Blantyre & Blantyre Park , Toronto

I like hearing about different places around the world with the name Blantyre. Here’s a little story kindly put together by my friend and history colleague, Gordon Cook.

   “Peter Paterson and his wife Jean Fraser brought their sons David, John, and Peter from Blantyre, Scotland, and settled in Little York (or as they called it “Muddy York” (now the city of Toronto) between 1817 and 1819. Peter senior started up a hardware business in King Street East, called P. Paterson and Sons, he died in Toronto in 1846 and son David carried on the business.

   Peter Paterson junior was born in Blantyre on 13th September 1807 and was about 11 when he arrived in Canada. He later married Hannah Wilson, who was born in England. Peter and Hannah had ten children, three dying in infancy. One of the surviving children was Thomas Wilson Paterson, born in 1847, who would enter the ministry 1869 with both B.A. and M.A. degrees and was later rector of Christ Church, Deer Park, Ontario. Thomas married Christiana Mary Porter in 1891 and had four children. His brother, Charles William Paterson, was also a minister.

   Peter Paterson had gone into partnership in the 1850s with a Jerry D. Merrick, son of an Irish immigrant, and after he retired he bought a fifty acre tract of land from Dr Orlando Salathiel Winstanley, and built a fine home on the Kingston Road near Toronto and named it “Blantyre”, the grounds and gardens were known as “Blantyre Park” and the lakefront property was called “Victoria Park”. Peter died in 1883.

   “Blantyre” and “Blantyre Park” were later taken over (before 1907) as a site for an industrial school for Roman Catholic boys.

Pictured is Blantyre Park (Toronto), now also the name of a little park.

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