Jarvis Collegiate Institute


Jarvis Collegiate Institute is a high school in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is named after Jarvis Street where it is located. It is a part of the Toronto District School Board. Prior to 1998, it was within the Toronto Board of Education.
Founded in 1807, it is the oldest active high school in Ontario. Kingston Collegiate and Vocational Institute, founded c. 1792), was the oldest but closed in 2020.
WWW Official Site

History

Jarvis Collegiate was founded as a private school in 1797 by William Cooper but closed in 1801 when Cooper changed his occupation. In 1807 the government of Ontario, then known as the British colony of Upper Canada, took over the school and incorporated it in a network of eight new, public grammar schools, one for each of the eight districts of Upper Canada. Of the eight were four key schools:Eastern Grammar School or Cornwall Grammar School c. 1806 was located in Cornwall, OntarioWestern Grammar School c. 1854 or J. C. Patterson Collegiate Institute was located in Windsor, Ontario; school closed in 1973Home District Grammar School in Toronto - Jarvis was the grammar school for the Home District, an area covering much of the modern Greater [Toronto Area|GTA]. Its first name was the Home District Grammar School.Midland Grammar Schools or Kingston Grammar School c. 1792 then as Midland Grammar School 1807 in Kingston, Ontario
These were the early days of Toronto, when the first parliament buildings were established and the first church and jail were constructed. In fact, it was only fourteen years earlier that Governor John Graves Simcoe arrived at the location on Lake Ontario, home to Mississauga communities and site of important Indigenous trade routes, to lay out the design of the new town he named York.
After the early period 1807-1811, enrolment started at five, rose to twenty, then fell to four - the school gained momentum in 1812 when the redoubtable John Strachan took over as headmaster. In 1839, Strachan became the first Anglican bishop of Toronto, living grandly in a home known as the "Palace" and signing his name "John Toronto". He also founded Trinity College.
The original 1807 school building was a shed attached to the headmaster's house. Strachan raised funds for a new two-storey building, completed in 1816 on College Square, a lot north of St. James' Cathedral, bounded by Richmond, Adelaide, Church and Jarvis Streets. In 1825 the school was renamed the Royal Grammar School. Later the name was changed to Toronto High School. In 1829 it moved to the corner of Jarvis and Lombard Streets. When Upper Canada College was founded in 1829 it shared a building with the Grammar School and for several years the two organizations were essentially unified. UCC eventually moved to its own facilities.
By 1864, the three rooms of the schoolhouse were inadequate for the 150 students, so a new building was constructed on Dalhousie Street, just north of Gould Street, near present-day Toronto Metropolitan University. This was also the year of the founding of the Toronto Grammar School Mental Improvement Society, the predecessor to all school clubs. Later known in schools as "the Lit," the club was a literary and debating society. Originally exclusively for boys, the club began admitting girls in 1893. It was also around this time that the first debates between schools were held in Toronto, the competing schools being Parkdale Collegiate Institute and Harbord Collegiate Institute. In the following decade, once again growing enrolment necessitated a new building. As the school underwent construction between 1870 and 1871, classes were held in a vacant insane asylum at Queen's Park, where the east wing of the legislative buildings are located today.
In 1871 the new building opened at 361 Jarvis Street, just south of College Street, directly in front of Allan Gardens. In 1889, the annexation of Parkdale brought a second high school to the board, precipitating yet another name change from Toronto High School to Jarvis Street High School. The school was given its current name, Jarvis Collegiate Institute, in 1890. In 1924 it moved to its current Collegiate Gothic building designed by architect Charles Edmund Cyril Dyson.
From 1928 to 1930, Toronto artist George Agnew Reid painted an ambitious multi-wall mural in the school with the help of his student Lorna Claire. The piece, honouring the staff and students killed on active duty in WWI, has never been covered or removed.
Jarvis Collegiate celebrated its 200th anniversary in 2007.

Principals

PrincipalYearsBornEducationOther positions held
Rev George Okill Stuart1807–1812Fort Hunter near
Amsterdam, New York
emigrated to
Canada 1781		Union College, Schenectady, New York
King's College, Windsor, Nova Scotia
A.B., Harvard College		Archdeacon of York, Ontario
Archdeacon of Kingston, Ontario
Rt Rev John Strachan1812–1822Aberdeen, Scotland
emigrated to
Canada 1799		King's College, AberdeenSuperintendent of Education for Upper Canada
First Anglican Bishop of Toronto
Rev Samuel Armour1822–1825ScotlandFounding Headmaster
Peterborough Collegiate and Vocational School
Rev Dr Thomas Phillips1825–1830EnglandCambridge University
Amalgamation1830–1834
Rev Duncan MacAulay1834–1836Scotland
Charles Cosens1836–1838Resigned to teach at Upper Canada College
Marcellus Crombie1839–1853
Dr Michael Howe1853–1863Ireland
emigrated to
Canada 1851		Trinity College, DublinFounding Headmaster
Galt Grammar School
Headmaster
Newington College
Rev Arthur Wickson1863–1872University of TorontoWorked with the Christian Instruction Society
Dr Archibald MacMurchy1873–1899ScotlandUniversity of Toronto
Major Fred Manley1900–1906Jarvis Collegiate InstitutePut down the Riel Rebellion
Fought at Battle of Batoche
Dr Luther Embree1906–1914University of TorontoTransferred from Parkdale Collegiate Institute
John Jeffries1914–1934University of Toronto
Fred Clarke1934–1939
Arthur Allin1939–1950Taught at Jarvis from 1913
James T. Jenkins1950–1952Whitchurch Twp.University of TorontoMath teacher at Jarvis for 28 years
Milton Jewell1952–1969B.A., University of Western OntarioPrincipal
Malvern Collegiate Institute
1946-1952
Eric McCann1969–1974Riverdale Collegiate
B.A., University of Toronto		Vice-Principal
Danforth Collegiate and Technical Institute
Ann Shilton1974–1983Jarvis Collegiate InstituteVice-Principal
Heydon Park Collegiate
Principal
Greenwood Secondary School
Janet Ray1983–1989
David Wells1989–1994Principal
Malvern Collegiate Institute
David MacDonald1995
Pauline McKenzie1995–2009
Andrew Gold2009
Elizabeth Addo2009–2013
Michael Harvey2013–2023
Stephen Bain2023–

In the media

Notable alumni

Notable staff