I have been following the various articles and debates concerning Main Street detailing what is or isn’t working. In this article, I hope to bring some focus to some of the issues concerning Main Street — some of which have been with us for more than 200 years, if you can imagine.
From its beginnings in 1802 until the late 1970s, Main Street was the focus of the community from Water Street north to the top of the hill at Millard Avenue. All community activities were concentrated in this area with doctors, lawyers, merchants, tradesmen and entertainment (theatre, the town hall and the arena). It was, in fact, a self-contained economic and social entity meeting the needs of our inhabitants.
Without exception, the professions, shopkeepers and tradesmen were recognized as unique community personalities, integrated into the very fabric of what was a large family of citizens. This is not to say that there were not any issues: too little parking, the street being too narrow, prone to fires and floods, and absentee ownership were among the concerns.
Main Street has had its issues since our incorporation, and particularly since 1935, when automobiles increased the traffic flow and a created a shortage of parking spaces. You can imagine the chaos that ensued running the Metropolitan Railway down the centre of Main in the early 1900s.
Originally the street was not surveyed to provide a standard road allowance of 66 feet, as it evolved as part of a widened Indigenous trail northward from the embryo settlement at the millpond (Fairy Lake). Early shops would stake their limits on each side of the roadway, their width ranging 54 to 60 feet north from Water to Ontario streets. Even with the many disastrous fires that would destroy complete blocks, the old building lines would always remain after any reconstruction.
In 1947, councillor Jack Luck presented a motion to council to expropriate land along Church Street from Park Avenue to Eagle Street and widen the street as a bypass for Main. Four attempts were made to have the motion passed and each time it was deferred. Finally in June, it came to a vote with only two supporters. This vision is still very alive to this day.
The condition of roads and bridges, sidewalks and services, in addition to the management of the waterworks, became increasingly difficult to control. In July 1946, a suggestion was made to hire a full-time graduate engineer and, in April 1947, a motion was passed to engage Denne Bosworth at a salary of $150/month to become the town’s first professional engineer. He would continue in that capacity until 1956.
Editorial comments in the local newspaper called for a planning commission to be formed to regulate building sites and codes. This would sit on the discussion table for several years until it finally materialized.
In August 1952, a referendum was held calling for the rebuilding of the street and widening of the road by reducing the width of the sidewalks by 2 feet (originally proposed back in 1935).
An elm tree was uprooted at the corner of Park Avenue and the Temperance fountain / watering trough was removed. Utility poles and overhead wires were also removed.
An area bounded by Timothy and Water streets and from the river to the railway tracks had been deeded to the town by lawyer W.C. Widdifield, its intended use to be a park. This had been low-lying land in the past primarily used as a cow pasture. Beginning in 1941, it was gradually raised to street level by depositing residual fill from new streets being built in other parts of town.
Hurricane Hazel damaged the river embankment, the dam at Fairy Lake was undermined and the roadbed on Water Street was washed away on Oct. 15, 1954. In 1962, the landfill was graded and paved to serve as a parking lot, initially to serve the Loblaws store that had been bridged over the river. It was never a park.
Over the years there were other changes with "downtown" organizations, merchants associations, boards of trade, chambers of commerce etc. being formed and quickly disbanded after numerous attempts to promote enhancements with little success.
During the 1950s, the character of Main changed, accelerated by post-war adjustment and a growth of population. Changing merchandising methods and chain stores such as Dominion and Loblaws affected traditional grocery shopping. Eaton and Simpsons catalogue orders were making inroads on retail stores. Business was good but shopping plazas and supermarkets on the outskirts of town were beginning to cast a dark shadow on Main Street.
The Bell Telephone Co. office and switchboard for many years was on 187 Main St. (opposite the United Church) until it moved to Millard Avenue in 1954, where a new telephone exchange building was erected replacing three frame houses on the south side of the street.
People complained about the number system on Main Street for decades. Home delivery became necessary to relieve the Post Office and the first requirement was to renumber all buildings and for the occupants to provide approved receptacles for mail.
The population had increased, and house numbering had been non-existent until the 1930s. When it arrived, it was done very haphazardly.
Attempts were made in 1950 to establish uniform numbering without much success. The federal government refused appeals for mail delivery until all the buildings were properly numbered. This was completed in September 1956, but actual home delivery did not start until November 1957.
A completely new house numbering system was introduced in 1971 by the regional government, prompting the synchronization of the national postal code in 1973. In April, 2.5 acres were purchased on Mulock Drive for a postal processing plant that went into operation in 1978.
The home delivery of mail and later the placement of lock boxes in various subdivisions eliminated the need to go downtown.
Finally, the Main post office was closed in January 1993 when Canada Post issued franchises to satellite postal stations in selected shopping plazas and convenience stores. This resulted in the end of a community ritual, the trip down to Main to pick up your mail and learn the local gossip.
The relocation of the municipal offices resulted in yet another blow to Main Street. The town had maintained a deputy in the clerk's office at the Millard Street corner that was the repository of town records and payment office for taxes and utilities. This municipal office would move to the corner of Botsford in 1942 and remained there until 1951 when it would move to the town hall.
In January 1959, it again moved to 171 Main St. and stayed there until 1987 when it relocated to the Davis Centre at 465 Davis Dr., despite assurances from the town that the town offices would never move away from Main Street.
The original Land Registry Office sat at Millard and Main, however it was demolished in 1952 along with the ancient fire hall and council room making way for a new fire hall.
When the old registry office needed more space in 1884, a new building was erected at the present location on 134 Main St. It remained there until 1980 when land registrations were transferred to the new courthouse.
The old registry office was inherited by the Regionial Municipality of York and became surplus in 1993. After being vacant for two years, it was transferred to the town on a long-term lease of $2 a year for 50 years for the intended purpose of a museum.
In 1996, the Elman Campbell Museum moved from the Office Specialty complex to the renovated building.
For almost 50 years, the revitalization of Main Street had been a recurring problem for council and downtown merchants, giving rise to many heated debates, different opinions and proposals for a solution, many of which still rage on.
In October 1959, after two years of preparation, a town development plan was presented by the planning board that included a proposal to make Main a pedestrian mall from Millard south to Timothy and construct a vehicular bypass road flanking the railway from Queen to Timothy. This would die when the Department of Highways rejected the road idea.
A more intensive study was launched in 1968 for the urban renewal of Main Street. This was a radical approach indeed, a five-year plan to demolish all the old buildings and create a mall along the right of way.
Arterial roads for the diversion of traffic would be added, including a road from Queen to Water, a west-east road from Church and Millard across the railway and flats to Prospect Street. At the south end, a road was proposed going east from Church, D’Arcy, Water to Prospect and Gorham. By March 1969, it was clear that the impact of the scheme was too difficult to digest and the whole project would go down the drain.
The deterioration of Main Street would gradually continue through the 1970s right up to the 1990s, primarily as the result of the growth of suburban plazas, which were endemic to most small towns in the country.
The Heritage Canada Foundation had been set up to assist municipalities in the revitalization of their central cores. In May 1987, the local Business Improvement Association made an application to join the program, which was approved and commenced in October 1988 with the appointment of a coordinator Susan Mullarky. The venture lasted only three years, ending in August 1991. It was virtually impossible to reach any desired objectives due to the ongoing reluctance of absentee landlords to cooperate.
A recent step forward has been the creation of heritage conservation districts. The Town of Newmarket has one heritage district, the Lower Main Street South Heritage District. There is high hope that through this tool, the revitalization of Main Street will take place and the uniqueness of the street will be enhanced.
The removal of the municipal offices from Main Street in 1987 and later the closing of the post office was detrimental to the livelihood of the downtown. However, the appearance of the street was enhanced by classic street lighting and floral decoration.
The face of Main has been in a continual state of transition either by purpose or by circumstance. Various merchants and entrepreneurs altered their street level storefronts to suit their line of business.
A fire on Feb. 21, 1968 wiped out three stores on the east side of the street opposite the post office. On June 30, 1990, the King George Hotel was severely damaged by fire and, in February 1994, the Granada Restaurant was gutted with considerable damage to the interior of the adjoining Bank of Toronto. All have been rebuilt or repaired. A semblance of many early buildings can still be seen on the upper storeys and cornices.
What does this mean for Main Street Newmarket today? The truth is Main Street still has issues that need to be addressed but it remains a wonderful community centre, a place that still represents all that I hold dear about this town. The merchants are still friendly, the conversations are still robust, and the area is quaint but perhaps too cramped.
Will this ever change? Likely not. History tells us so.
Sources: The History of Newmarket by Ethel Trewhella; Newmarket Era Articles; Stories of Newmarket, An Old Ontario Town by Robert Terence Carter; Town of Newmarket Minutes; Planning Department Newmarket – Maps and Diagrams; Archives of George W. Luesby.
Newmarket resident Richard MacLeod, the History Hound, has been a local historian for more than 40 years. He writes a weekly feature about our town's history in partnership with NewmarketToday, conducts heritage lectures and walking tours of local interest, and leads local oral history interviews.
