"Said tree is a veritable nuisance": Ottawa's street trees 1869-1939

Urban History Review

Volumn 34, Issue 1, 2005, Pages 46-57

  Dean, Joanna ^a  

^a CARLETON UNIVERSITY   (Canada)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

GREENSPACE; HISTORICAL GEOGRAPHY; NINETEENTH CENTURY; TWENTIETH CENTURY; URBAN HISTORY; URBAN PLANNING;

CANADA; NORTH AMERICA; ONTARIO; OTTAWA;

ULMUS AMERICANA;

EID: 27844526995     PISSN: 07030428     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.7202/1016046ar     Document Type: Article

References (89)

1. Blodwen Davies, The Charm of Ottawa (Ottawa: McLeod and Stewart, 1932), 15. This paper is part of a larger ongoing project on the urban forest, focused upon Ottawa. Thanks to Craig Huff, city forester, City of Ottawa, Serge Barbe and Serge Blondin of the City of Ottawa Archives, and Kim Nixon, National Air Photo Library, for their assistance with research.
2. "A Civic Policy for the Control of Street Trees," Ottawa Horticultural Society (OHS) Records, Annual Reports and Programs, 1917-1937 (Ottawa: OHS, 1922), 33, 19-0-8-E, R27, Library and Archives Canada (hereafter cited as LAC).
3. Thomas J. Campanella, Republic of Shade: New England and the American Elm (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003);
4. H. W. Lawrence, "From Private Allee to Public Shade Tree: Historic Roots of the Urban Forest," Arnoldia 57, no. 2 (1997): 2-10;
5. "Changing Forms and Persistent Values: Historical Perspectives on the Urban Forest," in Urban Forest Landscapes: Integrating Multidisciplinary Perspectives, ed. G. A. Bradley, (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1995);
6. "The Greening of the Squares of London: Transformation of Urban Landscapes and Ideals," Annals of the Association of American Geographers 83 (1993): 90-118;
7. "The Neoclassical Origins of Modern Urban Forests," Forest and Conservation History 37, no. 1 (1993): 26-36;
8. and "The Origins of the Tree-Lined Boulevard," The Geographical Review 78, no. 4 (1988): 355-374.
9. Peter C. Baldwin, Domesticating the Street: The Reform of Public Space in Hartford, 1850-1930 (Columbus: Ohio State University Press, 1999).
10. Cited, for example, on a text panel at the lumber shanty at the Museum of Civilization.
11. Ellen Frances Stroud, "The Return of the Forest: Urbanization and Reforestation in the Northeastern United States" (PhD diss., Columbia University, 2001).
12. Adam Rome, The Bulldozer in the Countryside: Suburban Sprawl and the Rise of American Environmentalism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001). Rome links the rise of environmentalism to the loss of open space near suburbia and notes in the cutline for figure 9 that the loss of woodlands evoked the strongest response.
13. For the involvement of the governors general in city beautification, see David L. A. Gordon, "From Noblesse Oblige to Nationalism: Elite Involvement in Planning Canada's Capital," Journal of Urban History 28, no. 1 (Nov. 2001): 3-34.
14. I have chosen to use the common names for trees, following the sources.
15. Seaton Findlay, Capital Woodlands: A Field and Armchair Guide to Ottawa's Urban Woodlands and Wooded Areas (Ottawa: Penumbra Press, 2001). A surveyor described the Ottawa forests in 1779: "The timber is in general tall and straight without any underbrush and I should suppose a man would be able to clear in the American method an area fit for seeding in eight days." Quoted in Wilfred Eggleston, The Queen's Choice: A Story of Canada's Capital (Ottawa: National Capital Commission, 1961), 70. For paintings, see Edwin Whitefield's Ottawa City, Canada West, Acc. 1986-49-1, LAC, and Thomas Burrows's 1812 painting held by the Art Gallery of Ontario, no. 12 (reproduced in Bruce S. Elliott, The City Beyond: A History of Nepean, Birthplace of Canada's Capital, 1792-1990 [City of Nepean: Nepean, 1991], 92). Paintings and sketches may exaggerate the tree cover: one artist claimed no artistic licence, "not even that of putting in a few trees, where no trees grow, for the sake of effect." Hunter's Ottawa Scenery (Ottawa: Hunter, 1855), 15. Herm. Brosius, Bird's Eye View of the City of Ottawa, Province, Ontario, 1876 (1876; repr.; Public Archives of Canada, 1976) shows a few street trees on downtown streets, such as Bay, Albert, and Slater;
16. Quoted in Wilfred Eggleston, The Queen's Choice: A Story of Canada's Capital (Ottawa: National Capital Commission, 1961), 70.
17. For paintings, see Edwin Whitefield's Ottawa City, Canada West, Acc. 1986-49-1, LAC, and Thomas Burrows's 1812 painting held by the Art Gallery of Ontario, no. 12
18. (reproduced in Bruce S. Elliott, The City Beyond: A History of Nepean, Birthplace of Canada's Capital, 1792-1990 [City of Nepean: Nepean, 1991], 92).
19. Paintings and sketches may exaggerate the tree cover: one artist claimed no artistic licence, "not even that of putting in a few trees, where no trees grow, for the sake of effect." Hunter's Ottawa Scenery (Ottawa: Hunter, 1855), 15.
20. Herm. Brosius, Bird's Eye View of the City of Ottawa, Province, Ontario, 1876 (1876; repr.; Public Archives of Canada, 1976) shows a few street trees on downtown streets, such as Bay, Albert, and Slater;
21. Lombardy popolars around the Basilica of Notre Dame, large trees on Major's Hill Park, and woodlands (probably second growth) behind Parliament Hill, by Patterson Creek and in what is now northwest Centretown. For trees on Parliament Hill, see the photographs in Commonwealth Historic Resource Management Ltd., The Landscape of Parliament Hill: A Collection of Illustrations, Report to Public Works Canada, submitted Oct. 1990, National Capital Commission Library. The description of the fifty-hectare site is from Stewart Letterbook, no. 304, LAC, quoted in Elliott, The City Beyond, 89. For bush in low-lying areas, see the descriptions of Stewart's Bush, Elliott, The City Beyond, 129. For stumps on the streets, see Robert Haig, Ottawa: City of the Big Ears (Ottawa: Haig and Haig, 1970), 95: "The eastern section of Daly Avenue is impassable [in 1850] due to the great number of tree stumps still not removed." For dynamiting 4,000 to 5,000 stumps at the Central Experimental Farm, see T. H. Anstey, One Hundred Harvests, Research Branch, Agriculture Canada 1886-1986 (Ottawa: Government of Canada, 1986), 12. For G. Doré's photograph of eastern white pine tree stumps in Dow's Lake, see Harry and Olive Walker, Carleton Saga (Ottawa: Runge, 1968).
22. The description of the fifty-hectare site is from Stewart Letterbook, no. 304, LAC, quoted in Elliott, The City Beyond, 89.
23. For bush in low-lying areas, see the descriptions of Stewart's Bush, Elliott, The City Beyond, 129.
24. For stumps on the streets, see Robert Haig, Ottawa: City of the Big Ears (Ottawa: Haig and Haig, 1970), 95: "The eastern section of Daly Avenue is impassable [in 1850] due to the great number of tree stumps still not removed."
25. For dynamiting 4,000 to 5,000 stumps at the Central Experimental Farm, see T. H. Anstey, One Hundred Harvests, Research Branch, Agriculture Canada 1886-1986 (Ottawa: Government of Canada, 1986), 12.
26. For G. Doré's photograph of eastern white pine tree stumps in Dow's Lake, see Harry and Olive Walker, Carleton Saga (Ottawa: Runge, 1968).
27. Union (1865), quoted in John Taylor, Ottawa: An Illustrated History (Toronto: J. Lorimer, 1986), 64.
28. Cited in "Ugliness Is Not Necessary," a speech given by Vincent Massey, to the lenth Anniversary of the Community Planning Association of Canada, 29 Oct. 1956. This observation is difficult to reconcile with Campanella's statement that "most American cities - including those of New England - remained woefully barren of street trees until well into the nineteenth century," Republic of Shade, 110, and Bernard Fernow's observation in 1910 that the planting of street trees had taken place over the last fifty years, i.e., from 1860.
29. See Bernhard E. Fernow, The Care of Trees in Lawn, Street and Park (New York: Henry Holt, 1910), 4.
30. City of Ottawa Bylaw 275-1869. There was an earlier bylaw protecting trees: in 1847, the town council of Ottawa's predecessor, Bytown, passed a bylaw that no one should "injure or destroy any tree or trees planted or growing in any street, or on any public ground within the said Town, for shade or ornament." Section 11, bylaw no. 3, Bylaw To Prevent Nuisances.
31. William Pittman Lett, The City of Ottawa and Its Surroundings, written in accordance with a resolution of the City Council (Ottawa: 1884), 14.
32. Anson Gard, The Hub and the Spokes: The Capital and Its Environs (Ottawa: Emerson, 1904), 35.
33. The 1890 bylaw explicitly prohibited planting except in front of a dwelling house.
34. See photos in the LAC: Monkland Avenue, PA10964; Metcalfe Avenue, "Metcalfe 1907," C94253, "Laurier Avenue," PA 34378 (n.d.). The City of Ottawa photograph collection holds numerous streetscapes, including an excellent series of images of Metcalfe (CA5076, CA0279, CA1591; CA29761 CA40530). The reports of the Ottawa Improvement Commission, particularly those published in 1912 and in 1925, include photographs of ceremonial driveways. For postcards see the postcard collection, Ottawa Room, Ottawa Library, especially "Laurier Avenue and All Saints Church," n.d., "Canadian Building at Albert St.," and "Metcalfe St. showing the new museum, Ottawa" (likely ca. 1912, the year the museum was built).
35. Ottawa: Canada's Beauty Spot (London: British Photogravure, [1911-1916?]): the reference is on the last pages.
36. The 1890 bylaw was specific: trees were to be located in boulevards or in a clearly defined location "at or within the distance of two feet (at the most) from the sidewalk nearest to the carriageway."
37. An Act To Encourage the Planting of Trees upon the Highways of this Province and To Give a Right of Property in Such Trees to the Owners of the Soil adjacent to Such Highways, Province of Ontario, 34 Vic, Cap. 31. Assented to 15 Feb. 1871. The term highway included streets, and even alleys. The law did not apply to incorporated cities unless they passed a bylaw to that effect.
38. See the Act Respecting Municipal Institutions in the Province of Ontario, 1873, S.O. c. 48, s. 372 (19), the Ontario Municipal Act, R.S.O. 1877, c. 174, s. 16, and subsequent municipal acts.
39. City solicitor to Alderman H. S. Cameron, Re: Supervision of Trees, 16 Mar. 1911, microfilm, City of Ottawa Archives.
40. "Your board recommends that Mrs. Morgan's offer of $70 for the right to remove the trees planted in front of her property, which obstruct the sidewalk on Bank St. between McLeod and Argyle, be accepted and that the Engineer be instructed to have said trees removed and the cost charged to Central Ward appropriations." City of Ottawa Minutes, 1895, report 9 of the Board of Works, p. 216. See also Report 17, 1895, in which Mrs. Mary Wilson's claim for five trees removed for asphalt paving was refused, and Report 13, p. 274, in which trees were removed for the electric streetcar, Similar claims were made in subsequent years.
41. See also Report 17, 1895, in which Mrs. Mary Wilson's claim for five trees removed for asphalt paving was refused, and Report 13, p. 274, in which trees were removed for the electric streetcar, Similar claims were made in subsequent years.
42. City Solicitor to Alderman H. S. Cameron, Re: Supervision of Trees, 16 Mar. 1911, microfilm, City of Ottawa Archives.
43. A study connecting Frederick Law Olmsted's work in hospital administration to his career as a landscape designer, by Bonj Szczygiel and Robert Hewitt, shows that reformers understood street trees to reduce miasma by taking up ground water, reducing the release of gases, moderating temperatures, and absorbing noxious gases through their foliage. Bonj Szczygel and Robert Hewitt, "Nineteenth-Century Medical Landscapes: John H. Rauch, Frederick Law Olmsted, and the Search for Salubrity," Bulletin of the History of Medicine 74, no. 4 (2000): 708-735. Similar effects are now measured by the Urban Forest Effects Model (UFORE), a tool developed for the USDA Forest Service. For an introduction to the science and an updated list of references, see Urban Forest Effects Model, http://www.ufore.org. For related research in Canada, see W. Andrew Kenney, "Leaf Area Density as an Urban Forestry Planning and Management Tool," Forestry Chronicle 76, no. 2 (2000): 235-239.
44. Similar effects are now measured by the Urban Forest Effects Model (UFORE), a tool developed for the USDA Forest Service. For an introduction to the science and an updated list of references, see Urban Forest Effects Model, http://www.ufore.org.
45. For related research in Canada, see W. Andrew Kenney, "Leaf Area Density as an Urban Forestry Planning and Management Tool," Forestry Chronicle 76, no. 2 (2000): 235-239.
46. A. H. D. Ross, Ottawa Past and Present (Ottawa: Thorburn and Abbott, 1924).
47. Frederick Todd, Preliminary Report to the Ottawa Improvement Commission (Ottawa: OIC, 1903), 35.
48. File of Annual Reports and Programmes, 1922, p. 33, OHS Records, 19-0-8-E, R27, LAC.
49. Saunders oversaw the planting of 14,000 trees and shrubs for the OIC in 1904. [Sir Henry N. Bate, chair], Report of the Ottawa Improvement Commissioners (Ottawa: 1904). His advice on street trees can be found in lecture notes, "Forest Problems in Canada," Saunders Family Papers, vol. 13, RG 17, LAC.
50. Balm of gilead (Populus balsamifera) also released quantities of cottony seeds, Mountain ash was added to this list in 1912 in bylaw 3378-1912, and in 1923 bylaw 5641 prohibited a number of trees that might drop fruit, nuts, or cones.
51. In 1903 the City of Ottawa included 100.49 miles of streets: 4.9 were asphalted and 0.47 paved with tar macadam. The rest were mainly unpaved or macadamized - paved with layers of aggregate, tamped down. Both these surfaces were permeable and, except for compaction, provided a relatively good environment for tree growth. For the history of street paving, see Baldwin, Domesticating the Street, and I. B. Holley Jr., "Blacktop: How Asphalt Paving Came to Urban United States," Technology and Culture 44, no. 4 (2003): 703-733.
52. and I. B. Holley Jr., "Blacktop: How Asphalt Paving Came to Urban United States," Technology and Culture 44, no. 4 (2003): 703-733.
53. See note 25.
54. City of Ottawa Departmental Reports for 1939.
55. Annual Report of the City Engineer, City of Ottawa Departmental Reports for 1903, 96.
56. Baldwin, Domesticating the Street.
57. For membership figures, see OHS Minutes of Meetings, p. 275, 19-0-8-E, R27, LAC. Macoun was president of the OHS in 1899, continued to sit on the board as ex officio member, and edited the short-lived journal Ottawa Horticulturalist in 1911.
58. Fred Pine, "The Story of the OHS," p. 57, M 0806, O-X-E, R7628, LAC. Pine compiled an anecdotal history of the society from newspaper records after the loss of the first thirty-five years of OHS records in a fire. In 1900 the council had passed a motion that the Parks Committee be required to take charge of the trimming of the trees in all the streets of the city. (City of Ottawa Minutes, 1900, p. 190.)
59. City of Ottawa Departmental Reports for 1909, p. 114.
60. Clause 6, Report 19 of the Board of Control, City of Ottawa Minutes for 1914: "The city engineer having reported the necessity of appointing a qualified Tree Inspector as he finds it impossible to attend to this matter."
61. OHS Minutes of Meetings, 1916, p. 181, 19-0-8-E, R27, LAC.
62. City of Ottawa Minutes, 1916, pp. 80, 119, 133.
63. City solicitor to Alderman H. S. Cameron, Re: Supervision of Trees, 16 Mar. 1911, microfilm, City of Ottawa Archives.
64. For the booster supper, see the pamphlet "Programme of the Annual Course of Lectures, OHS 1920," inserted in the OHS file, 1912-1922, pp. 408-409, and the accompanying notes on p. 411, 19-0-8-E, R27, LAC; and "Street Tree Policy Urged for Ottawa," Ottawa Citizen, 16 Apr. 1920. The Citizen reported attendance of 300, the OHS notes refer to 233 guests.
65. and the accompanying notes on p. 411, 19-0-8-E, R27, LAC;
66. and "Street Tree Policy Urged for Ottawa," Ottawa Citizen, 16 Apr. 1920. The Citizen reported attendance of 300, the OHS notes refer to 233 guests.
67. "A Civic Policy for the Control of Street Trees," OHS Records, Annual Reports and Programs, 1917-1937, p. 33 (dated 1922), 19-0-8-E, R27, LAC.
68. J. Johnson, foreman, Parks Division, Report on Tree Trimming and Cutting, City of Ottawa Departmental Reports for 1921, p. 178.
69. Director's Meeting 28 Oct. 1920, OHS, Minutes of Meetings, p. 424, 19-0-8-E, R27, LAC. An undated clipping from the Citizen included here in the OHS minutes refers to a talk on shade trees given by W. B. Varley, in which he advised on uniform planting and referred to the movement to have a satisfactory bylaw enacted. Dr. Grisdale's address is described in the OHS Minutes, p. 451: "Lecture Course, Normal School, April 15, 1921," 19-0-8-E, R27, LAC.
70. Dr. Grisdale's address is described in the OHS Minutes, p. 451: "Lecture Course, Normal School, April 15, 1921," 19-0-8-E, R27, LAC.
71. "A Civic Policy for the Control of Street Trees," Annual Reports and Programs, 1917-1937, OHS Records, p. 33 (dated 1922), 19-0-8-E, R27, LAC.
72. City of Ottawa Minutes 1922, 6 Mar. 1922, p. 111. The committee appears in city records variously as the Tree Committee, the Civic Tree Committee, the Parks and Tree Committee.
73. Membership is recorded in the City of Ottawa Minutes, and included, in addition to the core members, 1930: Walter Cunningham, George H. Dunbar (who later became a alderman); 1931: Mrs. John Bryson, 1932: Walter Cunningham, A. K. Stewart, Mrs. James Murdoch; 1933: Mrs. James Murdoch, W. H. Perrault, Mrs. B. G. Robinson. Other city staff, such as Mr. Proctor, the city solicitor, and Mr. Nelson, the superintendent of streets, attended meetingś. See Minutes of Special Committee Meetings, 1880-1936, microfilm, City of Ottawa Archives. For Macoun's central role, see the motion of condolences to Macoun's family on his death, noting that he "for several years, served this city as a member of the tree committee and as such made his life felt in the community." City of Ottawa Minutes 1933, 21 Aug. 1933.
74. See Richard J. Campana, Arboriculture: History and Development in North America (Lansing: Michigan State University Press, 1999). Campana notes that the Davey Company was asked to care for trees on Parliament Hill in Ottawa (p. 105). The Shade Tree Conference first met in 1924, with both commercial arborists and scientific specialists; 1932 saw the creation of a professional association, the American Society of Arborists.
75. Fernow, The Care of Trees, 4. William Solotaroff, Shade-Trees in Towns and Cities (New York: John Wiley and Sons, 1911).
76. Solotaroff described enabling legislation recently passed in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Massachusetts. See also Campanella, 141-146.
77. Evan D. G. Fraser and W. Andrew Kenney have shown that attitudes to urban trees are culturally contingent in a comparison of immigrant neighbourhoods: "Cultural Background and Landscape History as Factors Affecting Perceptions of the Urban Forest," Journal of Arboriculture 26, no. 2 (Mar. 2000): 106-113.
78. Records remain for only two of the advisory committee meetings. On 22 April the advisory committee recommended a survey be done. On 17 July, council recommended that $500 be transferred to the parks account for a survey, and the money is identified in the 1922 Departmental Reports (p. 178), although the results do not appear in city records. On 19 April 1922 the advisory committee asked the city solicitor if the city had power to pass a bylaw compelling residents to obtain a permit before planting trees on city streets; his reply is not recorded, but the 1912 bylaw wording was left unchanged. By the 1930s a permit system appears to have been in place. (See table 1). 19 Apr. 1922 meeting of the Civic Tree Planting Committee, Minutes of Special Committee Meetings, 1880-1936, microfilm, City of Ottawa Archives. City of Ottawa Minutes of 1922, 6 Mar. 1922, p. 397.
79. This represents a shift from the 1912 bylaw that did not permit the removal of a healthy tree unless there was another tree within nine metres.
80. City of Ottawa Departmental Reports for 1922, 1923, 1926, and 1928. In 1922 and 1923 the work was done by J. Johnson, the foreman of Parks Division, in 1926 the superintendent of streets included the work in his report. There is no report by either of these men for the other years.
81. City of Ottawa Minutes for 1928, 3 July and 20 Aug.
82. Waugh appears on staff only in 1930, although he refers to tree-trimming since 1929 in his report for 1932. City of Ottawa Department Reports for 1932.
83. City of Ottawa Department Reports for 1932. See also his editorial comments in City of Ottawa Departmental Reports for 1930, p. 663.
84. Curiously, although Campanella describes a tree warden who spoke against "weedy" elm trees (p. 144), he does not describe a general shift in attitude toward the elm.
85. City of Ottawa Minutes 1932, 4 Apr. 1932, 18 July 1932.
86. For annual numbers, see Julian Smith and Associates, Sandy Hill West Heritage Conservation District Study(Ottawa: September 1993), B10-B12. Joann Latremouille, landscape architect and historian for this report, brought these figures to my attention.
87. The number of trees removed was probably accurately recorded because the associated costs were substantial. Although preliminary observations of aerial photographs from these decades do not show a significant loss in tree canopy at this time, a block-by-block analysis of the inner city may reveal more significant local impact. It does, however, seem unlikely that no trees were planted on city streets between 1920 and 1934, a call for a permit system for tree planting in 1922 (see note 54) suggests that the city did not need to plant trees, because residents continued to do so. Waugh also refers to the trees trimmed by utility companies under his supervision.
88. J. Alph Dulude, "Shade Trees and Parklands: Planting, Cultivation and Preservation," September 1962, 2, part 3, Specific Surveys and Policies, City of Ottawa Departmental Reports. Submitted to the City of Ottawa Recreation and Parks Committee by the Commissioner of Recreation and Parks.
89. Ibid., 9.