Brunswick Hotel/Jewell Block
Southeast corner of Douglas and Yates
Date of construction – 1884
Image courtesy Simon Fraser University
From the Daily Colonist, April 15, 1884
“Mr. Jewell, furniture dealer , has just moved into his new building on the corner of Yates and Douglas streets .On the ground floor he occupies a large and commodious store, well stocked with furniture and crockery.
The back store is fitted with a hoist moved by hand power, and the attic is used for storage purposes. The western portion of the building is occupied as the Brunswick Hotel by Mr. Bryant, and has 26 rooms on the upper flat, and the dining room and kitchen downstairs.”
From the May 17, 1884 Daily Colonist, page 3
“.. the Brunswick Hotel, though only being open one week, reports a full house and a rush of business.”
In April 1900, Mowat and Wallace (the clerks who for years waited on you at Erskin Wall & Co.) opened a brand new grocery store in the Brunswick Hotel. Between 1903 and 1905, W O Wallace assumed total ownership and advertised as such. The newspaper ad for the week that the trolley travelled past the store is for fresh Salt Spring Island butter, fresh cream and strawberries.
The hotel was demolished and replaced by the National Trust Building, originally built for the Dominion Bank and designed by Douglas L. Kertland of Toronto, in a late Art Deco style in 1938. It suffered significant loss of architectural integrity in a 1964 renovation.
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Principal Photography & Consultant: Ron Bukta, West Ventures Photography