Mackenzie House

Yesterday, Mom and I went to Mackenzie house.

The first thing we did was some work in the print shop. We worked on a souvenir for the "City Cider" at Spadina Museum.

First we checked for spelling mistakes, grammatical errors and spacing issues.

After we were satisfied, we checked again on the Proof Press.
I got to ink the galley.

I put the paper in place and then I used the proof press.

Here I am checking the proof.

Here is the layout of what we printed.
If you want to see what we did, you have to go to City Cider tomorrow.

I got to use the guillotine!

I cut all the paper for the souvenirs.

We printed another proof with the right sized paper and then we packed up the stuff they would need for tomorrow.

After the work in the print shop, we went on a tour of the house.

We have been there many times before, and so we started off with a slightly different tour.
We checked out the front vestibule.

There is a cool door knocker that I hadn't noticed before.

Here are a couple other pictures from the front.

We learnt about flow blue. The blue glaze runs when the porcelain is fired. The kaolin clay that was used in fine China was too expensive and so they used a cheaper material, making it more affordable. But, the blue ink runs making it blurry.

In the parlour there is a portrait of John Montgomery, owner of the Tavern where the 1837 rebellion started. Even though Montgomery was not at the tavern at the time, he was arrested as a sympathizer of Mackenzie. The people who were involved in the rebellion wanted political reform. Mackenzie had escaped arrest by fleeing to Navy Island.

Montgomery managed to escape prison, and he too fled to Navy Island and met up with and supported Mackenzie.

Mackenzie declared a separate "Republic of Canada". He recruited supporters by promising them land.

The British were not happy with this development and they captured the steamboat, the Caroline, which Mackenzie used for supplies. One American died.

When Mackenzie and his supporters left Navy Island, Mackenzie was arrested and sentenced to 18 months in prison for violating the Neutrality Laws.  He was released after 11 months because he was granted amnesty.


We continued on with our tour and we looked at some items that were original to the house.
This slipper chair was embroidered by Janet Mackenzie, William Lyon Mackenzie's daughter.

This dresser was owned by the Mackenzies.

And this sampler was sewn by Isabel Baxter (Mackenzie's wife) in 1813, when she was 13 years old, before she migrated to Canada from Dundee, Scotland. It includes the names of members of her family.

Thank you so much to Chris and the staff at Mackenzie House for a nice, quiet afternoon out.
See you again soon!

Visit to Mackenzie House

Today, Mom and I went to Mackenzie House. We didn't plan to visit but we were close by and decided to stop by. It's always fun going there. We always learn something new. :-)

We noticed the belt strop for the very first time (the black thing on the table). It was used to clean razors.

We took a look at the books on the shelf.
I think this was one of Mackenzie's favourite series.

Mom noticed this book, but we didn't ask what it was. (We'll have to remember to ask about it the next time.)

When Alex lit the gasolier, we found out that they would use soot and linseed oil to make ink for printing.

It was interesting that we talked a lot about water today.

There was no well in the Mackenzie household. But, they had to get water from somewhere. It must have been very hard to go for water, every day.

We also found out that a Toronto printer by the name of Collins described the water from the well he used around the time of the Cholera epidemic as being the colour of a leek. (Yuck!)
Francis Collins, his wife and their child died from Cholera.

During that Cholera Epidemic of 1834, Mackenzie himself - the Mayor of Toronto - would drive a cart to take sick people to the doctor.  This was at a time when most officials were fleeing the city. He himself got cholera but he was able to recover.  After that they passed bylaws to clean up the city which included making it illegal to dump waster or garbage onto the streets or Lake Ontario, and they included plans to construct proper sewers. This was before they even knew what caused cholera!

Last week I read the book, "Patient Zero" by Marilee Peters and it talked about Dr. John Snow who researched cholera in London. In 1854 he figured out that drinking infected water would spread cholera and they needed to boil it to kill the germs. He noticed that Monks who boiled water while making beer didn't get sick even though they shared a pump with people who got sick. That's when they found out that it was the water!

Spadina House and Gardens

We're trying to visit all of the City of Toronto Museums.
On May 19th, we went to Spadina House.

James Austin was an apprentice of William Lyon Mackenzie before the 1837 rebellion! Even though James Austin had his own print shop at the time of the rebellion, he went to the United States because people knew he was associated with Mackenzie. When he came back to Canada in 1843 he had enough money to start a grocery store with a partner. They were so successful that they were able to start lending money to others within a few years.

James Austin bought the land that Spadina House is on in 1886. 

Three generations of Austins lived in Spadina House.
The Austin family donated the house to the City of Toronto and it's now a museum. 

There is some archeological excavations in the basement of Spadina House and you can still see where they dug. They found out more of the history of the property. It was owned by the Baldwins before.

Spadina House is set up as it was in the 1920s.
At the front door they have 2 wolves. Here's a picture of one of them. Don't you think it's strange?

They had an inside garden!
There was a trap door so that the servants could go into the room to take care of the plants without being seen.  (I wonder if they'll open up those secret passages for tours.)

Here's a picture of the dining room. Do you see the curtain at the right? The servants would put the food out onto the table from behind the curtain. That way, you would only see their hands. 

I liked this painting the most because it shows Mary Austin holding a music score. She used to play organ for her church before she got married, but back then it wasn't 'proper' for a rich, married woman to play for a church.

This is a picture of the Drawing Room.

The 1888 Steinway piano was a wedding gift for Mary Austin from her husband.  

Mom tried to get a close up picture of the gas light chandelier or would you call it a gasolier?

Here's a picture of the billiard room. Since the Austins were wealthy, they were able to have time to unwind. They had a golf course (which is where Casa Loma is now) and indoors they had a billiard table. 

You can see that they used to travel. Here's a picture of them in Egypt.

You can also see that they liked to hunt.

Next to the billiards room was a small washroom. The water tank is above the toilet and you have to flush it by pulling the string.

We got to see the kitchen.

I noticed that some of the brands are still with us today. Christie's, Mazola, Quaker Oats, Kraft, Del Monte, Clover Leaf, and Carnation are brands I recognize.

They had 2 stoves. One is a little more modern with gas burners and the other one looks like a wood burning stove.

Here's a picture of the ice box. The ice would be put on top to keep the food and drinks inside of it cold. When the ice melted, they would collect the water and use it in the garden or around the house.

Upstairs, we got to see the Austin's master bedroom.

There was a perfume sampler on the dresser. 

I wonder what it would have smelt like?

Here's a picture of the master bathroom. There's a little tub behind the bathtub that they would use for  water therapy when they were sick.

Here's the other wolf that's at the front door. 

After the tour we went into the gardens for a little.
I really liked these white flowers.

Here's a picture of me and Dad. :-)