Now an imposing, vacant building (currently undergoing renovations) Thelmo Mansions at 519 Burnell has quite a colouful history and strong ties to the West End’s Icelandic past.
Thelmo Mansions was designed and developed by Thorsteinn Oddson. He was an Icelandic immigrant who was responsible for most of the the residential developments on and around Burnell Street from Portage to Ellice.
Oddson's St. Paul 'triplets'
Oddson's specialty was smaller blocks or terraced housing with small living spaces. His portfolio already included Claremont Court, a development of small attached cottages near Ellice (now demolished), and the 'triplets' Komoka, Kelona and Kolbrun on St. Paul Ave, all filled with 600 sq ft. units.
(More on Oddson and his developments in a future post !)It was so important for him to get the most out of small spaces that he traveled to Seattle prior to construction of Thelmo to meet a man who had invented a new style of 'invisible bed', (a variation on the
Murphy bed), for inclusion in his new block.
September 11, 1914, Winnipeg Free Press
ca. 1931 adConstruction began in April 1914 and was open by September. With 78 suites and a price tag of $235,000, Thelmo was Oddson's largest project to date. It also had a greater variation of suite sizes than his previous projects, ranging from two to five rooms.
Before construction was completed Crescent Creamery began building their ice cream plant just a few meters south on Burnell, (the only building remaining from that complex is Hignell printing).
Some of the first tenants were families that had to downsize when a member went off to war. At least four residents served, two died.
Private John Scott of the 8th Battalion, Canadian Infantry was killed on May 19, 1915. He was 22 years old and left behind his parents of unit 19 Thelmo Mansions.
John William Nixon (above) lived at unit 32 with his wife Kathleen when he enlisted in February 1916. He was killed on the front lines in France the following May.
Gairdner Funeral Home ca. 1918 (source) Immediately following the war, Thelmo Mansions became infamous for a disease that killed more people worldwide than the war did - Spanish Influenza.
The
flu arrived in Manitoba in October 1918. A Free Press article of November 21, 1918 notes that Thelmo Mansions was one of the worst effected places in the city with almost every one of the 78 units under quarantine. Officials blamed overcrowding in small suites.
The following day, Thelmo's caretaker refuted these claims saying that only a handful of suites were under quarantine. An investigation found that the health nurses had, indeed, over-exaggerated the situation. There were just seven suites under quarantine and one death, an infant who was already ill with measles. (More on the Thelmo influenza situation can be found in
Jones.)
The flu situation didn't scare off Bill Pulham. He and wife Margaret moved in during this time and stayed until 1940. You can see a
history of the Pulhams here.
May 9, 1936, Winnipeg Free PressOne resident that certainly needs mention is Eva Leadbetter who lived in unit 27. At the beginning of the Depression the Salvation Army Adjutant created the Helping Hand League. They collected donations of fabrics and wool to make into quilts for poor families, especially single women with children.
The League's work expanded to include used clothing and continued on though the end of World War II. For a few years her apartment was the League's headquarters, home to up to a dozen sewing machines and a volunteer army !
November 13, 1942, Winnipeg Tribune
In May 1942 the Winnipeg Tribune
tells the story of Leadbetter walking into the Simonite Real Estate Agency with $200 that she saved from her Salvation Army stipend and her own savings. She was seeking a home for an evicted family with eight children and wanted the agency to help find them a home. She offered to pay them an additional $10 a month until the balance was paid off.
(I will have more on Eva in a future post !)
Where Barnett was nabbed then and now !In February 1940 Thelmo Mansions had a chilling visit.
John Barnett was one of three men involved in a botched downtown robbery that ended in the death of police
Constable John McDonald. The group, whose ringleader was the infamous
Mike "The Horse" Attamanchuk, fled.
Police caught up with Barnett at Furby and Ellice and shot him in the ankle. He still led them on a 15 minute foot chase through the West End and into Thelmo Mansions. Police searched the building only to find his cap, jacket and some blood in the laundry room. He had escaped through a back door but was nabbed in the back lane.
Images from Winnipeg Tribune (left, right) Another war meant another casualty. Private
William G. Monk (above, left) of suite 35 was killed in 1943 and is
buried in Germany.
Captain Thomson (above, right) served but survived, as did Training Officer
Arthur Perceval, Sgt. Wallace A Swanson of suite 24, Eric Sinclair of suite 40 and Sgt. Stanley J. Child of suite 72.
January 5, 1944, Winnipeg Free Press
September 29, 1945, Winnipeg Free Press
Then there is the odd case of Private Arthur Roland Quinn, whose parents lived at 43 Thelmo Mansions. He was injured in action in December 1944 and in January 1945 appeared on a list of war dead. It was some sort of error, (which, I imagine, wasn't uncommon), because the very same Private Quinn married a British singer the following September !
ca 1963 adFrom the 1950s to the 1970s Thelmo Mansions led a fairly uneventful existence. That came to an end in 1987 when Hazel Toye (60) was found dead in her suite. The following year a fellow tenant was charged with her murder.
In 2004 another tenant,
Stephanie Ann Buboire (30), was stabbed to death in what the Free Press referred to as a "rundown apartment building."
Later that year Thelmo stopped advertising suites for rent. In 2005 the building was cited for fire code violations. It closed soon after.
Winnipeg Free Press, April 12, 2007, page B3 (Phil Hossack)
In 2007 the building was back in the news over a garbage pile that formed adjacent to the building. The city
ordered the mess cleaned up, though the owners argued that the pile just appeared and had nothing to do with their building.
The owners defaulted on the mortgage and the building sat unheated and was vandalized a number of times. In 2010 it suffered a
$20,000 fire.
In 2010 Thelmo Mansions had new owners. They are renovating the building and plan to reopen it as rental suites in the near future.
If I can give a plug for a local program ... Kali Shiva AIDS has been operating Sunshine House since 1987. It's a drop in centre located on Logan Avenue that caters at-risk populations living with HIV, (the transient, IV drug users, homeless, low-income and street-involved populations.)
