From The Toronto Star Weekly, May 16, 1914
That well-known Toronto residence occupying the northeasterly corner of Jarvis street and Wellesley crescent, and formerly occupled by Mrs. Treble-Massey, was recently sold to Thos. W. Watkins, long prominent in Hamilton departmental store connections. The large structure and its beautiful grounds went for a good round sum, but no matter what the purchase price really was, the proprietor of the “Right House” in the Ambitious City secured a bargain.
“From basement to attic,” says a Toronto lumber merchant, “the old Massey home was finished in the cream of the finest hardwoods that entered the Massey-Harris works. Our old boss — for I was a foreman in one of the departments there then — the late H. A. Massey, was an adept at sizing up lumber of all kinds, but had a connoisseur’s loving eye for all the rarer varieties.
“Of course, the company buys very largely; nobody on the outside could credit the size of the shipments. Only the best material goes into those agricultural machines. Many’s the carload that is rejected — not up to grade. Well, old Mr. Massey, for several years before he proceeded with the renovation of his Jarvis street residence, gave standing orders that the choicest bits should be put by for his own use.
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When his carpenters got to work, the result was they had simply the best assortment of the rarer Canadian hardwoods to choose from, in everything from flooring to mantels and newel posts. I bet a dollar that Hamilton department store man does not realize a cent’s worth what a treasure trove he’s got.
“Butternut, walnut, cherry, ash, oak, maple there’s all kinds in abundance, perfection in grain and markings and in freedom from blemish. Some of the bird’s-eye varieties that were tooled up by skilled artisans for that house are not now procurable at all for love nor money. It would have been a good home for one of those forestry professors to buy. I know for a fact there is nothing like it in the Dominion.” ♦
