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89 Mosley St.

Aurora Heritage Buildings

Aurora Armouries     -     89 Mosley Street

 

Photo: 2005

	Date Built: 1874	Style: Civic Building.	Design: 1 storeys
	Designation: AHC Plaque (1992)	Legal desc.: Plan 68 .	Municipal Zoning: Institutional

Excerpt from The Evening Globe (Toronto), May 22nd 1874 ...

"Aurora, May 21. - The 12th Battalion Drill shed was raised today. Mr. Ireland, the contractor, is making great efforts to have it completed by the specified date, the 6th of June. The building is located in the Park, and is in a good position for Battallion drill. The village is rapidly improving. This spring upwards of thirty houses are in course of construction."

Excerpt from The Daily Globe October 5th 1874 ...

"Aurora, Oct. 3. - The Reformers of the North Riding of York have had a field day in honour of the re-union of the party and the success in achieved last January. The morning was dull, and showers fell in various places, but at Aurora the weather was fine without any intermission. At an early hour teams began to make their appearance, and continued coming in the whole morning, the farthest limits of the Riding being well represented as well as the more central portions.

The early train brought the Hon. Oliver Mowat, Premier of Ontario, Hon. Edward Blake, M.P., Hon. A. McKellar, Commissioner of Agriculture, and Mr. Cook, M.P. for North Simcoe. They were received at the station by Mr. Fleury, Reeve of Aurora, Mr. Nelson Gorham, Chairman of the Demonstration Committee, Mr Dymond, M.P., and other gentlemen. In the village they were joined by Mr. Aemilius Irving, M.P. for Hamilton, who was visiting his friends in the neighbourhood.

At one o'clock a very large crowd had gathered at the corners of Yonge And Wellington streets in front of the Queens Hotel, a large contribution to the numbers being made by the Reformers of Lloydtown and Schomberg who came in procession, headed by the Schomberg band in a wagon drawn by six horses.

At 1:30 the Aurora Fire Brigade band appeared and headed a procession on foot to the new drill shed recently erected on the corporation land at the head of Mosely St., and nearly contiguous to the railway station. Every needful preparation had been made by the local committee for the comfort of the audience and speakers. The latter occupied a carpetted platform with a large sounding board, and decorated with evergreens which interspersed with flags decoratred every part of the building. On the right of the platform were seats specially reserved for ladies of whom over two hundred were present.

The whole of the shed was provided with seating accomodation consisting of loose planks kindly lent for the occasion from the planing mills of Messrs Phillips.   . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

The total number present was estimated at over two thousand persons."

In April of 1916 members of the 127th Battalion (York Rangers) gathered at the armouries, from where they marched to Yonge Street and took the radial railway to Kodak Barracks at Mount Dennis. After several weeks of training, they departed for Europe and the battles of the first World War.

The Armouries is now home to "A" Squadron of the Queen's York Rangers, Canada's oldest regiment. The Armouries itself is one of the oldest in Canada still in military use.

Updated 20/04/05 - BBD