Industrial site.

Details of Site Location: The southwest corner of Bay Street and Temperance Street with various street numberings from 1872 until 1904.

Boundary History: The site is bounded by Bay and Temperance Streets, and by office buildings and stores on the other two sides.

Current Use of Property: Currently, a building on the site serves the Guardian Assurance Company.

Historical Description: Temperance Street was opened in 1845, and a marble and stone cutter used the site from 1850 to 1859. In 1874, David Gardiner, father of Frederick Gardiner, came to Toronto from Ireland. He worked as a labourer at the Dixon Carriage Works. The Dixon Works produced the wood and leather bodies for the Still electric car commissioned by Frederick Barnard Fetherstonhaugh in 1893. Fetherstonhaugh was a Toronto patent attorney, and his car was the first ever to be produced in Toronto. This accomplishment appears to be a second for Canada, as it appears that a car was built in 1867 in Quebec. The Dixon Carriage Works operated for some thirty two years in this location and was otherwise typical of the many Toronto carriage works that supplied horse drawn vehicles for Toronto’s families and businesses. The works was a red brick four storey building with additions. From 1905 to 1907 the Canada Cycle and Motor Company used the premises. After 1907 the Dominion Automobile Company used it as a Nash automobile agency. The building was then demolished to make way for the present structures.

Relative Importance: Today, Toronto is not regarded as a producer of automobiles; yet the first car produced in Ontario was made at this location.

Planning Implications: The collector car community is working toward a major event and erecting a plaque on the existing building to honour the Dixon Works and Fetherstonhaugh car. The present owners of the building have indicated a wish to cooperate. The former Toronto Historical Board had approved a plaque without proceeding to the next stage. A plaque on the exterior of the building would help to educate passers by about Toronto’s industrial history in an area currently dominated by business and finance.

Reference Sources: City of Toronto Archives; Toronto Reference Library; Might’s Directories 1870–1910; Bill Sherk, The Way We Drove (1993); Hugh Durnford and Glenn Baechler, Cars of Canada (1973).

Acknowledgements: Lincoln and Continental Owners’ Club; Maps Project.