Quick Facts
10,000 protesters marched on April 15, 1872, during a printers’ strike calling for an eight-hour work day; the Federal Government legalized trade unions three days later. In the years following, the labour movement grew, leading to Canada’s first official Labour Day holiday in 1894.
Today, the Toronto & York Region Labour Council represents 220,000 unionized workers across the GTA.
The City of Toronto has a “Fair Wage Policy” that dates back to 1893. It requires the municipality to ensure that its contractors paid their employees union rates.
In Toronto’s monied neighbourhoods, industries created castles of cash. Wells Hill, near Spadina Avenue and St. Clair Avenue West, has its own faux castle — the storied Casa Loma, built in 1914 by the mining and electricity magnate Henry Pellatt.
In the late 1800s, before Toronto had monied neighbourhoods, wealthy businessmen built mansions along the escarpment north of Davenport Road. They were owned by merchants, real estate speculators, bankers, and even a piano maker. One, Henry Pellatt, made a fortune in cobalt mining and turned his capital into Casa Loma — Toronto’s postcard castle.
The area, originally known as the Hill District, acquired neighbourhood names like Wells Hill, South Hill, and Forest Hill. It was subdivided and marketed to affluent buyers who wanted to live in stately homes.
Toronto’s earliest wealth came from distilleries, pigs, railways, and tractors. The business tycoons from that era built mansions on Jarvis Street and Spadina Avenue. However, the sources of the city’s wealth changed in the 20th century, with fortunes amassed from mining finance, investment banking, and newspapers.
Those profits landed in neighbourhoods like Rosedale, Lawrence Park, and the Kingsway. After the Second World War, wealth accumulated in places like the Bridle Path, where the castles these days belong to celebrities like Drake.