ISC / SCI Conference - 2009
Congrès de la SCI / ISC - 2009

Conference Venue and Accommodations

Location and Directions • Accommodations • Conference Sessions • St. Michael's College – History
St. Michael's College – Campus:   Main Buildings / Centres • Other Buildings • Public Art

Location and Directions

Our conference will be held at historic St. Michael's College in the University of Toronto. The college campus is located just northeast of the Ontario Legislature (Queen's Park), in the area bounded by Queen's Park Crescent on the west, Bay Street on the east, St. Joseph Street on the south, and St. Mary Street on the north. The college is immediately adjacent to another historic campus, Victoria College, which sits just north of St. Mike's. Pictured at left: The quadrangle on St. Michael's College campus. Anne Allardyce's sculptural representation of the archangel Michael is shown in the foreground.

Please note: For more information on places of interest near St. Michael's College, please see our University of Toronto and Area Attractions pages.

Map
A map of St. Michael's College campus provides an excellent overview of the campus, residence, library, and other buildings.

Directions
St. Mike's is well placed for transit users. The closest subway stop is Museum (Spadina-University line; be sure to exit on the east side and walk south), and the college can also be accessed in the following ways:

• via the Avenue Road bus (Route 5)
• via the Bay Street bus (Route 6, going north, or going south from the Bay subway station on the Bloor line)
• via the Wellesley Street bus (Route 94, going west from the Wellesley Street station on the Yonge line, or going east from the U of T campus)
• via the Queen's Park subway station (the next station south from Museum). Exit at the northeast side (you'll be facing the Ontario Legislature), then walk north past the Ontario government buildings, including the curved Frost Building and historic Whitney Block. Cross Wellesley Street, continue north to St. Joseph Street, then cross over to the north side. Carr Hall, the building in which we will be spending Day 1, is right at that corner.

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Accommodations

The Indexing Society of Canada has arranged with St. Michael's College for single rooms in Sorbara Hall Student Residence (70 St. Joseph St.). Built in 2001 on the campus, the residence has modern amenities and yet the architectural charm reminiscent of the turn of the last century, blending with nearby historical buildings. Single rooms include a desk, a wash basin, air conditioning, and high-speed Internet access, with shared bathrooms and showers.

Our special prices (including taxes) are:

Single room – $36.15 per night
Breakfast in the Canada Room cafeteria (Brennan Hall) – $7.18 each, payable in advance on check-in
Internet access – $12.21 per week (minimum), to be ordered in advance
Parking – $12.00 per 24 hours

A block of rooms is being held until April 20. To ensure your reservation, please contact:

Sabrina Coccagna
Conference and Catering Sales Manager
University of St. Michael's College
Tel.: (416) 926-2343
Fax: (416) 926-2300
E-mail: conferences.stmikes@utoronto.ca

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Conference Sessions

Conference sessions will be held at two campus venues: Father Robert Madden Hall, the renovated auditorium in Carr Hall (100 St. Joseph Street), and Charbonnel Lounge of Elmsley Hall (81 St. Mary Street), a hospitable meeting / dining space that features a walkout to a courtyard for outdoor enjoyment. For more information on conference sessions, please see our Conference Program page.

Did you know ...? Charbonnel Lounge is named after Armand-François-Marie de Charbonnel, Roman Catholic bishop of Toronto from 1850 to 1860. In addition to helping found St. Michael's College, he worked to establish a separate school system for Catholics in Ontario, and brought three religious orders – including the Basilian Fathers – to Toronto to undertake much-needed educational and social work. He also established a number of charitable institutions, including the St. Vincent de Paul Society of Toronto, whose members – often accompanied by the bishop – visited the poor and sick in their homes.

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St. Michael's College – History

St. Michael's College is one of the oldest and most distinguished colleges within the University of Toronto. A Roman Catholic institution of higher learning, it is one of the three great religious colleges at U of T – the others being Trinity (Anglican) and Victoria (United Church, originally Methodist). The college was founded in 1852 by the Basilian Fathers (the Congregation of St. Basil, or CSB), who still run St. Michael's College School, a Catholic school for boys from Grades 7 to 12, in Toronto.

Architectural historian Patricia McHugh writes that when the Basilian Fathers came to Toronto to establish their college, they first considered a site close to the venerable St. Paul's Church (now St. Paul's Basilica), just east of Queen and Parliament Streets. This location was rejected, however, "because of its proximity to the unhealthy Don River." The fathers were then approached by John Elmsley – a naval officer, member of government, and entrepreneur who had converted to Catholicism – and offered the property known as Clover Hill on the condition that they also build a parish church (St. Basil's).

St. Michael's was formally admitted as a federated college of U of T in 1910 largely due to the work of Father Henry Carr. In his mammoth history of the University of Toronto, Martin Friedland writes that Father Carr apparently worked with Premier James Whitney to amend the 1906 University Act, clearing the way for the Roman Catholic institution to become incorporated into the university. Father Carr, who became Basilian Superior of St. Michael's in 1915, was also later instrumental in the foundation of the Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, and – like Father John Teefy before him – had high ambitions for the college. Friedland quotes from a letter Father Carr wrote to U of T president Robert Falconer in 1916, in which he states that in "a comparatively short time" the college could be made "the greatest Catholic education centre in the world."

Today, St. Michael's remains a university in its own right. Its Faculty of Theology is one of the largest in North America, and is one of seven U of T-affiliated members of the Toronto School of Theology. The college maintains a strong continuing education division, and is home to two important academic centres: the Pontifical Institute, referred to above, and the Canadian Catholic Bioethics Institute. (See the section below on main campus buildings, academic centres, and resources for more information.) A timeline of college history can be found on its Web site.

St. Michael's is famous as the home college of media guru Marshall McLuhan, who taught here from 1946 to 1979. Its most famous alumnus is undoubtedly former Prime Minister Paul Martin, who graduated from St. Mike's in 1961; he lived in residence at McCorkell House, one of the historic homes on Elmsley Place. The former PM, however, was merely following in the footsteps of his father. Paul Martin, Sr., the distinguished parliamentarian and diplomat and a member of Cabinet under four prime ministers, earned an undergraduate degree at St. Mike's before going on to studies at Harvard and Cambridge. Other alumni include author Morley Callaghan, journalist and former senator Laurier LaPierre, and former U of T president Robert Birgeneau.

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St. Michael's College – Campus

St. Michael's College is home to a number of important academic centres and heritage buildings. In addition, several works of public art are to be found throughout the campus. Because of its location east of Queen's Park, St. Mike's may not enjoy as high a profile as King's College Circle, but it occupies an important position in the academic, religious, and cultural life of the university. With an area of 12 acres, it is the largest of the college campuses. And architecturally, as Patricia McHugh notes, the college "can claim the oldest buildings on the U of T campus, predating completion of University College by three years."

Main Campus Buildings, Academic Centres, and Resources

• Odette Hall (50 St. Joseph St. at Bay St.): This is the original St. Michael's College building, designed by William Hay and built in 1852. First known as Clover Hill after the site on which it was built, it is the oldest building on the U of T campus in continuous academic use. St. Basil's Church, built four years later, is physically attached to it. Two of the three additions to Clover Hill were demolished in the 1920s to make way for the extension of Bay Street; the structure also sustained damage in a fire in 1968. Renovation and restoration of the building was later undertaken by Nexus Architects of Toronto, and it was reopened as Odette Hall in 1996 – named after Toronto businessman and philanthropist Louis L. Odette. The building is home to offices, two U of T departments (French and German), and St. Mike's Celtic Studies department, as well as the Donovan Collection (described below).

  The Donovan Collection, housed at Odette Hall, is made up of more than 175 contemporary Canadian artworks with spiritual themes. Father Dan Donovan began assembling art pieces in 1980, but became interested in art much earlier, as a student at both St. Michael's and Laval University. This interest deepened as he spent four years in Europe in the early to mid-sixties, taking in the artistic and architectural heritage of Old World cities like London, Paris, Rome, Florence, Munich, and Vienna. More information about the collection, including two essays by Father Donovan originally published in the collection catalogue, can be found at the Centre for Contemporary Canadian Art Web site. The collection can be viewed Monday to Friday from 9 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.

• St. Basil's Church (50 St. Joseph St.): Also designed by William Hay, this handsome Gothic Revival church was consecrated on November 16, 1856, and is the third oldest Roman Catholic church in Toronto (after St. Paul's Basilica and St. Michael's Cathedral). It underwent various additions over the first forty years of its life, culminating in the spire designed by Arthur W. Holmes in 1895. Since October 2007, St. Basil's has been the home of the National Televised Daily Mass, which is broadcast on three cable channels, including Vision TV. With its spire a familiar sight as one travels north on Bay Street to "Clover Hill," it's difficult to imagine St. Basil's dwarfed by two enormous condominium towers – but that's what is likely to happen, although the priests and parishioners of this venerable church have been fighting a David-and-Goliath battle with developers, and city hall, to the end.

• John M. Kelly Library (113 St. Joseph St.): Named after Father John M. Kelly, who served as president of the college for two decades, the library was planned in the 1960s as a single repository for the three main college collections, which were outgrowing their original homes. As recounted in a history of the library, the main college collection, as well as those of St. Basil's College and the Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, were brought together under one roof. The library now also houses the Joseph Sablé Centre for 19th Century French Studies and the Frank Iacobucci Centre for Italian Canadian Studies.

  Designed by John Farrugia and opened in 1969, the library was named after Father Kelly – who had overseen the planning and completion of the facility – in 1978. The building is constructed of reinforced concrete and features a modular interior design that allows for flexibility in rearranging the collection as needed. Although the porous nature of the soil precluded a basement, the structure's weight-bearing columns were, as noted on the library Web site, "sunk to a depth to allow for further building."

• Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies (59 Queen's Park Cres. E.): Originally the Institute of Mediaeval Studies, this centre for advanced studies in the culture of the Middle Ages was founded in 1929 through the work of four men: Etienne Gilson, the French philosopher, diplomat, and academic; Father Henry Carr, who served as Basilian Superior of St. Michael's College from 1915 to 1925; Father Edmund J. McCorkell, who succeeded Father Carr as Superior of the college and would serve in that capacity for 12 years; and Father Gerald Phelan, a graduate of the Université catholique de Louvain and philosophy professor at St. Michael's. The institute's success enabled it to receive the honour of pontifical status in 1939. As the PIMS Web site states, "it was to be regulated by pontifical Statutes and its governing Council empowered by charter to grant the pontifical Licence in Mediaeval Studies and Doctorate in Mediaeval Studies." It has the distinction of being the oldest humanities research institute in Canada. The PIMS Web site provides an excellent overview of its history and organization.

  Did you know ...? Father Leonard Boyle, who began teaching at the Pontifical Institute in 1961, left in 1984 for a new job – prefect of the Vatican Library. Appointed to this position by Pope John Paul II, Father Boyle served as the Vatican's chief librarian until 1997. During his tenure, he undertook the digitization of manuscripts, extended the library's operating hours, and hired women as staff members for the first time in the library's history.

  As noted below, the building housing the Pontifical Institute was designed by Arthur Holmes and completed in 1936. PIMS shares space with three student residences, and on its east side opens on to a quadrangle which features an abstract sculpture of the archangel Michael.

• Faculty of Theology (95 St. Joseph St. at Bay St.): Originally the Roman Catholic seminary St. Basil's College, the Faculty of Theology is one of the most distinguished in North America, offering nine degree and three diploma programs. Located across the street from St. Basil's Church, it is part of the Cardinal Flahiff Basilian Centre, which also contains offices, classrooms, and a chapel. The yellow brick building was built in 1951 and designed by Montreal's Ernest Cormier, architect of the Supreme Court building in Ottawa. The complex is also home to the Canadian Catholic Bioethics Institute, which officially opened in 2002 "to help enhance Catholic research and communications in the area of bioethics in a way that would be of service to Canadians generally." The Basilian Centre is named after George Bernard Cardinal Flahiff, who was educated at St. Michael's and served as Archbishop of Winnipeg from 1961 to 1982.

Other Campus Buildings and Historic Architecture

Other campus buildings and examples of historic architecture are listed below in alphabetical order. The college's Conference Rooms page provides photos and descriptions of some of these buildings and facilities.

• Alumni Hall (121 St. Joseph St.): Originally the one-storey Ontario Research Foundation, built in 1929, its second and third storeys were added in 1955. It now houses two U of T departments, philosophy and Slavic studies.

• Brennan Hall (81 St. Mary St.): Designed by Arthur Holmes and built in 1937, Brennan Hall is home to a variety of activities, including the student union and the college newspaper (The Mike). Dining facilities include the magnificent Canada Room, which features a reproduction of Guido Reni's painting of the archangel Michael. The building is named after Father Laurence Brennan, who served as pastor of St. Basil's Church from 1880-1889 and 1891-1904.

  Did you know ...? Scollard Park, a small oasis of green located between Brennan Hall and St. Basil's Church, bears the name of the man who made it possible: Father Robert Scollard. An enthuasiastic gardener, Father Scollard created the park out of a sand pit and planted his favourite tree, a Mountain Ash, there. The tree survived until the 1980s, when it was replaced by a Japanese Maple – a favourite of Father Scollard's fellow librarian, the fittingly named Father H.B. Gardner. Scollard Park includes a Mediaeval Rose Garden and a lemon tree, and represents just one part of the extensive landscaping around the campus. More information on gardens at St. Michael's can be found on the college Web site.

• Carr Hall (100 St. Joseph St. at Queen's Park Crescent): This second of two campus buildings designed by Ernest Cormier, completed in 1954, commemorates Father Henry Carr. In addition to classrooms, it is home to the U of T Italian department, St. Michael's French department, and a multimedia lab. The building's ground-floor auditorium has been renovated in recent years, and reopened in 2000 as Father Robert Madden Hall – named in honour of the popular teacher and administrator who served St. Mike's for 50 years.

• Elmsley Hall (81 St. Mary St.): Built in 1955, Elmsley Hall houses a variety of administrative offices (including the mail desk), as well as student residences and Charbonnel Lounge.

• Elmsley Place Houses: These historic houses, grouped together in an enclave across from the Kelly Library, were originally part of an exclusive residential area put together by John Elmsley's son Remigius. St. Michael's College later bought the entire parcel of land and was thus able to save these turn-of-the-century homes. The houses on the west side of Elmsley Place are used as student residences; two of the three houses on the east side are residences for priests, while the third is home to administrative offices. Further details follow below:
  • Founders House (1 Elmsley Place): Designed by the father and son team of Henry and Charles Langley and built in 1896. This house was originally the home of Sir George W. Ross, who served as Ontario Minister of Education under Sir Oliver Mowat and became premier himself in 1899. It is now used for offices, including those of alumni affairs and continuing education.

  • McCorkell House (2 Elmsley Place) and Sullivan House (96 St. Joseph St.): Designed by Marshall B. Aylesworth and built in 1892-93, these two separate residences are actually semi-detached homes forming a single structure. McCorkell House is named for Father Edmund McCorkell, the teacher and administrator who helped found the Pontifical Institute; it is the residence that future Prime Minister Paul Martin called home while at St. Mike's. Sullivan House, where Marshall McLuhan maintained an office, is named for Father Basil Sullivan, a professor and registrar at the college.

  • Phelan House (3 Elmsley Place): Designed by Langley and Langley and built in 1896, this house was originally the home of William E. Chalcroft. It is named for Father Gerald Phelan, one of the founders of the Pontifical Institute.

  • Windle House (5 Elmsley Place): According to McHugh, this is possibly by Royal Alexandra Theatre architect John M. Lyle. Also built in 1896, it was originally the home of Hartley Dewart, a future leader of the Ontario Liberal Party who was serving as Crown attorney for York County at the time he lived here. The house is named for Sir Bertram Windle, an Irish anthropologist who taught at St. Michael's.

  • Maritain House (6 Elmsley Place) and Gilson House (8 Elmsley Place): Designed by Frank Wickson – who was part of the architectural team for the original Toronto Reference Library (now the Koffler Student Services Centre) – and built in 1904. Maritain House is named after the French philosopher Jacques Maritain, who taught at the Pontifical Institute in the 1930s, while Gilson House is named after Etienne Gilson, one of the founders of the Institute.

• Loretto College (70 St. Mary St.): Residence for women students, built in 1958.

• Queen's Park Building (53 - 59 Queen's Park Cres. E.): Designed by Arthur Holmes and completed in 1936, this large structure houses both the Pontifical Institute and three student residences: Fisher House, More House, and Teefy Hall. Fisher and More Houses commemorate two martyrs put to death for their defiance of Henry VIII: the cardinal St. John Fisher, and the scholar and statesman St. Thomas More. Teefy Hall is named after Father John Teefy, Basilian Superior of St. Michael's from 1889 to 1904, who negotiated the college's affiliation with U of T in 1881.

  Did you know ...? A Memorial to the Fallen was unveiled at St. Michael's in November 1988, just in time for Remembrance Day services that year. Carved into the stone of the "slype" (covered passage) between More and Fisher Houses, the memorial commemorates 32 alumni who gave their lives in the service of their country. Although such a memorial had been contemplated for many years, it eventually came to fruition through the efforts of Father William H. O’Brien, a St. Mike's alumnus and teacher who had served as a lieutenant in the Royal Canadian Artillery.

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Public Art

Artworks on the St. Mike's campus are listed below in alphabetical order. They can be located on the campus map by clicking on the box for "Outdoor Sculptures" under "Show details" at right.

• Businessman on a Horse (William McElcheran, 1989) – between Brennan Hall and the south entrance to Elmsley Hall.

• Consolation (Joe Rosenthal, 1996) – in the courtyard of Elmsley Hall, just outside Charbonnel Lounge.

• Kells Nest (William Vazan, 1997) – located just north of Michael and created "out of a piece of the Canadian Shield."

• Kelly Library sculpture [untitled] (William McElcheran, 1973) – in front of the library. As described by the college Web site, "Facing the street are the crowds of eager readers wanting to get into the library to read the work of the figures who are depicted on the side facing the library." Authors depicted range from Chaucer, Shakespeare, and Dante to humorist Stephen Leacock and St. Michael's own Marshall McLuhan.

• Michael (Anne Allardyce, 1978) – in the quadrangle behind Carr Hall and the Queen's Park Building. This representation of the warrior archangel, created from stainless steel and granite, was commissioned by the college to celebrate its 125th anniversary in 1977.

• Neighbours (Joe Rosenthal, 2001) – another Rosenthal sculpture, located near St. Mike's "neighbour" – Victoria College.

• Zen West (Kosso Eloul, 1980) – stainless steel sculpture at the northwest corner of Bay and St. Joseph Streets, near St. Basil's Church. Donated to the college by Father Dan Donovan in 1982.

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