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  Brantford, Ontario Canada 

Brantford is a city in southwestern Ontario, Canada, founded on the Grand River. Modern Highway 403 connects it to Woodstock in the west and Hamilton in the east; and Highway 24 connects to Cambridge to the north and Simcoe to the south. It is the seat of Brant County, but it is politically separate with a government independent of the county.


      The Bell Telephone Memorial

Brantford is sometimes known as the "Telephone City": former city resident Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone at his father's home, the Bell Homestead. In 1876 he conducted the first long-distance telephone call, making it from Brantford to Paris, Ontario.

 

Brantford is also the birthplace of hockey player Wayne Gretzky, comedian Phil Hartman, as well as Group of Seven member Lawren Harris. Brantford is named after Joseph Brant, an important Mohawk chief during the American Revolutionary War and later, who led his people in their first decades in Upper Canada. Many of his and other First Nations citizens live on the neighbouring reserve of Six Nations of the Grand River First Nation, the most populous reserve in Ontario.

 

 

Victoria School
 
Victoria School, located at 40 Richmond Street in the City of Brantford consists of a 10‐room school built in 1897. 
 
Click here for the Victoria School Building Stories. 
 
Victoria School was constructed to replace the North Ward or Albion Street School, with the intention to provide a place of elementary school education for generations of North Ward
children. The school, which was named in honor of the Queen’s diamond jubilee, is one of Brantford’s last remaining 19th century elementary school buildings and educated the city’s children for over 100 years before closing as an elementary school in 2002.  
 
The school was re-purposed as an Alternative Education school offering secondary education program for struggling students and continuing education program for adult student from September 2003 to September 2007.
 
In Sept. 2007, the school served as an auxiliary secondary school campus for Brantford Collegiate Institute (BCI) during the extensive renovation and rebuilding of BCI. All classrooms plus four portable classrooms that were placed on the property served as the BCI satellite campus until Sept. 2011. The Grand Erie District School Board declared the school surplus to its accommodation needs and offered the property for sale in 2012.
 
Left is a postcard in 1920' with the school building and member of Brantford Board of Education in early 1900'. Mary Colter, fourth from the left, was the first principal of Victoria School, and she was in the position for over thirty years.    
 

Design or Physical Value:
 
The scale and craftsmanship of the building speaks to the era of prosperity Brantford was experiencing at the time of construction. Architect Beaumont Jarvis designed Victoria School in the Neoclassical style. The school is the only
known example of his work in the city. 
 
The building is a square floor plan with a unique recessed entrance and balcony above. All walls are constructed of red brick resting on top of a raised basement foundation of broken range limestone‐ providing the already imposing structure with additional height. A distinctive feature of both the east and west facades are shed roof basement entrances also made of limestone and adorned with pilasters. 
 
The craftsmanship is most outstanding at the top of the building where a complex hip roof with pediments and intricate ornamentation along the eaves and cornice make the building instantly recognizable.  
 
Contextual Value:
 
Bound by three public streets, a park, and fronted by a large lawn, the ornamented two‐storey school is a landmark in a neighborhood comprised of modest two and one storey homes. The school is the largest building in the neighborhood with fine craftsmanship and detail evident on all street‐facing facades.
 
New Life: 
 

In August 2014, Henan Education Canada Inc. took over the Victoria School and plans to give the 117-year-old former Victoria School new life.

 

The school would include Chinese students and those from other countries. Local students would also be welcome to attend, said Norman Zhang, an Ontario resident who will be principal of the school to be called Victoria Academy.

 

"We looked at sites in Toronto, Mississauga and Markham but so many of the people there are from China," said Zhang. "We wanted to have a more Canadian environment."

 

Zhang, who represents Henan Education Canada Inc., said the company recently purchased the Richmond Street school from the Grand Erie District School Board. He estimates the company's total investment in the school, including the purchase cost and renovation, between $2 million and $3 million.

 

The plan is to initially have 250 students enrolled in Grades 9 to 12, with future growth, perhaps at another location, said Zhang. There will also be a need for student residences.