Extraordinary doctors, all in a row
Sixth in a series looking at the history of Brock Street
Martha Kidd referred to the north side of Brock Street west of George as Doctors’ Row. This nickname probably goes back to the 1840s. It remained an apt description around 1900 and perhaps as late as 1920, the year that the new Peterborough Medical Centre was established, and its earliest building was erected at Charlotte and Reid.
Brock Street has changed much over the years, but surprisingly the presence of doctors and medical offices has been a continuing feature of the street, and not only between 166 and 196 Brock Street. There is still a medical presence at 168 Brock where Dr. J. Ingram has her clinic. The Hutchison House Museum, 270 Brock Streeet, is partly a medical museum, and a reminder of the medical importance of Brock Street.
Both Dr. Hutchison and Thomas A. Stewart, who was a legislative councilor (equivalent to later descriptions of senators) for this area and father-in-law to Dr. Hay died of typhus contracted while visiting Hospital Point. Dr. Hay and Dr. Burnham were assisting at the immigrant sheds then as well.
Dr. Thomas Hay (1804-1857) and his wife, Ann Marie, had one son, T.A.S. Hay, later the city engineer and designer of the Inverlea Bridge. According to the Peterborough Review in 1845, “Dr. Hay has removed to his new residence in Brock Street, next door to Mr. Poole’s Furniture Warehouse.” This building, later numbered as 190, was built to be Dr. Hay’s home, and when Dr. Hay died young his widow ran a rooming house here. This house was on the west part of what is now the Brock Street parking lot, next to the Youth Emergency Shelter at 196 Brock Street.
To get a better sense of the medical importance of Brock Street I consulted the Dr. John Martyn’s impressive biographical work done by in the 1980s and 1990s, which he published in 1993, and placed his research materials in the Trent Valley Archives. As well, I used Martha Kidd’s Peterborough’s Architectural Heritage and the business directories which appeared occasionally in the 19th century and nearly annually in the 20th century.
In the earliest years, the Doctors’ Row appellation applied to the house at 166 Brock and to the distinctive double houses between 168 and 172 Brock.
Dr. George Burnham Jr. (d. 1917), son of the Rev. Mark Burnham and nephew of Dr. George Burnham, Sr. had his office at 166 Brock Street. By 1888, Dr. John Clarke (18521899) had his house and office at 166 Brock Street, which he owned. Dr Thomas P. McCullough (1860-1937) had his office at 166 Brock in 1913 in the same office originally used by Dr. Burnham Jr. The Rare Restaurant is on this site.
Charles Perry, the former mayor and former owner of the Nassau Mill (where Trent University is now located) had been at 168 Brock; his widow was still there in 1888.
John Moloney, county court clerk, was living at 172 Brock which was built for him in 1882; John Belcher was the architect and R. Carveth the contractor. This building now adjacent to the Brock Street parking lot, was in 2017 extended at the rear.
Dr. James Bingham (18221918) graduated from Queen’s in 1965, and after a stint in Warsaw came to Peterborough in 1878. In 1888, his office was at 420½ George Street and he lived at 176 Brock. By the 1890s, his office was on Hunter Street, and then he was at 393 Water Street. He served for 10 years as Peterborough’s medical officer of health.
Dr. S.D. Crawford, the father of Isabella Valancy Crawford, was said around 1900 to have lived at 184 Brock Street. The writer described his location as across the lane from Dr. Eastwood, but that is not so helpful now as it might have been in 1900.
It is unclear what the houses between 176 and 190 looked like in former years, as they were all gone by the 1970s, and this is now the site of the burial ground for a 12th-century Indigenous hunter whose remains were discovered in 1960. By 1968, only the former Orange Hall remained on this stretch between 178 and 196 Brock, and it was key to making the Brock Street Parking Lot a reasonable size.
One of the breaks in Doctors’ Row was the Orange Hall at 184 Brock. The fundraising for the new Orange Lodge began in 1932, although the property had been purchased in 1914. A fire in 1932 damaged the building and made it seem uneconomic to repair the damage for a house, or to build a new meeting hall. A feasibility committee hired architect John T. Hornby to design a building suitable for a lodge and for the location in the middle of the block. The two storey building with a 36 foot frontage extended almost to the rear property line with the Murray Street Baptist Church. The financial campaign was aimed not just at its members, because “many members are on reduced working schedules and salaries”; we now know this was the middle of the Great Depression.
West of 196, the Brock Towers Apartment Building at 210 Brock had already been built where one of the grand Italianate houses of the 1880s had been built; now only the three remained: 220, 226 and 232.
In 1913 and 1914 Dr. Mars McClelland was renting at 190 Brock Street, the house built for Dr. Hay. In the 1869 assessment, John James, a cabinet maker, and Robert Johnson, a merchant, were on this lot. In 1865, Robert Johnson and his son, Thomas, ran a dry goods and grocery store on George Street. In 1925, Charles H. Perry, the owner of the American House, was living here. By 1937, the house had been converted to three apartments, one of which was home to Perry’s widow. This house was demolished before 1962 to create the parking lot for the Orange Lodge.
Dr. Robert Pennel Boucher (1848-1912), 196 Brock by 1900. Dr. Perry Goldsmith (?) had his office at 196 Brock, before moving to Belleville in 1908. Dr. Archibald Moir (18721952) began his practice in 1913 and was at 196 Brock until he moved his office to the new Peterborough Medical Clinic; later the offices of John Foote, podiatrist; now the Youth Emergency Shelter. Famously, this building was earlier, by 1888, a private school run by Edward Duff, and already in 1869 it was home to James Campbell, a Hunter Street merchant who had a fairly impressive advertisement in the county directory for 1865 and 1866 and whose assessment in 1869 was over $15,000, one of the largest in Peterborough.
The two houses removed for the Brock Towers were 212 and 214 Brock. Dr Edward Earle Harvey (1867-1924) had his home and office at 212 Brock from 1914 or so. Dr. William Caldwell (1839-1914), had his home and office at 214 Brock Street before 1888; later his house at 201 Brock.
Dr. John Havelock Eastwood (1866-1941), 220 Brock Street home and office before moving to the new Peterborough Clinic, of which he was a founding partner. His home remained here in 1925, but by 1937 the house was subdivided into three units, one of which was the Mineral Fume Health Baths run by Eva Wall; the building was owned by her husband Ernest M. Wall, who was a travelling salesman. Dr. Edward A. Hammond (1879-1955) had his home and office at 232 Brock, at the corner of Aylmer for several years after 1920; now known as Hammond Hall, and the site of Stewart Travel.
On the south side of this block, in 1888, Dr. William Dixon Scott (1858-1946), a recent medical grad, was boarding in this old stone house where the Credit Union building now stands; he was the father of Dr. G.R. Scott (1891-1984) who in 1946 founded the Scott Medical Clinic on George Street.
Dr. Thomas G. Louden (1884-1938) lived from 1921 to 1937 at 201Brock Street, the former home of Dr. Caldwell. This site is now part of the parking lot for the grocery store housed in the former Brock Street Arena. Before returning to Peterborough
Dr. Louden’s career had been mostly at Sudbury. At the time of his death, his family was in Cambray.
Also on the south side, Dr. Frederick Hall Brennan (1861-1927) lived at 215 Brock by 1895. Brennan was with the Midland Regiment at Batoche in 1885. He remained active with the militia and served in the Boer War, where he organized a nursing service, the Daughters of the Transvaal. He introduced baseball into South Africa, where he remained until he died.
Truly there were always extraordinary doctors on Doctors’ Row for the whole block from George to Aylmer.
Elwood H. Jones, Archivist, Trent Valley Archives, can be reached at elwood@trentvalleyarchives.com. The current issue of Heritage Gazette of the Trent Valley is available at Trent Valley Archives, 567 Carnegie Avenue, and new members are most welcome. For details see www.trentvalleyarchives.com or phone 705-745-4404 and ask for Heather. A new book on Brock Street, featuring chapters by local archaeologists and historians, will be launched later this month and be available at Trent Valley Archives.