The days are numbered for the old building on the southeast corner of Parkdale and Gladstone. Best known as being the recent headquarters for the Ottawa Girl Guides, 453 Parkdale has sat vacant, dilapidated and ignored for the past decade. Portions of the façade are now crumbling, windows are broken and missing. It’s the type of old building that you would suspect might have a few ghosts occupying it, and in this case, you would be more accurate than you might expect.
This property has played a key role in the history of funerals and undertaking in Ottawa. For over 60 years, tens of thousands of west end residents experienced their final moments above ground in the rooms of this old building, operated by three generations of the Veitch family.
In fact, there was a period of time where this relatively small part of the neighbourhood (from Parkdale to Gilchrist Avenue) was actually home to a trio of funeral homes. The appropriately-named Parlour restaurant at 1319 Wellington West was the long-time home of Radmore-Stewart (1930-1976), while Lauzon Music at 1345 Wellington West was the first parlour of Lorne Kelly (1954-1965).
The north part of 453 Parkdale started life as a residential house. Joseph Riopelle was a Hintonburg carpenter who acquired a lot from John Foster in 1898 for $175 and spent that year constructing a two-and-a-half storey wood-frame house fronting Queen Street — soon to be renamed Parkdale Avenue — in fairly close proximity to the relatively-new tracks of the Ottawa, Arnprior and Parry Sound Railway — which ran where the Queensway does today.
Riopelle sold the house in April 1902 to Rev. Abel H. Coleman, who had come to Ottawa to take over St. Matthias Church. Coleman had spent 33 years in the ministry, having been stationed at Iroquois, Arnprior, Richmond, Augusta, Vankleek Hill and other parishes throughout the Ottawa Valley before arriving in Hintonburg. Coleman also purchased the lot next door, giving himself a 120’ wide lot fronting Parkdale.
Coleman later sold to James Reynolds in 1911, who in turn sold the property on January 2nd, 1925 to Albert E. Veitch, for $6,400.
Veitch was Winchester-born, and ran a funeral home in Kars from 1902 to 1925. He was a multi-tasker, also operating a furniture store and a Maxwell automobile dealership and service station while there
For reasons long lost to history, Veitch decided not only to relocate to the west end of Ottawa, but decided to purchase the nondescript house on Parkdale Avenue and convert it into the west end’s first funeral home. He brought his 23-year old son Eldon, who had completed secondary school at Ottawa Collegiate Institute in 1924, into the business with him.
A.E. Veitch & Son ran their opening advertisement on Jan. 24, 1925, promoting “twenty-two years’ experience in Undertaking and Embalming.”
The city bylaw was required to be amended to allow undertaking parlours on Parkdale Avenue. A petition was put together and signed by most of the residents of Parkdale Avenue, which convinced city council to approve the bylaw change in late February.Though there surely were other funerals held at Veitch before the end of May, the first reported wake held at Veitch’s was Walter Carley, a 73-year old Westboro resident on May 29.
Veitch held wakes, prepared bodies, and offered ambulance services. The earliest report of providing ambulance services was in August, when a Jockvale farmer – John Cassells – was driving a farm wagon along Wellington near the junction of Somerset. His horses became spooked and ran into the verandah of the office at 959 Wellington. Cassells was thrown from the rig and suffered a broken leg, arm and skull. Veitch was called in to transport him to the Civic Hospital. A few days later, Veitch was called to pick up a 79-year old Ottawa woman who had fallen on stairs at her hotel in Malone, New York and broken a leg.
Within the first year or two, Veitch gradually expanded the house with a small addition on the side, and a large two-storey addition of approximately 2,000 square feet at the rear, which was the original chapel and where the “slumber rooms” were located. Parking was presumably on the south side of the building, accessed off Parkdale. The Veitch family resided inside the funeral home.
The opening of A.E. Veitch & Son was tied to a growing trend in handling of the dead.
During the 19thcentury and early 20th century, it was typical for family and friends to prepare the body during the period of mourning. The preparation of the body (washing and dressing) and the wake would take place in the home of the deceased.
A simple box for the body would be constructed, and a procession would bring the deceased to the cemetery by horse and wagon, where the funeral would be held, or sometimes, to a church in between. A gathering was held afterwards back at the home, where even the poorest would purchase abundant food and drink for all to come and celebrate the deceased.
Embalming was a process just coming into widespread use, which would allow for the preservation of the body, and thus could allow for a funeral to be delayed to accommodate relatives travelling in, or a more ceremonial funeral process. Embalming was also viewed as more sanitary, especially during periods of epidemics and poor sanitation. Early on, embalming would happen in the home, but over time, as the requirements for body handling and funerals grew, the need for funeral homes increased.
Coffins, hearses, flowers, and all the other components of a “proper burial” led to a new industry of funeral homes, with chapels where hundreds of visitors could be accommodated, which the growing number of apartments and small houses could not.
The Veitch business was a growing success. When they opened in 1925, they were just the tenth funeral home in Ottawa, and first west of Lyon Street. The Veitches opened just earlier than two other big names in the funeral business: the Hulse Brothers opened in April 1925 at 315 McLeod, while a month later the McEvoy Brothers opened at 471 MacLaren.
In 1944, the Veitches acquired additional land adjoining the property, including the large lot off Foster, which would become the parking area.
After Albert Veitch passed away at age 73 in 1947, Eldon took over full operations. In January of 1950, a $35,000 building permit was taken out for a major expansion. Abra, Balharrie & Shore were hired as architects, and F.E. Cummings as the contractor. The new wing off the south side of the building contained the new Albert Veitch memorial chapel, where “limed oak pews and paneling keynote the decoration behind the glass brick front.” A private room off to the side allowed for the privacy of the family during services, and air conditioning was added throughout the building. An acoustic tile ceiling was added, as well as “noiseless light switches.” The second floor featured a series of sliding doors to enable different shapes and sizes of parlour rooms.
“Of the other newly-decorated slumber rooms in the old section of the building, one was done in imitation teakwood wallpaper. It is called ‘The Teakwood Room.’ Others were finished in “bright flowery prints,” noted the Citizen. Veitch boasted that six funerals could be accommodated at the same time in the new facilities. A new garage for the hearses was added at the rear.
The firm held a three-day open house to invite the public to view the new facilities in November 1950. Eldon Veitch took on a partner in the form of its office manager Kenneth V. Draper, who bought into the company in February of 1953. The firm became known as Veitch-Draper Ltd. Eventually, Clive Veitch, the third generation of the family, took over the business as well.
It is worth mentioning that Eldon Veitch, like his father, was involved in the community in endless ways. He was instrumental in bringing Little League Baseball to Ottawa, served as President of the Gyro Club, various BIAs, the Board of Trade, Rotary Club, and the Humane Society, among many other roles.
The end of the Veitch business is a bit of a sad one. Draper passed away in 1977, and in 1979, Clive Veitch and the business were targeted in various ways. The two hearses were stolen and burned, Clive’s home was broken into and vandalized, and his private car damaged in a hit and run. An expansion to a second location at 3440 Richmond Road in 1981 (now operated by Tubman’s), Nepean’s first funeral home, may have been too much to manage.
The firm began offering discounted rates to compete. Finally and sadly, Clive passed away from a massive stroke in May of 1984 at age 35, and his elderly father Eldon, now in his mid-80s, was unable to keep the business going.
Eldon sold the business and property on Parkdale in July 1985 for the low sum of $163,499, before he passed away in February 1986. Christopher Duncan became the new owner of 453 Parkdale, while Tubman’s acquired 3440 Richmond after Eldon’s passing.
The discounted rates Veitch-Draper had been offering before going out of business created shortfalls in some trust funds set up for pre-arranged funerals. The new owners and other funeral homes in Ottawa had to make up the difference as they carried out the funerals. As a result, a compensation fund was set up across Ontario to cover pre-arranged funerals for failed companies.
Duncan Funeral Home did their own renovation in late 1986, and continued to operate on Parkdale until July 1989, the location perhaps too small to compete with the large, modern homes opening across the city. Duncan had also opened a location in Metcalfe, where they turned their efforts, remaining in business until 2006.
An investor purchased the building in January 1990 for $437,500, financed with five mortgages. It sat vacant, and then was lost to foreclosure and sold to the Girl Guides of Canada Ottawa Area in March of 1993. The Girl Guides opened their Guide House, with a store, council room, office, resource room and archives.
For the next 20 years, this was the Ottawa headquarters for Ottawa Girl Guides, but closed at the end of November 2012 as part of a province-wide cost-cutting consolidation of seven regional offices across the province into one office. Around the same time, the Ontario council had closed 16 of its camps.
The building was briefly tenanted as office space, but has largely sat empty for the last 10-plus years, and the property awaits its fate. The fences are up indicating demolition is near, and soon the last vestiges of the important Veitch family presence in our neighbourhood will sadly disappear along with it