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Divinity students from Victoria University were sent into the Ward to survey "the religious condition and outlook of the people and to urge them to attend Methodist Revival meetings in Massey Hall". One of the students, Arthur H. Burnett, photographed his findings and reported on "a state of moral and religious destitution past all belief, and unsanitary conditions of the most horrible kind". Burnett took it upon himself to raise awareness of the poor living conditions he had observed in the slums.

He held a series of lectures accompanied by lantern slides of his Ward photographs, where he advocated the establishment of social settlements. Burnett emphasized that a new charity model was needed. Jewish, Protestant and Catholic organizations could not meet the needs of the predominantly Jewish settlers. Evangelical campaigns further alienated the population they were meant to assist. There were even rival proselytizing meetings held on opposite street corners between Jewish and evangelical missions.

While, geographically, the slum was located in the centre of Toronto near City Hall, in many ways it was on the periphery of genteel urban citizens' daily routes. The settlers who prospered moved out of the Ward. The Jews moved west towards Spadina, forming Kensington Market; and the Italians moved to College forming Little Italy. Those that remained were faced with an uncertain future.

In 1911, George P. Bryce together with superintendent, John Joseph Kelso, and divinity student, Arthur H. Burnett, founded Central Neighbourhood House - a social settlement that sought to provide incoming Canadians with services they desperately lacked in the downtown Ward neighbourhood. The house was to provide them with education, recreation and cultural activities and, unlike other missions and social reform movements of the time, the services were to be completely secular in nature.

In 1919, a group of young adults and children are seen in a line up outside of the Central Neighbourhood House social settlement in the Ward. Ranging in age from children to teens, they represent a cross section of immigrants that have arrived for a day of programming; many of them are Slavic and Jewish in origin.

Thus, within a few blocks, "five or six languages are spoken and as many different creeds professed."

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Victoria College in the University of Toronto
January 2011
Downtown Toronto

Credits:
Central Neighbourhood House Records

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Victoria College Theological Graduating Class 1912
1912
Downtown Toronto

Credits:
Victoria University Libraries and Archives

4

He held a series of lectures accompanied by lantern slides of his Ward photographs, where he advocated the establishment of social settlements. Burnett emphasized that a new charity model was needed. Jewish, Protestant and Catholic organizations could not meet the needs of the predominantly Jewish settlers. Evangelical campaigns further alienated the population they were meant to assist. There were even rival proselytizing meetings held on opposite street corners between Jewish and evangelical missions.