History
Bishop John Strachan, an Anglican priest and Archdeacon of York, received a royal charter from King George IV in 1827 to establish King's College in Upper Canada. The colonial college was effectively controlled by the Church of England and members of the elite Family Compact. In 1849, over strong opposition from Strachan, Reformists took control of the college and secularized it to become the University of Toronto. Incensed by this decision, Strachan immediately began raising funds for the creation of Trinity College, a private institution based on strong Anglican lines.
Working with Darling and Pearson, Charles Barry Cleveland superintended many of their important architectural works in eastern Canada including the Trinity College campus at the University of Toronto. The cornerstone was laid on April 30, 1851. Trinity was incorporated as an independent university on 2 August 1851, and a charter was granted by Queen Victoria the following year. The Cameron property on Queen Street in western Toronto was purchased for £2,000, and the college opened to students at the site on January 15, 1852.
Beginning in 1837, representatives of the United Church of England and Ireland in Upper Canada met with the Society for Propagation of the Gospel to solicit support for fellowships to enable the education of local clergy. With a guarantee of support, in 1841 Bishop Strachan requested his chaplains, the Rev. Henry James Grasett and the Rev. Henry Scadding of St. James' Cathedral, and the Rev. Alexander Neil Bethune, then Rector of Cobourg, to prepare a plan for a systematic course in theology for those to be admitted to Holy Orders. On January 10, 1842 the first lecture was given at the Diocesan Theological Institute in Cobourg. In 1852, teaching was transferred to Toronto in the new Faculty of Divinity at Trinity College. Trinity College absorbed the Diocesan Theological Institute in Cobourg in 1852.
Trinity College gradually expanded its teaching beyond arts and divinity, and by the end of the 19th century its scope had included medicine, law, music, pharmacy and dentistry. The college admitted its first female students in 1884, and St. Hilda's College was created in 1888 as the women's college of Trinity. With Strachan's death in 1867, efforts could begin to unite Trinity College with the University of Toronto.
Eden Smith (architect) built St. Hilda's College (1899), on the grounds of Trinity College.
After taking office in 1900, provost Thomas C. S. Macklem supported joining the college with the University of Toronto. The matter became hotly contested when Trinity's medical faculty merged with the University of Toronto Faculty of Medicine in 1903. After what Macklem described as a "long-drawn and bitter" series of debates, the college voted 121 to 73 in favour of federation with the University of Toronto. The university made a concession to allow Trinity to administer its own examination in religious subjects, which required the university to remove the restriction from its governing charter.
On October 1, 1904, Trinity became part of the University of Toronto and relinquished to the university its authority to grant degrees in subjects other than theology. It became clear that the relocation of Trinity closer to the university was necessary, and the college abandoned plans for a northward expansion at its Queen Street site. The college acquired its present property near Queen's Park at the university grounds in 1913, but construction of the new college buildings, modeled after the original buildings by Kivas Tully, was not completed until 1925 due to World War I. The former site of the college became Trinity Bellwoods Park.
Towards the end of the 20th century, the place of longstanding institutions and traditions within the college community underwent changes initiated by internal and external parties. Episkopon, a society based in the college since 1858, was officially dissociated from Trinity in 1992. In 2004, the college board of trustees voted narrowly in favour of ending Trinity's long practice of same-sex residency, and beginning in 2005 large portions of Trinity's residences became home to both men and women, although still separated by houses or wings.
On 30 April 2002 Canada Post issued 'University of Trinity College, 1852-2002' as part of the Canadian Universities series. The stamp was based on a design by Steven Slipp, based on photographs by James Steeves and on an illustration by Bonnie Ross. The 48¢ stamps are perforated 13.5 and were printed by Ashton-Potter Canada Limited.
Read more about this topic: Trinity College, Toronto
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