ARCHITECTURE:
Regents Park, one of Victoria’s most elaborate Italianate Villas, is a two-storey, hip-roofed house with a full height gabled projection on the right front, a shallow rectangular bay under a pent roof, and a first-storey angled bay with balconet. On the R side is a full-height, gabled rectangular bay, on the left is a single-storey rectangular porch with balconet, balustrades now removed; the dormer was a later addition. The corner front porch below the upper balcony has square chamfered posts with decorative brackets and sawn balustrade replicating the original. The house abounds in decorative detail: single and double brackets on the frieze, an ornamented belt course, corner boards replicating pilasters, and scrollwork on the door and window casings. It is clad in drop siding. It cost $8,000 when constructed: only J.D. Pemberton’s home Gonzales (p150,151) exceeded it at $10,000; at the time the average house was $1,000-$1,500. The name Regents Park was associated with this property as early as 1863, when architect Charles Verheyden sold 20 acres in what is now known as Rockland neighbourhood.
When Carl Rudolph purchased it in 1963, the house had deteriorated extensively after years of neglect, and was facing possible demolition. The 2-storey entrance hall is dominated by the grand floating staircase that splits into two flights. Huge reception rooms with 12-foot ceilings on the main floor retained original wallpaper friezes and plaster cornices, ceiling borders and corners. Of the eight fireplaces, only the lower hallway retained its original tiles, but Carl refitted the others with Victorian tiles which he collected from important early residences demolished in the 1960s and ’70s. Carl started restoring this house a decade before the heritage movement began in British Columbia, and when the majority of the public still encouraged wholesale demolition of old properties. In 1974 Carl asked Victoria City Council to designate the house as heritage, the first designation in Victoria and BC of a privately-owned residence. Carl received restoration awards from Heritage Canada in 1975 and Victoria’s Hallmark Society in 1984.
When Carl Rudolph purchased it in 1963, the house had deteriorated extensively after years of neglect, and was facing possible demolition. The two-storey entrance hall is dominated by the grand floating staircase that splits into two flights. Huge reception rooms with 12-foot ceilings on the main floor retained original wallpaper friezes and plaster cornices, ceiling borders and corners. Of the eight fireplaces, only the lower hallway retained its original tiles collected from important early residences demolished in the 1960s-70s. He started restoring this house a decade before the heritage movement began in BC, when the majority of the public still encouraged wholesale demolition of old properties. In 1974 he asked the city to designate the house as heritage, BC’s first designation of a privately-owned residence. Carl received restoration awards from Heritage Canada in 1975 and Victoria’s Hallmark Society in 1984.
ORIGINAL OCCUPANTS:
1885-1904: David William Higgins (b. Halifax, NS 1834-1917) studied in Brooklyn, NY, apprenticed as a printer, and sailed to California in 1852. He founded The Morning Call in San Francisco in 1856, but in 1858 another journal sent him as special correspondent to the Fraser River gold rush. He arrived on SS Sierra Nevada in the new British colony, and settled in Yale, managing a store and mining camps. He met Amor De Cosmos (b. Windsor, NS 1825-1897) and came to work here on De Cosmos’s British Colonist in 1860-62. With partner J.E. Higgins organized and was president of the first fire department in 1860, and in 1886-87 was a Victoria City Councillor. From 1866-69 he was a trustee on the first Board of Education in the Colony of Vancouver Island. In 1886, after building this house, he sold the Colonist and was elected Liberal-Conservative MLA for Esquimalt. He was Speaker of the Legislative Assembly 1890-97, then retired in 1900. In 1889 Higgins was founding President and Managing Director of the National Electric Tramway & Lighting Co (508 Discovery St).
In 1863, Higgins married Mary Jane (née Pidwell, b. PEI 1846-1900), daughter of Elizabeth and John Trevasso Pidwell, a merchant from Charlottetown, PEI. [Pidwell was frequently fined for riding his horse too fast through city streets; a fall from his horse eventually killed him.] D.W. Higgins wrote two books, The Mystic Spring and The Passing of a Race, published in 1904 and 1905. His descriptions of Victoria’s early colonial life solidified his fame. The Higginses were members of Bishop Cridge’s Reformed Episcopal Church, and Mary Jane was a staunch worker for church and local charities. In 1904 Higgins sold Regents Park and moved to the Balmoral Hotel. He later lived in Port Angeles and served as British Vice-Consul, then with daughter Elizabeth (1865-1929) and husband James Lawson Raymur (1859-1923) until his death on his 83rd birthday.
Son William “Will” Ralph (1866-1896) studied music, was an amateur actor and member of Victoria’s famed Arion Male Voice Choir. In 1889 he married Edith Louisa “Dolly” Helmcken (b. Victoria 1862-1939), daughter of Dr. J.S. Helmcken (638 Elliot St) and granddaughter of Sir James Douglas. Son Frank (1871-1953), barrister and chief factor of Native Sons of BC for many years, married Addie Louise Whitlock (b. New York 1872-1940). Daughter Maud Eve (1869-1938) married Thomas Corsan (b. ON 1868-1911). Son Dr. Charles Paul (1878-1951) married Johanna Maud Huggins (b. Oshawa, ON 1880-1948) moved to San Francisco in 1921.
OTHER OCCUPANTS:
1904-26: Dr. Ernest Amos Hall (b. Esquesing, ON 1861-1932) married Mary Louisa (née Fox, b. Trafalgar, ON 1863-1941) in 1885 and came here shortly after.
1910-11: Restholme Sanitarium & Convalescent Home, Miss Grace Mowat, Matron.
1913-14: Nurses’ Home, Mrs. Lillian McDougall, proprietor. Dr. Hall played violin and piano, was in politics, and a member of Grand Templars of Temperance and Board of Police Commissioners.
1927-63: David Evans (b. Ystrad, Rhondda, WAL, 1890-1983) served overseas with the 103rd Btn. CEF in WWI. He stated his occupation as mining engineer. He received permission to marry Ida Madeline (née Peckham, b. Lewes, Sx, ENG. 1894-1930) in 1917. She died giving birth to a premature baby. Evans was a nurse, orderly and later a physiotherapist. Daughter Ida Mary (b. Sussex, ENG 1917-1997) married William Layfield Smith, RCA (b. Vancouver, BC 1915-1998) there in 1940. Son David Peckham Evans (b. Victoria 1921-2003) joined the Canadian Scottish Regiment (Princess Mary’s) during WWII and was overseas until 1947. He served 42 years in BC Registrar of Companies office. He and wife Edith “Edee” were the last of the family to live in the house.
1963-97: Carlisle “Carl” Pierce Rudolph (b. Victoria 1915-1997) was the elder son of Robert Andrew “Andy” Rudolph (b. Kentucky1865-1949) and Mary “Minnie” Hannah (née Tennant, b. IRL 1872-1964), who married here in 1911. After grade eight, Carl and brother Thomas (b. 1918-?) were apprenticed to Devonshire-born woodturner and cabinetmaker Charlie Whitfield. They made small furniture, which was sold privately.
After Andy received $150 from injuries in a car accident, he, Carl and Tom opened The Chair Shop on Fort St. The boys built the furniture and did woodturning, and Andy did the upholstery, until the Depression killed the business. They moved to 1219 Wharf St c.1936 and built boats for several years. Then the brothers moved to Vancouver. Carl worked at Sigurdson Millwork, then F.A. Brodie’s BC Brush Works. They made specialty brushes, including ones for cleaning guns during WWII, so Carl was exempted from war service.
After the war, Carl worked at David Boat Works in Steveston until he and Tom started Rudolph Boat Works in Vancouver. But post-war shortages of copper nails and other essential supplies made business tough. Carl moved back to Victoria to live with his mother and bought this house. He worked at Foster’s Boat Yard, then at the Federal Graving Dock Esquimalt, as a woodturner and shipwright. After retirement, Carl operated Regents Park as a private museum, Higgins Hall until his death.
The house then became a B&B called Amethyst Inn under the ownership of Karl and Grace Sands.