Description du lieu patrimonial

The two-storey foursquare Colonial Revival style side-by-side Duplex at 158 Granville Street has an asphalt shingled hipped roof and a hipped roof double entry with dormer above on the east elevation facing Granville Street. It is located on the northwest corner of Granville and Pleasant streets. The registration includes the building and its lot.

Valeur patrimoniale

The attractive building at 158 Granville Street has historical value as one of the first double houses in Summerside to be called a duplex. It was built in 1938 using the same symmetrical design as another dwelling erected the year before at 117-119 Kirk Street. Both were constructed as rental properties by plumbing contractor, Allan W. Palmer.

Prior to 1937, there appears to have been no use of the word duplex in the local press. Up to that point in time, buildings in Summerside that provided living quarters for more than one family were generally referred to as tenement houses, with the exception of the D.R. Morrison home at 66 Spring Street which had been named in 1934 as Summerside's "first modern apartment house." A duplex is simply defined as a dwelling comprised of two units, either side-by-side or one above the other. They became popular in North America in the early twentieth century as a means of affordable home ownership. Often the owner lives in one unit and earns income by renting the other unit.

Mr. Palmer purchased the 75 by 56 foot lot at the north corner of Granville and Pleasant Streets from Willis R. Warren, a local carpenter. There is a possibility that in contracting the work for the duplex, Mr. Palmer may have hired Mr. Warren for the carpentry labour. The side-by-side units with separate entrances were constructed with three second-level bedrooms per apartment.

Allan W. Palmer (b. 1899) grew up in Freeland, PEI and came to Summerside around 1931 where he began a plumbing business from his residential property on Poplar Avenue. He sold the Granville Street duplex in November 1939 for $5250. The new owner was Harry S. Allen, a local dentist, who was living at 36 Granville at the time. The duplex was an investment property from 1939 until 1974, Mrs. Allen retaining the building after her husband's death in May 1965. Various tenants lived in the units during the Allen's ownership.

The tenant with the longest occupancy was Richard S. Hinton, local lawyer and magistrate, who lived in one side of the house with his wife Marion from 1939 until 1956. Jack MacLeod, a long-time employee of the Holman mercantile firm, rented the adjoining unit from 1946 until 1956. Mrs. Allen sold the property in May 1974 to David Simmons who resold it in August 1975. The next owner had it for almost three years before selling it in 1978 to the current owner.

Source: City of Summerside, Heritage Property Profile

Éléments caractéristiques

The heritage value of the house is shown in the following character-defining elements:

- the square massing and two-storey height
- the hipped roof with wide overhanging eaves
- the large brick chimney
- the central hipped roof dormer on the east elevation
- the symmetrical arrangement of the windows and entrances
- the hipped roof porch over the double entrance on the east elevation