The former home of a gold medal Olympian and former Member of Parliament has been approved for a heritage designation in Mississauga.
The city’s Heritage Advisory Committee voted to designate the home at 1241 Stavebank Rd. in Port Credit this month.
The property was first home to “prominent citizen” Charles James (C.J.) Tidy (1864-1947). Tidy inherited Tidy & Sons, Florist, from his father, Stephen, in 1903, according to a heritage report to the committee.
Previously living in Toronto, Tidy built his country home, which he named “Cobham Woods,” after his birthplace in England, on the property. The main stone house sat on lot 13, with the “porter’s lodge” on lot 17. Tidy grew flowers for his business on the estate.
It is the porter’s lodge at 1241 Stavebank Rd. that the committee voted to designate. The main house burned down in 1969 with no injuries.
The property changed hands a few times.
Member of Parliament, lawyer and gold medal Olympic hockey player Hugh John Plaxton (1904-1982) purchased the Tidy estate in 1948.
During his hockey career, Plaxton competed in the 1928 Winter Olympics, winning a gold medal with Canada, and later played for the former NHL team, the Montreal Maroons, during the 1932–33 season. Mississauga added Plaxton’s name to its list of potential street names in 2019 due to his Olympic significance.
Plaxton was elected to parliament in the 1935 federal election as a Liberal MP from the Toronto riding of Trinity.
Hugh John Plaxton is seen as a hockey player for Team Canada, a lawyer and as a Member of Parliament.
Plaxton and his wife had four young children who made great use of the large property, according to the report. He continued to grow flowers on the estate, selling them to Tidy Flowers. Under Plaxton’s ownership, a gardener occupied the house at 1241 Stavebank Rd.
Plaxton began to split and sell off lots on the property in 1948. He sold the gardener’s cottage to architect Grant Whatmough (1921-1999) in 1953. Whatmough was an “early modernist” local architect who was involved in planning living quarters for Avro Arrow staff in Malton. Plaxton sold the main house to Chilean-born mining engineer Edward “Ted” Futterer (1896-1971) in 1964.
For thirty years, from 1956 to 1986, lawyer and Mississauga “pillar” Gordon Burgess Jackson (1888-1989) lived at 1241 Stavebank. Jackson’s most notable contribution was chairing the development of the hospital from 1953-65, originally the South Peel Hospital. It became the Mississauga Hospital in 1970.
The cottage is described as an Arts and Crafts era house with a mix of natural materials, including stone and wood siding, with a varied roof, overhanging eaves, shed dormer, gables and two asymmetrically placed stone chimneys.
The property meets the cultural heritage criteria, including contextual value for its “Mineola cottage” character and Credit Valley stone exterior, according to the report.
For more information, see the Heritage Advisory meeting and reports here.
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