By Susanna McLeod
Special to Ontario Construction News
Natural threats abounded in early Ontario; foul water, viruses, frigid winters… and fire. Homes and buildings were often constructed from timbers cut from abundant forests. Over time, buildings became tinder dry. They could ignite into a roaring blaze by oil and gas lamps, candles, or sparks from woodstoves. One way to ease the ever-present dread of fire was building with brick.
The art of brickmaking stretches back millennia to ancient Egypt and before. Blended occasionally with straw and droppings, clay and sand from the Nile River were combined with water. The mix was pressed by hand into molds and left to dry in the hot sun. In the Roman era, “mud bricks were also baked in a kiln,” said The Global Egyptian Museum.
Fast-forward to 1889 Toronto and establishment of the Don Valley Pressed Brick Company by Taylor brothers John, William, and George. Changing ownership, the company incorporated in September 1920 as Don Valley Brick Works Limited (DVBW).
The firm competed with more than 30 brick plants in the region. Don Valley production started with “machinery for manufacture of dry-press brick, and eight kilns for firing,” said John. C. Carter in “Don Valley Brick Works” at Wayback Times. The firm expanded rapidly to produce a variety of bricks. “Plain, moulded and ornamental bricks, enamelled bricks, terra cotta building materials, roofing tiles, vitrified paving bricks, sewer pipes, and fire brick” were on the roster. Catalogue pages displayed “over 400 different brick types,” Carter stated. There were different colours, too.
Excellent quality in the company’s brick and clay developments earned DVBW gold medals at Chicago’s Columbian Exposition in 1893, and the next year at the Toronto Industrial Fair. “Daily production increased from 44,000 bricks in 1891 to 120,000 by 1912,” reported Lost Rivers in “Brick Manufacture.”
Always innovating, the company “introduced new equipment to the operation enabling at the peak of production to produce 43 million bricks annually,” according to Canada’s Historic Places. Shale and clay materials were mined at a nearby quarry, just north of the plant on Bayview Avenue.
One of DVBW’s first structures was a clay grinding building constructed in 1891, and seven years later, the first of several tall chimneys was constructed. Storage buildings, screening and dust collecting buildings, production plants and kilns, and a brick storage shed later added up to 16 buildings at the site.
Several key processes became the enduring bread-and-butter for DVBW: dry press, soft-mud, sand-lime, and stiff-mud brick. As the first three types lost popularity, stiff-mud brick production soared.
Starting with ground-up shale or clay, water is added to form the right consistency—softer than dry-press yet firmer than soft-mud brick. “The batch is driven by an auger through a die, and bricks are cut from the extruded clay column by wires,” described Lost Rivers. Operating continuously, “large auger machines are capable of producing more than 20,000 brick per hour.” The raw bricks are loaded in stacks on steel “cars” and sent to a warming room at 42.5º C. If desired, designs are created on the raw brick surface by rollers, and then on to a drying tunnel before the kiln.
The lengthy drying tunnel is critical. If green bricks were moved directly into the kiln, the remaining moisture in the mixture could turn into steam and explode inside the oven.
Updating kilns from burning wood and soft coal, the firm’s new expansive tunnel kilns were fueled by gas. Tunnel kilns act as a flue, with air flowing in one end and out through to the other. In the general process, “midway along the kiln, producer gas entered through flues in the kiln walls and passed through flues in the truck decks,” wrote T. Richie in “Developments in Brick Manufacture and Use” (National Research Council Canada, 1978). The decks were protected underneath by fire bricks, and “had openings at the top to allow it to flow among the bricks on the deck where the gas burned.”
During World War Two, local workers at DVBW were joined by German and Italian POWs. “They were housed at a nearby Prisoner of War Camp on the property which is now Todmorden Mills Museum,” said Carter.
Closing the plant in 1989, a few years later the quarry was filled in to create a city park. In 2008, Don Valley Brick Works was recognized as an historic place by the Ontario Heritage Trust. Owned by Toronto and Region Conservation Authority, the site is protected by Ontario Trust Conservation Easement for its heritage buildings, industrial machinery, archaeological features, and more.
The non-profit firm Evergreen Brick Works took over stewardship of DVBW in 1991. Concentrating on healthy living, inclusive culture, and Indigenous recognition. the company has transformed the site into a busy, sustainable meeting place.
Ontario’s longest-operating brick manufacturer, Don Valley Brick Works provided durable bricks to customers throughout North America.
© 2020 Susanna McLeod. McLeod is a Kingston-based freelance writer who specializes in Canadian History