ARCHITECTURE:
This one-storey, front-gabled Vernacular cottage is a good example of a worker’s cottage. It was built by one of Victoria’s major early contracting and development companies, Moore (1437 Vining St, Fernwood) & Whittington (1433 Vining St, Fernwood), during Victoria’s great pre-(WWI) building boom. It has a small, central, gabled entry porch with square posts. There is bevelled-siding in the gables and on the first floor. Asbestos shingles cover the basement level, tying the two gabled additions at the rear to the rest of the house. It has a concrete foundation. There is an exterior brick chimney on the left side. Two three-over-one windows frame the front entrance, with a simple stained glass window on the right.
OCCUPANTS:
Owners: 1913-18: Civil engineer Lauritz Davick (b. Norway, 1870) and Otto (née Magnesen, b. Norway, 1884-1917) married in Victoria in 1912. Otto died of tuberculosis.
Tenants: 1913: Samuel John and Margaret Elizabeth Laity; Samuel was an employee at the Victoria Botanic Beverage Co and later an insurance agent for Metropolitan Life Insurance Co.
1914: George James and Florence Pretty; George was a letter carrier for 34 years.
1915-16: Edward Deighton, an employee of H.P. Baines, Tire & Tube Repairs.
1917-29: Vacant for 12 years, according to city directories.
Owners: 1931-52: Auto upholsterer Ernest George Saunders (c.1878-1955) and Florence (née Foxall, b. ENG, 1882-1946). Florence lived at Britannia Mines, BC, and in Vancouver before coming to Victoria.
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION & IMAGES:
- Fernwood History
- Fernwood Heritage Register
- This Old House, Victoria’s Heritage Neighbourhoods,
Volume One: Fernwood & Victoria West