on the walls. The live music venue was country-themed, but it also hosted rock, hip hop, and funk acts. Even Randy Bachman played there! It was also known for hosting raves.

The last mention of it in "at the clubs" newspaper listings was the end of December 1999. The last mention of it hosting a show was the "Groove Community Festival of Funk" on June 9, 2000. 

Here's a video of an on-stage performance that pans the room to give a sense of its interior.

The old Herzig Building was now nearly 75-years old, vacant, and in poor condition. 

CentreVenture, the arm's-length civic property development agency, began courting the North West Company in 2001 to open one of its Giant Tiger stores in the downtown. (Like BiWay, Giant Tiger was a long-time Ontario retailer ready to launch into Western Canada.)

On top of the cost of purchasing the store, the NorthWest Company estimated that it would take another $750,000 to gut and renovate the building, including replacing the roof and facade. The city agreed in 2002 to help out with a modest $32,000 Strategic Economic Incentive Grant to be paid out over five years.

The Free Press did not cover the grand opening, nor did Giant Tiger take out any ads, but the store opened in late 2002 or early 2003. 

In July 2026, it was announced that the store will close on November 7, 2026. It provided no reason, just to say that the decision to close a store is "never made lightly". (Unlike the closure of its store in The Pas on July 31, 2026, there was no press release issued.)

What's next for the former Herzig Building? Given its eclectic history, it could be anything, really!

115 Garry Street - HBC Garage / The Keg Restaurant

 © 2026, Christian Cassidy

Place: HBC Garage / The Keg Restaurant 
Address: 115 Garry Street (Map)
Built: 1911
Architects: Woodman & Carey (John Woodman and Raymond Carey)

This building was constructed in 1911 as part of the ever-growing footprint of the HBC's first department store at Main Street and York Avenue.

The store was constructed in 1881 and expanded to the west a couple of times. In the early 1900s, several modern outbuildings were added to the streets around it, such as a stable/livery, a power plant, and this garage for its fledgling fleet of motorised vehicles.

The garage was designed by architects Woodman and Carey of Winnipeg. That same year, they designed a $200,000 CPR laundry building near the CPR Depot (now demolished), the Free Press Building on Carlton Street, and the HBC Wholesale  Warehouse on Main Street (now Gibraltar House.)

September 5, 1931, Winnipeg Tribune

When the Bay's new department store opened on Portage Avenue in 1926, its collection of buildings around Main and York fell out of use. The last year this building is listed in street directories as the HBC garage was 1930.

The building continued to serve the motor vehicles industry for several companies. The first was Watson Motors from 1931 to 1932, McRae and Griffith Ltd. garage from 1940 to 1944, then Red Wing Cartage and Storage from 1944 to 1964. It then sat vacant for several years.

A very different enterprise came along in 1975.

The Keg 'N Cleaver restaurant chain began in Vancouver in 1971, and by 1975 it had 16 restaurants operating in Canada and six under development in the U.S..

It applied for a liquor permit for 115 Garry Street, at what would be its seventh location, in  February 1975, and held its grand opening in June. By 1984, all of its restaurants had rebranded to simply "The Keg".

In 1989, the restaurant closed temporarily for a $1.6 million renovation that saw a new entrance and patio added to the south side of the building and the original Garry Street entrance was closed.

Rendering of DSM (Carrington Real Estate - DSM)

In 2022, construction began on a new mixed-use development at Donald Street and St. Mary Avenue that was to contain The Keg as a retail anchor. The developers ran into financial trouble, and construction came to a halt.

The project was revived by Carrington Real Estate in 2024, and the project was rebranded DSM (short for Donald St. Mary). The 14-storey building will contain two floors of retail, including The Keg, and 160 rental units on the upper floors.

In a 2025 Free Press story about the 50th anniversary of The Keg in Winnipeg, Scott Stephen, the director of operations for Winnipeg's restaurants, confirmed that “For now, the plan is to continue to operate out of our Garry Street location right up to the time we move over in summer or fall of 2026.” 

The Keg closed its 115 Garry Street location on July 29, 2026.

HBC Delivery Truck, ca. 1920 (eBay)

Related:
115 Garry Street Historic Buildings Report City of Winnipeg
115 Garry Street Manitoba Historical Society
115 Garry Street Winnipeg Architecture Foundation

772 Sargent Avenue - Home Street Playground

© 2026 Christian Cassidy.

Place: Former Kiwanis Playground No. 3 / Home Street Playground
Address: 772 Sargent Avenue at Home Street (Map)
Opened: September 14, 1947

A big renovation is taking place at what used to be known as Kinsmen Playground No. 3 at the intersection of Sargent Avenue and Home Street. It opened om September 14, 1947, and was one of several playgrounds funded by the Kinsmen Club and other community service organisations who answered the city’s call to help create outdoor recreation spaces on land it owned after the Second World War. (For more about the Kiwanis Playgrounds.)

It appears that this was vacant land, even after the area urbanized. A survey of street directories shows no homes on Home or Simcoe streets beyond the ones that already border it (built in 1924 and 1931), and there is no address on that block along Sargent Avenue.

There was the office of a fuel yard, in the 1930s known as A. J. McInnis, at the corner of Beverley and Sargent. This block could have been its work yard, which would have meant piles of coal, wood, coke, and the wagons to deliver it to homes. (The only way to know for sure would be to locate fire insurance maps for this area and see what is indicated.)

Whatever the reason, the land was vacant in the 1940s and at some point became property of the city.

June 2, 1944, Winnipeg Tribune

Kiwanis began their fundraising efforts for playgrounds in 1944. The first to open was at Burnell Street at St. Matthews (current site of Orioles Community Club) in 1945; the second was at Lizzie Street and Logan in 1946 (later Lizzie Playground and now Giizhigooweyaabikwe Park); the third was at Sargent Avenue and Home in 1947.

The practice was for Kiwanis to raise the estimated amount of money needed, donate it to the city to hire the contractors to build it, then do a ceremonial handover of the playground to the city when the work was complete.

September 13, 1947, Winnipeg Free Press

Work began on the site in the spring of 1947. Like the other Kinsmen playgrounds, the space got playground equipment (swings, a see-saw, three types of merry-go-rounds, sandboxes, and picnic tables), a wading pool, and a pool building. The cost was around $5,000.

The official opening ceremony took place at 4:15 pm on Sunday, September 14, 1947. George Jackson, president of the Kiwanis Club of Winnipeg, handed over the playground to Mayor Garnet Coulter. The Salvation Army Band, likely from the nearby Citadel No. 8 at Ellice Avenue and Home Street, provided the musical entertainment.

September 15, 1947, Winnipeg Free Press

The city's newly created recreation department supplied staff, usually high school or university students, to work at the playgrounds from late June to late August. At times, various playgrounds would go on field trips to larger parks for things like picnics or to compete against each other at sports days.

The name "Kiwanis Playground" began to fall out of use by the late 1960s. By 1972, notices about programming at this space usually referred to it as Home Street Playground.

In 1977, it received a $7,300 renovation.

In 2008, a mural called Pathways was added to the pool building by Mandy van Leeuwen and Michel Saint Hilaire

Source: Winnipeg.ca

A tender was awarded for the Home Street Playground Redevelopment in October 2025. The city budgeted $290,000 for the project, but it is unclear how much the winning bid was.

The work will revitalise the park but not change much about the footprint or services offered. The site will be excavated, regraded, and new play equipment, site furniture, fencing, and pathways will be added. The wading pool is not part of the bid, but will remain in place.

The playground was to reopen on July 1, 2026, but fell behind due to the wet spring. The city's new estimated date for reopening is July 27.

Manitoba Legislature - Victoria Memorial (R.I.P.)

© 2026, Christian Cassidy

Object: Victoria Memorial
Location: Manitoba Legislature grounds
Erected: October 1, 1904
Artist: Sir George Frampton
Removed: 2021

This is a three-part 2026 update on all things Queen Victoria, 125 years after her death. To read more about the history of the Victoria Day holiday and her connections to Canada, visit here. For another lost Victoria monument, the Jubilee Fountain, read here.

Winnipeg Free Press, August 13, 1904

Queen Victoria was the monarch who signed the Manitoba Act in 1870, and there were a number of major monuments to her around Winnipeg. One of the most visible for over a century was the Victoria Memorial that sat outside the front entrance of both of Manitoba's legislative buildings.

Not long after the death of Victoria in January 1901, a Provincial Memorial Committee was created under the leadership of Thomas Gilroy and C. N. Bell.

The group shortlisted several British artists for the work, and by the time it made its first public appeal for funds in July 1901, it knew it would be commissioning a larger-than-life bronze sculpture on a stone base that would cost at least $25,000. It also reached an agreement with provincial officials to put it somewhere on the legislature grounds.

It was expected that each municipality in the province would contribute anywhere from $10 to $50 towards the cause, and the Manitoba and Winnipeg governments would provide larger grants. The bulk of the funds, though, would come from individuals. The maximum contribution per person was set at just $5 so that it could truly be considered a people's memorial, with anyone who wanted to contribute to her memory to be able to do so.

The first out-of-town donation came from the schoolchildren of Emerson, Manitoba, who collected $14.95. From time to time, the committee published a long list of donations, many ranging from 50 cents to a couple of dollars.

The donation limit had the intended effect as thousands of people were donating, but the small amounts meant that raising the funds would take a long time. 

Frampton, ca. 1920s

By 1903, the commission for the statue was given to London, England-based artist George Frampton (knighted as Sir George Frampton in 1906).

Frampton already had a long and illustrious career and was considered one of the leaders of the dynamic "New Sculpture" movement. His best-known works today are likely Peter Pan at Kensington Garden (1912) and the Edith Cavell memorial at Charing Cross (1920). (See a list of his memorials here.)

Given his reputation, Frampton was commissioned to produce several Queen Victoria memorials in the years following her death, including similarly seated ones for Kolkata, India, and St. Helen's, England.

Frampton sent a letter to the committee in July 1903 to say that Manitoba's memorial was "progressing very satisfactorily" and would be delivered to Winnipeg early the next summer. 

The next issue to deal with was the stone base. which the committee resolved in October 1903. Local architect Daniel Smith, who was also the provincial building inspector at the time, was chosen to design it and supervise the erection of the entire memorial/ reaction of the full memorial. The stone work was contracted to Fred Dickson and the Winnipeg Stone Co. for a cost of $2,150.

 

May 26, 1904, Winnipeg Tribune

In late May 1904, members of the memorial committee met again with officials from the legislature to finalize its exact location. (This was the original Legislature on Kennedy Street, not the present-day one.) 

Initially, it was thought it could be placed prominently at the intersection of Kenney Street and Broadway, but the final decision was to place it in front of the legislature facing Kennedy Street.

It was hoped that the memorial would be in place for an unveiling on Dominion Day, July 1, 1904, but there were several delays in getting the statue, packed in an 11-foot by 8-foot crate, on a ship. It finally departed London aboard the CPR passenger liner SS Montrose (1) on July 26, arrived in Montreal on August 8, and arrived in Winnipeg by rail a couple of weeks later.

Unseasonably wet weather had delayed work on the base, but by mid-September, the crated statue, derricks and stone base were in place on the legislature grounds, ready for Smith to oversee its assembly. 

Legislature and memorial ca. 1908, Martin Bermand Postcard Collection

At 4 pm on Saturday, October 1, 1904, a crowd of invited guests gathered under cold and rainy skies for the unveiling. The Royal Canadian Mounted Rifles and 13th Field Battery did a march past. Music was provided by the 90th Battalion band. 

Lieutenant-Governor Sir Daniel MacMillan dedicated the statue on behalf so that future generations might remember her". It was left to Premier Rodmond Roblin to do the unveiling.

The new Manitoba Legislature was officially opened in July 1920, and the following June, workers removed the memorial from its old location. After a good cleaning, it was reassembled in front of the new building on August 4, 1921.

On July 1, 2021, the statue was toppled by protesters and damaged beyond repair. The stone base was removed in November 2022, at which time a note was found underneath apologising that due to Prohibition, workers could not leave the customary bottle of brandy.

Assiniboine Park - Boy With The Boot / Queen Victoria bust

 © 2026, Christian Cassidy

Objects: Former Jubilee Fountain (Boy With The Boot / Queen Victoria bust)
Place: English Garden, Assiniboine Park
Created: 1898

This is a three-part 2026 update on all things Queen Victoria, 125 years after her death. To read more about the history of the Victoria Day holiday and her connections to Canada, visit here. For another lost Victoria monument, the Victoria Memorial, read here.

Queen Victoria was the monarch who signed the Manitoba Act in 1870, and there were a number of major monuments to her around Winnipeg. 

In early 1897, Victoria's diamond jubilee year that celebrated 60 years on the throne, the local branch of the Young People's Society of Christian Endeavor proposed a centrally located drinking fountain to celebrate the event. It was eventually agreed that the "Jubilee Fountain", designed by well-known architect Samuel Hooper, would be located on the front lawn of city hall.

The main feature of the fountain was a bust of Queen Victoria carved by Hooper, who was also a stonemason. The secondary feature of the fountain was a four-foot-tall-bronze of "...a boy of about ten years of age holding a boot in his hand" that was ordered from New York. (There are several casats of this statue around the world.)

The fountain was fed by an artisanal well, and the Free Press described how the water flowed this way: "About the base of the pedestal upon which the bust of Her Majesty will rest four buffalo heads in bronze, from which four sprays of water will pour into the surrounding basin....From the point in the shoe the hands of the boy, another series of streams fall into the basin, and at the base of this, the streams from the drinking fountain will fall from the bronze lips of two ferocious-looking lions."

The city agreed to lay the foundation, and the Trades and Labour Council agreed to assemble the column of local stone that the queen's bust would sit atop. Sunday schools from churches across the city fundraised nickels and dimes to put a dent into the estimated $1,500 price tag. (Their fundraising came up a "few hundred dollars short", so it is likely the city paid for much of it.)

Work was still underway in June 1898, but the fountain was ready by July 12th when Lord Aberdeen and Lady Aberdeen, Canada's Governor General and Chatelaine, respectively, unveiled it.

The fountain with Queena and boy, ca. 1910 (City of Winnipeg Archives)

It is difficult to find a photo of the entire fountain because the "Boy with the Boot" barely lasted 15 years at this site, and not a lot is written about its removal. 

Winnipeg Tribune coverage of a September 1910 Libraries and Civic Baths committee meeting noted that there would be several improvements made to Assiniboine Park in the coming years. It then notes: "If the plan suggested is carried out, the board may remove the 'boy with the boot' fountain which has been located in the city hall gardens" without explaining what the connection was.

A 1955 Tribune story says it had been removed because the driveway in front of city hall had to be widened.

Whatever the reason, the "Boy and the Boot" was removed by the start of the first World War, leaving just the Queen, as can be seen in this 1961 photo.

What happened to the 'Boy with the Boot'?

September 29, 1948, Winnipeg Free Press

Neither daily newspaper mentioned the statue again until the Winnipeg Free Press ran a photo in September 1948 showing it at the edge of the duck pond in Assiniboine Park. It is unclear how long it had been there for.

A few months later, the newspaper ran a follow-up item on its editorial page to say that the image had prompted a wave of phone calls and letters from the public asking "why this little statue, one of the most delightful pieces of boy sculpture, should be kept buried in the foliage at Assiniboine Park?"  The editorial called on the parks board to look at moving it, even just 20 feet from the edge of the pond, so that people could see it in the round.

In 1952, the statue was removed for repairs as its arm with the boot had broken off. This was around the same time that the park was developing an International Gardens (now called the English Garden.)

Rotary International, which was paying for the construction of the entrance to the gardens, rescued the boy and made it a central figure of its project that opened in summer 1953. The statue still calls that spot home.

What happened the the Victoria bust and column?

Victoria's bust and its column also ended up at the English Garden at Assiniboine Park, but its journey is less mysterious.

The fountain was dismantled in 1962 to make way for the construction of the new Civic Centre on the site of the old city hall and public market building. Initially, the column and bust were moved across the street, as was the Little Black Devil which also stood on the lawn of the old city hall. 

When preparations were underway to start construction on the Centennial Concert Hall in 1965, the Manitoba Centennial Centre Corporation, a provincial Crown corporation, told the city to remove it. (It did keep room to reinstall the Devil, which today stands between the Concert hall and Planetarium.)

The Centennial Corporation and Manitoba Historical Society suggested that the best place for the city to put the monument would be in the English Garden at Assiniboine Park to reunite it with the "Boy with the Boot".  the city agreed but there were no funds in the budget for its reconstruction, so it likely sat in storage for most of 1965 and 1966.

Lamarsh with the Victoria Bust, May 18, 1967, Winnipeg Tribune

The column was rebuilt in 1967, possibly with some finding from the Centennial Corporation. On May 18, 1967, just days before the Victoria Day holiday, Secretary of State Judy LaMarsh pulled away a giant black drape to unveil it to the public.

After more than 50 years, the queen and her boy were reunited.

Also see this video about the Boy with the Boot from the City of Winnipeg Archives.

198 King's Drive - King's Park

 © 2026, Christian Cassidy

Place: King's Park
Address: 198 King's Drive (Map)
Opened: 1987

March 16, 1912, Winnipeg Tribune

A subdivision called "King's Park", named for King Edward VII who died in 1910, was established in the R.M. of Fort Garry in 1912, but the nearby by the same name wasn't formally established for another 75 years.

It's is a little difficult to research the history of the park due to the subdivision and eventually a community club with the same name. Around 95 percent of the hits you get from newspaper searches relate to one of those! 

Here's a first-hand account of someone moving to the subdivision in 1938.

Metropolitan Corporation of Greater Winnipeg, Planning Division, 1964 (Source)

It was in the 1950s that this land began its long journey to becoming a formal park.

In A City at Leisure, Catharine Macdonald notes that during that decade, "The Metropolitan Parks and Protection Division ... acquired the peninsula then known as Washington's Point, today King's Park." Further land was added to the site in the 1960s, and the current size is about 40 hectares.

It is possible that Metro bought the land from a man named George Baldry, as the 1956 annual report of the Metropolitan Planning Commission of Greater Winnipeg describes i its Fort Garry section:

"A development plan for the King's Park-Cloutier Drive area was prepared during the year by Mr. George Baldry who owns a substantial part of the area. The area was bounded by the University, Cloutier Drive, Pembina Highway and Kilkenny Street. Preliminary sketches prepared by Mr. Baldry were discussed with the owners and the local planning commission, as well as the municipal engineer. Provision was made for school sites, churches, parks, one large and several smaller commercial areas."

George Baldry was a local engineer whose firm, Baldry Engineering and Construction, worked on many large buildings and public works projects throughout the Winnipeg region. Though he lived in Wolseley for most of his life, he had interests south of the city.

Baldry was an early executive member of the Southwood Golf Club, and a 1954 biographical article in the Winnipeg Tribune noted that his retirement hobby was "a herd of 100 registered Holstein cattle on land just past the university." This land might be what we currently know as King's Park!

King's Park ca. 1983 (Source: A City at Leisure, page 182)

The purchase of the land did not mean immediate development into a park. The 1964 "possible park" map above shows the land being used as market gardens, so it was rented out to people to grow flowers and vegetables commercially.

The creation of Unicity in 1972 meant that the City of Winnipeg inherited dozens of suburban parks on top of its own extensive collection. A King's Park was on the books but had to wait in line with small improvements made to the site over several years. 

It wasn't until the summer of 1987 that King's Park formally opened. Macdonald described it as having an "oriental feel ... with its small pagoda, arched bridge and stylized waterfall." The pagoda was originally located in Assiniboine Park.

July 8, 1987, Winnipeg Free Press

Winnipeg Free Press columnist Val Werier walked the park with a friend soon after it opened. He called in "an absolute gem" and goes into detail about some of the work that was done there.