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Prior to the British colonization of Southern Ontario, the future Old Mill lands were home to several other highly significant sites. The strategically situated Haudenosaunee village of Taiaiagon sat across the Humber River near its eastern bank. The settlement was likely established in the early 17th century and variously inhabited by the Seneca and the Mohawk. It lay directly along the ancient Toronto Carrying-Place Trail, the primary portage route between modern-day Lakes Ontario and Simcoe since at least 2000 BCE, and comprised some 5,000 residents and dozens of longhouses. A French fortification and trading post now referred to as Fort Douville also existed on or near the same spot from 1720 to 1730.
The first mill on the Old Mill lands was built in 1793 as Toronto's first industrial site. Its construction was ordered by John Graves Simcoe, Governor-General of Upper Canada. It was a sawmill known as the King's Mill. This structure was later bought by Thomas Fisher, who replaced it with a grist mill in 1834. This second mill was bought by William Gamble, who built a new, larger mill on the same spot in 1838. This third mill was destroyed by fire in 1849. Gamble then constructed what would be the fourth iteration of the Old Mill. This building was constructed of stone, lumber, and heavy wooden beams sourced locally. In 1881, the fourth mill was also destroyed by fire. The third and fourth mill were both designed by William Tyrrell.
The current Old Mill venue is not a functioning mill, but rather a Tudor Revival hotel, events space, spa, and restaurant which began its life as a tea garden developed at the same location by Robert Home Smith in August 1914 from designs by Alfred Hirschfelder Chapman. Home Smith gave his tea garden a telling motto: "A little bit of England far from England." As the Old Mill grew more popular, he built many additions. In 1919, a new print room offered a space for dinner and dancing. Later additions included the Dance Hall and Garret Room. Home Smith was particular about giving these additional structures Tudor design aesthetics to invoke his desired affiliation with Britain and the Old World. Home Smith left the Old Mill to his close friend Godfrey Petit in his will.
The Old Mill was again expanded in 1956 with the construction of new banquet rooms overlooking the Humber Valley. These rooms were expanded in the 1980s. Major recent renovations have culminated in a large complex of Tudor Revival buildings stemming from Home Smith's original 1914 tea garden. In 2001, the Old Mill Toronto Hotel opened following extensive restoration and reconstruction of the original grist mill on the site of its ruins.
Photographs of the ruins of Gamble's 1849 mill suggest a Georgian architectural style. Hints of this have been represented in the stonework juxtaposing the current Old Mill buildings' faux half-timbered façade.
(Research and text by Alessandro Tersigni.)
