William Philp and The Guelph Musical Society Band, 1910

In 1910, as it had been for many years, the season began with concerts on the occasion of the old Queen's birthday, May 24th, known better as Victoria Day. As usual, the Guelph Musical Society (GMS) Band put on a good show (Mercury, 25 May 1910):

The G.M.S. Band as usual made its first outdoor appearance for the summer season on Victoria Day with its new conductor, Prof. Philp in the lead. An hour’s performance was given on the Trafalgar Square stand from 10 to 11 and a forty-five minute programme in front of the City Hall steps. There was a large turn-out of players and, seldom, if ever, has the band appeared to better advantage at a start of the season.

The report noted the particular distinction of the brass section, one of the best in the nation, in the view of the reporter. The reed section was not so strong but this issue could be rectified if some better musicians could be hired for this purpose. Not that being in the band paid all the bills. Band members were paid for their performances but this income was not enough to live on. When the band found someone they wanted to induct, a job in a local factory under music-friendly management could usually be secured for him.

Perhaps just prior to its performance on the old City Hall steps, the band posed for a group photo, as was apparently its custom. Some copies were printed up as postcards ("real-photo" postcards), one of which is shown below.

This card was sent by "Earnie" to Miss Sarah Cartledge at 37 Glouster St. in Toronto on 10 October 1910. It shows the band arrayed across the steps of the old City Hall, uniforms on and instruments at the ready. It was taken no earlier than May 1910 as it shows bandleader William Philp on the right-hand edge, who joined the GMS in that month. Also, the windows on either side of the doorway have Union Jacks hung in their upper reaches, with the middles cinched up, a decoration normally reserved for civic holidays, especially Victoria Day, Dominion Day, and Labor Day. My guess is that the photo was taken at the first opportunity, namely Victoria Day.

In "Bands of music in Guelph," Ross Irwin explains that Guelph has had musical bands since about 1845. In 1847, on the occasion of obtaining its first fire engine, the Guelph Fire Company laid on a concert featuring George Sunley's Brass Band. Its efforts were much appreciated, reported the Guelph Herald (30 Sep. 1847):

Many of the toasts were accompanied with appropriate Airs, by the very efficient band of Mr. George Sunley, which were in attendance and discoursed most excellent music, greatly to the delight and amusement of the evening.

Through the ensuing years, music for special occasions or just general entertainment was provided by private groups, military bands, or some combination. In 1878, the City Band was formed when the City Council started contributing money to the effort. After the Guelph Musical Society was formed in 1898, the City Band was renamed the Guelph Musical Society Band, a name that lasted until 1968.

We have a pretty decent record of the GMS Band activities in that era due to the diary kept by Arthur Parker, the bass drum player who joined in 1904 and quoted extensively in Irwin (1993). Mr. Parker is likely the young man squatting to the right of the bass drum in the front row of the photo above.

The year 1910 did not begin on a high note, according to Mr. Parker. The bandmaster, Frederick Stares, was "lost" in January of that year due to "bad conduct." Unfortunately, Mr. Parker does not elaborate and newspaper records of that time are also lost, so it is not clear what conduct he is referring to. In any event, bad conduct is no good in a conductor, so Mr. Stares returned to Hamilton and the Band managed to entice William Philp to take on the role.

Hiring William Philp had to be considered a coup for the Band. Born in 1842 in Cobourg, Philp started his musical career early (Daily Mercury, 14 July 1923). He began violin lessons at the age of eight and was teaching that instrument by the age of seventeen. He also learned to play the piano and organ.

He was still a teenager when appointed as the bandmaster of the 57th Rangers of Peterborough. In this capacity, his band and the band of the 60th Rifles performed for the Prince of Wales, later Edward VII, at Cobourg in 1862. He later moved to Port Hope, where he continued to be a bandmaster, while also giving piano and violin lessons. In addition, he joined the Rochester Conservatory of Music. In those days, two steamboat companies laid on trips between Port Hope and Rochester, three times a week. Passengers on each trip were entertained by live bands, so there was certainly a demand for good musicians.

Above is a photo of William Philp, date and provenance unknown, reproduced by kind permission of John Philp. (Cf. Guelph Civic Museums 1986.33.16) This picture may show William Philp in the uniform of the 13th Hussar Regiment, which he joined in 1872 upon their arrival in Ontario in response to the Fenian Raids (Mercury, 14 July 1923):

At the time of their arrival the Professor was taking a course at the Toronto Military School, and as he had always been fond of horses, he couldn't resist the temptation to enlist, so joined up with the English regiment, and was with them until they disbanded in 1875, when he was given his discharge.

In 1877, Philp visited Guelph to judge a band competition sponsored by William Bell, the organ and piano manufacturer. Showing sound judgement, Philp took a liking to the Royal City and solicited the position of choirmaster at the Dublin Street Church. In addition, he became bandmaster of the Wellington Field Battery band.

Philp was enticed away to Winnipeg in 1882, then moving on to Sarnia, Chatham, London, Charlottesville, Virginia, and Waterloo. Upon Fred Stares' departure, Philp (now styled "Professor Philp") was recruited back to Guelph through the good offices of Billy Jones and George Sleeman. The hiring of such an accomplished and reputable bandmaster was a "red letter day" for the Royal City.

("Bandmaster Philp," looking forward to his return to Guelph; Daily Mercury, 2 May 1910. Cf. Guelph Civic Museums 1992.8.1)

The year 1910 was a good one for the GMS Band. It played many engagements and acquitted itself well. Arthur Parker notes that he made $50 playing for the Band that year, about $5 more than previous years, which suggests that Prof. Philp got off to a good start.

Prof. Philp led the GMS Band until 1923, when he took a leave of absence for his health. His second wife, Mary, died later that year. He passed away on 30 June 1925, having devoted so many of his 83 years to music, about 15 of those in Guelph. He is buried in Woodlawn Cemetery.

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In 1910, the members of the GMS Band were:

Conductor Prof Wm Philp
Solo cornet Herbert Philp
Solo cornet George Walton
1st cornet John Johnson
2nd cornet Hugh Taylor
3rd cornet Wm McKen
Solo clarinet Ben Greybill
Solo clarinet Fred Sherlock
1st clarinet Gerald Garland
1st clarinet Bert Horrison
2nd clarinet Wm Hunter
2nd clarinet Norman Philp
Piccolo Alex Rundle
Bass clarinet Enoch Wisswell
Tenor saxophone Durward McGimsie
Solo horn Charles Metcalf
Solo horn Wm Wiley
Solo horn John Eby
3rd horn Edward Foster
4th horn Alfred Palmer
Solo trombone Alex Wilson
2nd trombone Fred Lynch
3rd trombone John Wildgast
Euphonium Chas Withington
Baritone HarryPalmer
Tenor horn J.B. Collins
BBb bass John Ziegler
BBb bass Sidney Cronk
Eb bass Charles Edwards
Eh bass Enoch Hazelwood
Snare drum Harold Gerrard
Bass drum Arthur Parker

The Guelph Civic Museums archives hold other group photos of the GMS Band from around the same time as the postcard above.

(From about 1907, in front of the Bank of Montreal building on St. George's Square; 2014.84.95)

(From about 1910, location uncertain; 1986.33.20.1)

Herbert William Philp, one of Prof. Philp's sons, fought in the Great War and died of the consequences in 1920.

Bell Organ and Piano Co. clock

In previous posts, I have been revisiting some of the civic clocks that once looked out over the Royal City. Some were public clocks, such as those on the City Hall and on the old Post Office. Others were private property but nevertheless served as public timepieces, such as the Scotiabank clock. Another privately held clock prominently displayed in a public place was the Bell Organ and Piano Co. clock (the "Bell clock").

The company ("Bell Organ Company" to begin with) was founded by William and Robert Bell in 1864 and was taken over the next year by William. The business proved to be a great success and was moved from Wyndham St. to a larger facility in Market Square on Carden St. in 1871. By 1880, the company was billing itself as, "The largest and oldest organ factory in the British Empire"(Couling 1996, p. 13). The company decided to expand its factory into additional space on Market Square at the east end of Carden St. Besides more factory floor room, the company topped off their new structure with a clock tower. The new building and clock tower can be well seen in the postcard below.

The card was published by A. B. Petrie & Son sometime around 1905. It shows the south face of the building, looking out over the rail yards.

Today, the lot is largely empty, as you can see from this Google Street View perspective (taken from a lower angle), making the old factory a kind of ghost building:


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The clock was manufactured by the Seth Thomas Clock Co. of Thomaston Connecticut. It is described in glowing terms in the Mercury (29 Mar. 1882):

The clock stands 5 feet 8 inches high, and will have four illuminated dials of ground plate glass each measuring 4 feet 6 inches in diameter, the cost of which are $80 each. The pendulum weighs 130 pounds, and the hands are gilt, 2 feet 3 inches long. This is the first illuminated clock to our knowledge in the country.

The Seth Thomas catalog of 1911 lists a similar clock (No. 16) as an eight-day mechanism, suggesting that the Bell clock was wound once a week as well.

Here is a picture of No. 16 from the catalog. Somehow, it is not as I imagined.

It is clear that the townsfolk were impressed with the new timepiece. Indeed, installation of the clock on 20 April 1882 is noted in the Centennial edition of the Mercury (1927) as a noteworthy event in Guelph history. Perhaps Bell put the clock there precisely to impress or to boast. Today, high rise structures are sometimes built partly to stroke the ego of the builder. (Pick any Trump Tower for an illustration.) Also, the clock would have to be especially good since it was on the same street as the City Hall clock tower. A photo of both buildings in the Public Library archives shows how well the two clocks were lined up. Perhaps to minimize the competition, the Bell clock is placed as far away from City Hall as possible.

However, a more specific purpose may also be present. Besides its distance from City Hall, the Bell clock also dominated the Grand Trunk Railway station which was at the east end of Carden St. in that era. The entry on William Bell in the Cyclopedia of Canadian Biography (1888, p. 140) makes the point quite plain:

Four large dials on the tower, which surmounts the central corner, announce the time of day to the neighborhood and to passengers on the Grand Trunk Railway, the station of which company is quite contiguous to the factory.

Anyone arriving in or departing from the Royal City by the G.T.R. would likely have taken note of the Bell clock.

In addition, this photo from the Civic Museum archive shows that the clock tower stood at the end of Neeve St. where it crossed the railway tracks at the time. It was a common practice among architects to situate prominent features at the end of cross streets in order to add to their effect. Consider the siting of the steeple of St. George's Anglican Church at the end of Douglas St. as seen from St. George's Square, for example. Anyone entering downtown from Neeve St. would have faced the tower surmounted by its boldly illuminated dials.

The clock endured a number of trials over its life. On 22 Dec. 1883, a fire occurred in the Bell factory that stopped the clock at exactly midnight (Mercury). Happily, it did not seem to have been badly damaged. In November 1909, the clock stopped due to cold weather brought on by a storm (Mercury, 23 Nov. 1909). It was not unusual for outdoor clocks to have difficulty in the cold. In 1911, the G.T.R. station was moved next to the City Hall and the Neeve St. crossing was cut off. Thus, the clock was deprived of part of its raison d'être.

It is hard to tell when the Bell clock was finally removed. The company reached its zenith of production by about 1888, at which point it was sold to a British syndicate and renamed the "Bell Piano and Organ Co., Ltd." (Johnson 1977, pp. 295-296). Production suffered due to economic recession and World War I and did not recover during the 1920s. The Company was sold to a syndicate of Brantford businessmen led by John Dowling in 1928 (Mercury, 11 Apr. 1928). The premises were extensively remodeled by Oct. 1929 (Globe & Mail, 4 Oct. 1929) but it is not clear whether or not this included the clock tower. The firm seems to have gone bankrupt by 1931 and its assets were sold to Lesage Piano of Sainte-Terese, Quebec in 1934. It may be that the clock was removed at this time, although records of the period are spotty. At any rate, it seems to have disappeared to parts unknown by the end of World War Two.

Like all civic clocks, the Bell clock was more than just a timepiece. It was an assertion of importance by the Bell Organ and Piano Company. It was an aesthetic statement by the designers of the building. Perhaps it was also a symbol of progress, its glowing dials signaling to Guelphites from on high that their time had come.