Rosedale, Toronto

Rosedale is a neighbourhood in central Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It was formerly the estate of William Botsford Jarvis, and so named by his wife, granddaughter of William Dummer Powell, for the wild roses that grew there in abundance. It is located north of Downtown Toronto and is one of its oldest suburbs. It is also one of the wealthiest and most highly priced neighbourhoods in Canada. Rosedale has been ranked the best neighbourhood in Toronto to live in by ''Toronto Life''. It is known as the area where the city's ' old money' lives, and is home to some of Canada's richest and most famous citizens including Gerry Schwartz, founder of Onex Corporation, Adrienne Clarkson, the 26th Governor General of Canada, and her husband, the author John Ralston Saul, as well as David Thomson, 3rd Baron Thomson of Fleet of the Thomson Corporation, the latter of whom is the richest man in Canada.

Rosedale's boundaries consist of the Canadian Pacific Railway tracks to the north, Yonge Street to the west, Aylmer Avenue and Rosedale Valley Road to the south, and Bayview Avenue to the east. The neighbourhood is within the City of Toronto's Rosedale-Moore Park neighbourhood. The neighbourhood is divided into a north and south portion by the Park Drive Ravine.

History

South Rosedale was first settled by Sheriff William Jarvis and his wife, Mary, in 1826 after Jarvis inherited his father's home there two years earlier. Mary Jarvis, the granddaughter of chief justice and loyalist William Drummer Powell frequently walked and rode on horseback around the trails for that formed Rosedale's meandering streets (which are one of the area's trademarks). She named the estate "Rosedale" as a tribute to the abundance of wild roses that graced the hillsides of their estate. The Jarvis estate was subdivided in 1854 and became Toronto's first "garden suburb". The Jarvis Family sold the Rosedale homestead in 1864, which led to the residential development of the area soon after, including the extension of Cluny Drive.

A noteworthy piece of Rosedale's History, is that it was home to Ontario's fourth Government House. The house was called Chorley Park, and it was built for the Lieutenant Governor in 1915. It was demolished in 1960 by the city of Toronto to save money. It is now a public park of the same name.

Notable residents

One of Canada's foremost fiction writers both pre- and post-World War II, Morley Callaghan lived in the southern part of Rosedale at 20 Dale Avenue from 1951 until his death in 1990; a historic plaque at the nearby Glen Road footbridge summarizes Callaghan's noteworthy writing career and his best-known literary contemporaries, including Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald. Hockey Hall of Fame inductees W. A. Hewitt and Foster Hewitt, lived on Roxborough Street at Yonge Street.

Character

Rosedale is built among three ravine

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