![]() ![]() ![]() The city’s Black community was hardly homogenous in its political outlook. 4 Dubbed “The Noble Ward,” the area – now home to Nathan Phillips Square and the institutional buildings north and south of Dundas - was known for its rowdy saloons and the Orange lodges that served the Irish Protestants who dominated Toronto’s public life. ![]() John’s Ward, which extended from Yonge to University (then known as College), and from Queen north to Bloor. 3 About half lived in the southern section of St. Toronto, at the time, had a population of 47,000, of whom approximately one thousand were Black, according censuses conducted in 1856 2 and 1861. With conservative and reform-minded factions waging a see-saw battle for control of the legislature of pre-Confederation Canada, politicians from different parties had come to the neighbourhood looking for votes, including those of the significant number of Black residents who had been settling there since the 1840s. John’s Ward, the working class enclave that extended north of Queen Street and west of Yonge, boiled with intense, and often fractious, political debate. An Essay Marking Black History Month in the City of Torontoĭuring the summer of 1858, the raucous taverns of St. ![]()
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