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When it was announced in 1881 that the Canadian Pacific Railway would cross the Red River at Winnipeg, the young city’s future as Western Canada’s pre-eminent centre of trade, finance, and culture was secured. As a result, the already briskly growing city experienced a real estate boom of such stupendous proportions, that it would make the Calgary of today look like, er, the Winnipeg of today by comparison.

Main St north of William Ave, 1874

A shallow pitched roof is a typical feature of Winnipeg’s early houses. The roof of the house on Albert St that was built in 1878, is a good example of this

The boom lasted sixteen months, from 1881 to ‘82, and though it is unknown by how much the city grew in those months specifically, by 1886 Winnipeg’s population was 20,238 persons–153% more than the 7,985 that lived there in ‘81. Winnipeg would not grow at such a rate again until 1901-06, when the population grew by 113%, from 42,000 to 90,000 persons.

With such a significant building boom, it stands to reason that there would be a good number of houses that date back to this time, yet it remains a relatively unknown fact among Winnipeggers that there are many houses in the city that are now more than 125 years old. The tendency is to think that a house in Fort Rouge or the West End from 1908 or 1914 is as old as houses come, unless they have been converted to museums.

This may have much to do with the fact that the neighborhoods that were built up in the real estate boom of ‘81-’82 are ones that most Winnipeggers–even those that live in the city’s urban centre–have never explored at length, or even set foot in: Centennial (west of the Exchange District), and north and south Point Douglas. Here, in spite of decades of decline and disinvestment, scores of houses built in 1881 and ‘82 still stand. Located in neighborhoods where the owners are or were landlords too negligent to make decent improvements, many of these houses either sit in a state of decline, or have been subject to some horrendous renovations–their exteriors stripped of their modest ornamentation.

Duplex built in 1882, Lorne Avenue, Point Douglas

Others have escaped these modern age “improvements”, but are simply left alone to fall apart, like this one that was built in 1882, at the corner of McArthur St and Higgins. Note the all-but-gone picket fence, and the piece of wood panel affixed to the bay window

Seldom are these houses possessing any sort of grandeur, and even in their day, they probably did not. Nearly all of the houses built for the wealthy at this time have long disappeared, and many of the ones in Point Douglas or Centennial were built as quickly as possible, simply to give the droves of new arrivals to Winnipeg a place to live.

They do, however, remain as remnants of a very important era of Winnipeg’s history: when it flew headlong from being a muddy village to a great Canadian city in the span of sixteen months. For this, they do not deserve to go on so grossly undervalued and unrecognized.

Second Empire-style house, built in 1881. Lorne Avenue, Point Douglas

-Robert W. Galston

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