George Brown House, Historic house in Grange Park, Toronto, Canada
The George Brown House is a three-story brick building in the Second Empire style, located in the Grange Park neighborhood of Toronto, Canada, with a grey slate mansard roof and symmetrical side sections. Inside, twelve fireplaces feature intricately carved marble mantels that speak to the craftsmanship of the period.
George Brown built the Second Empire house, which he called Lambton Lodge, between 1874 and 1876. He died there in 1880 after being shot in the leg at his office by a disgruntled employee of The Globe, the newspaper he founded. From 1889 to 1916 it was home to Duncan Coulson, president of the Bank of Toronto, and his family. The Canadian National Institute for the Blind acquired it in 1920 and used it as offices until 1956.
The Victorian library was recreated with federal funding and holds 2,000 of George Brown's personal books. The Coulson family, Bank of Toronto president Duncan Coulson and his wife Eliza, hired architect David Brash Dick in the 1890s to remodel the dining room in Art Nouveau style, and the front hall fireplace was reworked at the same time.
The house is now managed by the Ontario Heritage Trust and functions as a conference and office space, so access for general visitors is not always open. It is worth checking in advance whether guided tours or special viewing days are available.
The 1987 and 1988 digs produced over 5,000 artifacts, including a collectible pint corker stamped "William Robertson", a silver ring and amber bead linked to the Coulson years, and a St. George penny token from the 1850s. They also exposed a double "shell wall" foundation beneath the house.
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