Old Toronto - History

The former town of York was incorporated on March 6, 1834, reverting to the name Toronto to distinguish it from New York City, as well as about a dozen other localities named 'York' in the province (including the county in which Toronto was situated), and to dissociate itself from the negative connotation of dirty Little York, a common nickname for the town by its residents. The population was recorded in June 1834 at 9,252.

William Lyon Mackenzie, a Reformer was its first mayor, a position he only held for one year, losing to Tory Robert Baldwin Sullivan in 1835. Sullivan was replaced by Dr Thomas David Morrison in 1836. Another Tory, George Gurnett was elected in 1837. That year, Toronto was the site of the key events of the Upper Canada Rebellion. Mackenzie would lead attacks on Toronto in November 1837. The attacks were ineffectual, but loyal militia in Toronto went out to the rebel camp at Montgomery's Tavern and dispersed the rebels. Mackenzie and other Reformers escaped to the United States, while some rebel leaders such as Samuel Lount and Peter Matthews were hanged. Toronto would elect a succession of Tory or Conservative mayors, and it was not until the 1850s that a Reform member would be mayor again.

The earliest Toronto neighbourhoods were the five municipal wards that the city was split into in 1834. The wards were named for the patron saints of the four nations of the British Isles (St. George, St. Andrew, St. Patrick, and St. David) and St. Lawrence, the patron saint of Canada. Today, only St. Lawrence remains a well-known neighbourhood name. The others have attached their names to a variety of still existing landmarks including three subway stations. As Toronto grew, more wards were created, still named after prominent saints. St. James Ward is preserved in the modern St. James Town neighbourhood, while the northern ward of St. Paul's has continued to the present as a federal and provincial electoral district.

In 1834, Toronto was incorporated with the boundaries being Bathurst Street on the west, 400 yards north of Queen Street and Parliament Street on the east. Outside this formal boundary were the 'liberties', land pre-destined to be used for new wards. These boundaries were today's Dufferin Street to the west, Bloor Street to the north, the Don River to the east, with a section along the lake shore east of the Don, and south of today's Queen Street, to the approximate location of today's Maclean Street. The liberties became formally part of the city in 1859 and the wards were remapped.