Part 35 (1/2)
In the _Gazette_ of March 14, 1801, we have a further account of the improvement on Yonge Street. We are informed that ”at a meeting of the subscribers to the opening of Yonge Street held at the Government Buildings on Monday last, the 9th instant, pursuant to public notice, William Jarvis, Esq., in the chair, the following gentlemen were appointed as a committee to oversee and inspect the work, one member of which to attend in person daily by rotation: James Macaulay, Esq., M.D., William Weekes, Esq., A. Wood, Esq., William Allan, Esq., Mr. John Cameron, Mr. Simon McNab. After the meeting,” we are then told, ”the committee went in a body, accompanied by the Hon. J. Elmsley, to view that part of the street which Mr. Hale, the undertaker, had in part opened. After ascertaining the alterations and improvements necessary to be made, and providing for the immediate building of a bridge over the creek between the second and third mile-posts, the Committee adjourned.”
All this is signed ”S. McNab, Secretary to the Committee. York, 9th March, 1801.”
A list of subscribers then follows, with the sums given. Hon. J.
Elmsley, 80 dollars; Hon. Peter Russell, 20; Hon. J. McGill, 16; Hon. D.
W. Smith, 10; John Small, Esq., 20; R. J. D. Gray, Esq., 20; William Jarvis, Esq., 10; William Willc.o.c.ks, Esq., 15; D. Burns, Esq., 20; Wm.
Weekes, Esq., 15; James Macaulay, Esq., 20; Alexander Macdonell, Esq., the work of one yoke of oxen for four days; Alexander Wood, Esq., 10; Mr. John Cameron, 15; Mr. D. Cameron, 10; Mr. Jacob Herchmer, 5; Mr.
Simon McNab, 5; Mr. P. Mealy, 5; Mr. Elisha Beaman, 10; Thomas Ridout, Esq., 4; Mr. T. G. Simons, 4; Mr. W. Waters, 5; Mr. Robert Young, 10; Mr. Daniel Tiers, 5; Mr. John Edgell, 5; Mr. George Cutter, 10; Mr.
James Playter, 6; Mr. Joseph McMurtrie, 5; Mr. William Bowkett, 6; Mr.
John Horton, 4; Mr. John Kerr, 2. Total, 392 dollars.
The money collected was, we may suppose, satisfactorily laid out by Mr.
Hale, but it did not suffice for the completion of the contemplated work. From the _Gazette_ of Feb. 20 in the following year (1802), we learn that a second subscription was started for the purpose of completing the communication with the travelled part of Yonge Street to the north.
In the _Gazette_ just named we have the following, under date of York, Sat.u.r.day, Feb. 20, 1802: ”We whose names are hereunto subscribed, contemplating the advantage which must arise from the rendering of Yonge Street accessible and convenient to the public, and having before us a proposal for completing that part of the said street between the Town of York and lot No. 1, do hereby respectively agree to pay the sums annexed to our names towards the carrying of the said proposal into effect; cheris.h.i.+ng at the same time the hope that every liberal character will give his support to a work which has for its design the improvement of the country, as well as the convenience of the public: *the Chief Justice, 100 dollars; *Receiver-General, 20; *Robt. J. D.
Gray, 20 (and two acres of land when the road is completed); John Cameron 40; *James Macaulay, 20; *Alexander Wood, 20; *William Weekes, 20; John McGill, 16; Wilson, Humphreys and Campbell, 15; D. W. Smith, 10; Thomas Scott, 10; *Wm. Jarvis, 10; *John Small, 10; *David Burns, 10; *Wm. Allan, 10; Alexander McDonell, 10; Wm. Smith, 10; Robert Henderson, 10; *Simon McNab, 8; John McDougall, 8; D. Cozens, 8; Thomas Ward, 8; *Elisha Beaman, 6; Joseph Hunt, 6; Eli Playter, 6; John Bennett, 6; *George Cutter, 6; James Norris, 5; Wm. B. Peters, 5; John Leach, 5; John t.i.tus, 5; Wm. Cooper, 5; *Wm. Hunter, 5; J. B. Cozens, 5; *Daniel Tiers, 5; Thomas Forfar, 5; Samuel Nash, 5; Paul Marian, 3; Thomas Smith, 3; John McBeth, 3.” It is subjoined that ”subscriptions will be received by Mr. S. McNab, Secretary, and advertised weekly in the _Gazette_. Those marked thus (*) have paid a former subscription.”
In the _Gazette_ of March 6, 1802, an editorial is devoted to the subject of the improvement of Yonge Street. It runs as follows: ”It affords us much pleasure to state to our readers that the necessary repair of Yonge Street is likely to be soon effected, as the work, we understand, has been undertaken with the a.s.surance of entering upon and completing it without delay; and by every one who reflects upon the present sufferings of our industrious community on resorting to a market, it cannot but prove highly satisfactory to observe a work of such convenience and utility speedily accomplished. That the measure of its future benefits must be extreme indeed, we may reasonably expect; but whilst we look forward with flattering expectations of those benefits we cannot but appreciate the immediate advantage which is afforded to us, in being relieved from the application of the statute labour to circuitous by-paths and occasional roads, and in being enabled to apply the same to the improvement of the streets, and the nearer and more direct approaches to the Town.”
The irregular track branching off eastward at Yorkville was an example of these ”circuitous by-paths and occasional roads.” Editorials were rare in the _Gazettes_ of the period. Had there been more of them, subsequent investigators would have been better able than they are now, to produce pictures of the olden time. Chief Justice Elmsley was probably the inspirer of the article just given.
The work appears to have been duly proceeded with. In the following June, we have an advertis.e.m.e.nt calling a meeting of the committee entrusted with its superintendence. In the _Gazette_ of June 12, 1802, we read: ”The committee for inspecting the repair of Yonge Street requests that the subscribers will meet on the repaired part of the said street at 5 o'clock on Monday evening, to take into consideration how far the moneys subscribed by them have been beneficially expended. S.
McNab, Secretary to Committee. York, 10th June, 1802.”
In 1807, as we gather from the _Gazette_ of Nov. 11, in that year, an effort was made to improve the road at the Blue Hill. A present of Fifty Dollars from the Lieutenant Governor (Gore) to the object is acknowledged in the paper named. ”A number of public-spirited persons”
the _Gazette_ says, ”collected on last Sat.u.r.day to cut down the Hill at Frank's Creek. (We shall see hereafter that the rivulet here was thus known, as being the stream that flowed through the Castle Frank lot.) The Lieutenant-Governor, when informed of it, despatched a person with a present of Fifty Dollars to a.s.sist in improving the Yonge Street road.”
It is then added by ”John Van Zante, pathmaster, for himself and the public,”--”To his Excellency for his liberal donation, and to the gentlemen who contributed, we return our warmest thanks.”
These early efforts of our predecessors to render practicable the great northern approach to the town, are deserving of respectful remembrance.
The death of Eliphalet Hale, named above, is thus noted in the _Gazette_ of Sept. 19, 1807:--”Died on the evening of the 17th instant, after a short illness, Mr. Eliphalet Hale, High Constable of the Home District, an old and respectable inhabitant of this town. From the regular discharge of his official duties” the _Gazette_ subjoins, ”he may be considered as a public loss.”
The nature of the soil at many points between Lot Street and the modern Yorkville was such as to render the construction of a road that should be comfortably available at all seasons of the year no easy task. Down to the time when macadam was at length applied, some twenty-eight years after Mr. Hale's operations, this approach to the town was notorious for its badness every spring and autumn. At one period an experiment was tried of a wooden tramway for a short distance at the worst part, on which the loaded waggons were expected to keep and so be saved from sinking hopelessly in the direful sloughs. Mr. Sheriff Jarvis was the chief promoter of this improvement, which answered its purpose for a time, and Mr. Rowland Burr was its suggester. But we must not forestall ourselves.
We return to the point where Lot Street, or Queen Street, intersects the thoroughfare to whose farthest bourne we are about to be travellers.
After pa.s.sing Mr. Jesse Ketchum's property, which had been divided into two parts by the pus.h.i.+ng of Yonge Street southward to its natural termination, we arrived at another striking rectangular meeting of thoroughfares. Lot Street having happily escaped extinction westward and eastward, there was created at this spot a four-cross-way possessed of an especial historic interest, being the conspicuous intersection of the two great military roads of Upper Canada, projected and explored in person by its first organiser. Four extensive reaches, two of Dundas Street (identical, of course, with Lot or Queen Street), and two of Yonge Street, can here be contemplated from one and the same standpoint.
In the course of time the views up and down the four long vistas here commanded will probably rival those to be seen at the present moment where King Street crosses Yonge Street. When lined along all its sides with handsome buildings, the superior elevation above the level of the Lake of the more northerly quadrivium, will be in its favour.
Perhaps it will here not be out of order to state that Yonge Street was so named in honour of Sir George Yonge, Secretary of War in 1791, and M.P. for Honiton, in the county of Devon, from 1763 to 1796. The first exploration which led to the establishment of this communication with the north, was made in 1793. On the early MS. map mentioned before in these papers, the route taken by Governor Simcoe on the memorable occasion, in going and returning is shewn. Explanatory of the red dotted lines which indicate it, the following note is appended. It reveals the Governor's clear perception of the commercial and military importance of the projected road: ”Lieut.-Gov. Simcoe's route on foot and in canoes to explore a way which might afford communication for the Fur-traders to the Great Portage, without pa.s.sing Detroit in case that place were given up to the United States. The march was attended with some difficulties, but was quite satisfactory: an excellent harbour at Penetanguishene: returned to York, 1793.”
(On the same map, the tracks are given of four other similar excursions, with the following accounts appended respectively:--1. Lieut.-Gov.
Simcoe's route on foot from Niagara to Detroit and back again in five weeks; returned to Niagara March 8th, 1793. 2. Lieut.-Gov. Simcoe's route from York to the Thames; down that river in canoes to Detroit; from thence to the Miamis, to build the fort Lord Dorchester ordered to be built: left York March 1794; returned by Lake Erie and Niagara to York, May 5th, 1794. 3. Lieut.-Gov. Simcoe's track from York to Kingston in an open boat, Dec. 5th, 1794. 4. Lieut.-Gov. Simcoe's route from Niagara to Long Point on Lake Erie, on foot and in boats: returned down the Ouse [Grand River]: from thence crossed a portage of five miles to Welland River, and so to Fort Chippawa, September, 1795.)
The old chroniclers of England speak in high praise of a primeval but somewhat mythic king of Britain, named Belin: