Accommodation, refreshment, stagecoach stop

Details of Site Location: The corner of Steeles Avenue and the Yorkville and Vaughan Plank Road, on the east side of Dufferin Street.

Boundary History: The hotel occupied a small corner building lot.

Current Use of Property: Shopping plaza. The surrounding area is mainly parkland.

Historical Description: The West Don River crosses Steeles Avenue to the east of Dufferin Street, takes a large westward bend, then corrects its course to flow south into G. Ross Lord Park. The roads in the area have an interesting history, which affects the location of the hotel. The Yorkville and Vaughan Plank Road was laid out in 1853. It had followed the line for Dufferin for some distance, but as it rose toward Steeles, it met a sharp curve laid out by earlier surveys. From Farm Lot 22 north to 25, the road ran at an angle, but upon entering Farm Lot 25 at Steeles, the 1853 road veered eastwards so that it could run through the community of Fisherville, which had developed in the area of the intersection. On the West Don, south of Steeles, the Fisher family had established three mills, and the West Don had two good-sized ponds in the 1820s and ’30s. On the east side of Dufferin, a block of 47 acres was sold out of Farm Lot 25, and out of this block Jacob Fisher purchased the west 24 acres, which included a section of the river running through the land. He laid out a subdivision of 1-acre lots along Steeles and Dufferin. The realigned 1853 road ran through these acres. Fisher’s purchase was in 1836, and the realigned road ran through his subdivision Lots 4 and 5 as well as through the four along Dufferin. In 1843, Christian Troyer purchased Lot 5 from Andrew Miller; in 1845 he bought Lots 3 and 4 from Daniel Stong. It was in 1855 that Jacob Kurtz purchased or leased the three lots and built a hotel on the southeast corner of Steeles and the Yorkville and Vaughan Plank Road cum Dufferin. In 1858, Kurtz sold the hotel and land to James Mabley, who had married Kurtz’s sister-in-law. As Kurtz died the same year, it appears that Mabley did not have clear title. When Mabley died, his widow married Abner Cherry, and as Mary Cherry she received title from the Mabley heirs from 1876 to 1878. Abner and Mary Cherry ran the hotel for over 50 years. Abner purchased all of the lots in the Fisher subdivision as they became available. Thomas Potton bought the hotel and built a dance pavilion there in 1920. Potton renamed the hotel The Hanging Gate Inn. In 1945, the Connaught Laboratories purchased the hotel and grounds and demolished the buildings.

Relative Importance: The hotel was a very important stop on an important route that connected Vaughan Township with downtown Toronto and the market there.

Planning Implications: A commemorative plaque informing all about the roads, Fisher, the subdivision, and the hotel should be mounted close to the point where Steeles crosses the West Don.

Reference Sources: J.H. Beers, Commemorative Biographical Record of the County of York (1907); C. Blackett Robinson, History of Toronto and the County of York (1885); Miles’ Atlas (1878).

Acknowledgement: Maps Project.