190 Lisgar

   This jarring little photo is  testament to what Centretown was and what it has become. Imagine walking through a late 19th century neighbourhood where these 2½ storey brick houses were the norm...

   This (admittedly unflattering) rear view of 190 Lisgar shows us its 1½ storey summer kitchen,  typical of so many simple, front-gabled Victorian houses. These homes were often built using the cheaper brick-on-wood method, more prone to fire and decay — and easier to knock down and replace with something more densified.

   It's a measure of our city's growth that the 1878 Goad maps depicted Lisgar Street as the southern boundary of Ottawa's development for that year. Mr. Goad didn't see fit to include anything beyond, dismissing the area as the marshy hinterland it (mostly) was.

   The 1875 City Directory was more nuanced. A.S. Woodburn did list 16 households on Lisgar's south side — mostly Scottish, a few Irish, mostly "labourers." Woodburn mentioned two carpenters, a carter, a painter, a tailor, a teamster, and a farmer. Three widows were duly noted. However none of these people lived between Elgin and Metcalfe. So yes, you could have indeed looked south from what is now Sobey's onto a miasmatic, frog-festered "beaver meadow."

    A decade-and-spare-change later, Goad's 1888 maps reveal a shift toward more prestigious land use...

   At the top of this detail from sheet 52, the Elgin Street Orphanage exemplifies things institutional. Nine houses command the rest of block 288. Of these, seven are larger, all-brick designs — their footprints bespeak mass and complexity. The two remaining buildings are of more modest size and construction — 190 Lisgar, highlighted in pink, huddles next to its neighbour at 188. 190 is a bit larger up front and boasts a pretty bay window. 188 has the larger summer kitchen and makes do with a broad front verandah. Both houses are shown with long, narrow sheds extending to the very backs of their respective properties.

   Of all the buildings shown here, only two survive. 251 Cooper houses the Czech Embassy while behind it, prim and tidy, is 190 Lisgar, pied-à-terre to Bennett Property Shop Realty. Sometimes, the little house does prevail.

   190 Lisgar would have been built some time between 1875 and 1884. According to the Woodburn Directory for the latter date, the house was occupied by John Robertson, a grain dealer. 

   I haven't had a chance to get a clear shot of #190 from the front — until then, we'll make do with this treatment of a Google Street View capture.