BRANCH EXPANSION-1886-1910.

Maritime

Year. Ontario. Quebec. Provinces. West. Columbia, Canada.

North- British Outside of

Total. 31

ETITITTI

54

1886...... 21

2

4

2

None. 2

1903. 1905.

26

5

8

5

8

2

27

17

24

14

12

2

1910..

96

At the annual meeting in December, 1905, the appointment of an Hon. President was authorized and Lord Strathcona appointed, after having acted as President for 18 years. Mr. Drummond was promoted to the Presidency and Mr. Clouston became a Director and Vice-President as well as General-Manager. The Hon. Robert MacKay was also elected to the Board and a By-law passed increasing the number of Directors to 10. In 1906 26 new Branches were opened in Ontario through the taking over of the business of the Ontario Bank and on Dec. 3rd Mr. Clouston explained the Bank's policy in this connection: "When in October the deplorable condition of the Ontario Bank was submitted for the consideration of a number of Bankers it was thought best in the interests of all concerned that the Bank should be liquidated and with the view of allaying an excitement which would probably be detrimental to the interests of the commercial community, generally, it was decided that this Bank should undertake to assume all the liabilities of the Ontario Bank-a guarantee being subsequently given by the other Banks in the event of the Assets being insufficient to discharge the liabilities. This Bank is also a party to the guarantee and we have agreed, in addition, to pay $150,000 for the good-will of the business."

During 1907 D. Morrice and Sir T. G. Shaughnessy were added to the Board and in 1908 C. R. Hosmer and in 1909 A. Baumgarten. At the 1907 (Dec. 2) annual meeting Mr. Clouston spoke of the coming stringency and advised general retrenchment. Very largely this advice was followed and, with the cautious policy of other Banks, prevented any serious Canadian trouble during the ensuing collapse of credit and depression in the United States. Upon the Bank's policy regarding Call and Short Loans abroad he spoke in words which are self-explanatory: "Every dollar of this money is loaned on Call at short date upon the most ample security. It constitutes a part of the Reserves of Canadian Banks. If to-morrow we were to call in the whole of our loans of this class, which are at all times immediately available, the merchantile public of Canada would derive absolutely no benefit from the action. Being a portion of our Reserves the choice given the Bank is between retaining the money unproductive in its vaults or lending it at Call upon interest in foreign financial centres." In the Autumn of 1908 Mr. E. S. Clouston, Vice-President and General Manager of the Bank was created by the King a Baronet of the United Kingdom.

The Deposits of the Bank in 1909 increased by $36,000,000 largely through money coming to Canada from Great Britain. In December of this year Sir Edward Clouston issued a warning against the tendency to speculate in real estate which was visible in certain parts of Canada and which he described as a form of gambling certain to bring disaster. In 1910 Sir George A. Drummond died, after 28 years' service on the Board, and Mr. R. B. Angus succeeded to the chair of the institution whose business interests he had once managed and so long promoted. Mr. H. V. Meredith became a Director while maintaining his post of Assistant GeneralManager. The other members of the Board at this time were Lord Strathcona, Hon. R. MacKay, Sir W. C. Macdonald, A. Baumgarten, D. Morrice, E. B. Greenshields, C. R. Hosmer, Sir E. S. Clouston, Bart., Sir T. G. Shaughnessy and James Ross. The figures of the Bank's business during this period of great and almost unbroken prosperity will afford a fitting conclusion to this narrative:

1902...12,000,000 8,000,000 7,007,321 86,825,633 92,432,051 1,601,152 114,670,653 1903...13,379,240 9,000,000 7,968,972 93,397,919 98,810,535 1,813,483 125,548,110 1904...14,000,000 10,000,000 10,925,689 94,794,412 105,803,937 1,609,207 131,166,768 1905.14,000,000 10,000,000 8,206,795 101,508,477 107,449,360 1,638,659 135,124,452 1906...14,400,000 11,000,000 12,036,097 129,901,450 140,224,231 1,797,976 168,001,173 1907...14,400,000 11,000,000 12,500,549 126,138,157 136,063,168 1,980,138 165,234,768 1908...14,400,090 11,000,000 10,492,869 130,097,538 135,220,973 1,957,658 167,357,600 1909...14,400,000 12,000,000 10,455,537 170,238,174 162,573.478 1,826,167 207,938,995 1910...14,400,000 12,000,000 11,959,522 194,942,370 183,538,917 1,797,992 234,438,318

HISTORY OF THE

ONTARIO DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION

The Department of Education in Ontario was the natural outcome of (1) the passing away of the founder of the Provincial Educational system and (2) of the dominant desire under popular government to control all the functions and forces of public policy. In a sense the institution developed gradually. There was in the earlier days of pioneer life and settlement the law of 1807 creating 8 public (grammar) schools and dividing the Province of Upper Canada into 8 Districts for this purpose with a grant to each of $400 a year. Under the Elementary Schools Act of 1816, a Board of Education for each District was to be appointed by the Lieut.-Governor and $24,000 was voted for encouraging popular education. The natural evolution came in 1824 of a General Board of Education for the whole Province appointed by the LieutenantGovernor, for the Crown, and composed of the Rev. Dr. Strachan, the Hon. Joseph Wells and Hon. G. H. Markland of the Legislative Council, the Rev. Robert Addison, John Beverley Robinson and Thomas Ridout. There was a similarity in this to the later system of a political Minister in that all the members of the Board were of the dominant governing party of that time.

With somewhat varying powers in the matter of prescribing text-books, courses of study, qualifications of teachers, &c., and with greatly changing personnel this Board existed until 1850, at which time its powers were advisory chiefly, and it was entirely under the control of the Chief Superintendent. In that year the Council of Public Instruction was constituted in its place with nine members appointed by the Governor-in-Council and with powers which continued by the Act of 1871-included the preparation of examination papers for teachers' certificates, the preparation of a course of study for Public Schools, the training of teachers, the selection of text-books, and regulations for the government and administration of Public and High Schools. It was abolished in 1876 by the Act which put Education under the control of a responsible Minister of the Crown.

Meanwhile, the Educational system, generally, had been going through varied conditions and changes. The Public Schools Act of 1807 dealt with early settlements and a scattered, isolated population and provided for the appointment of School Trustees by the Lieut.-Governor to control the few Public Schools. The ensuing Elementary Schools Act of 1816 endeavoured to estab lish common schools for the mass of the community with elective

Trustees; and the Common Schools Act of 1824 transferred control over the qualifications of teachers from the Trustees to the District Boards of Education of which there were then only 11 in the entire Province. The Act of 1841, in days of somewhat greater population, was passed immediately after the Union with Lower Canada and was a much more comprehensive measure. As a result of the long-preceding efforts, agitations and policy of the Rev. Egerton Ryerson, it constituted the basis of Ontario's modern educational system. The chief clauses were as follows:

1. A permanent Educational Fund was established to be made up of moneys accruing from the sale of lands appropriated by the Legislature or otherwise provided.

2. The grant for Education (Upper and Lower Canada) was increased to $200,000.

3. A Chief Superintendent of Education was to be appointed for the two Provinces.

4. Municipal Councils were empowered to raise by assessment such sums of money for school purposes as would be equivalent (or more) to the amount appropriated by the Legislature for each school.

5. District Boards of Trustees were abolished and their powers given to the Municipal Councils, which were also authorized to organize school sections and assess the people for building schools and purchasing school books.

6. Township Boards of Trustees called School Commissioners were to be elected by the people and to supervise local educational matters.

7. A religious minority was given the right to form Separate Schools in any section, but under the same general conditions as those of common schools.

By an amending Act of 1843 the office of Chief Superintendent was confined to the Province of Ontario and put in the hands of the member of the Government occupying the post of Provincial Secretary. In 1846, after Dr. Ryerson had been to Europe, studied educational conditions under many Governments, and made elaborate recommendations to the Provincial authorities, a new Act was passed taking the control out of the Provincial Secretary's hands, creating the office of Chief Superintendent of Schools, with such Assistants as might be required-the appointment to be made by the Governor of the Province. The duties were to be the proper distribution of Legislative grants for school purposes; to prepare regulations for school reports and to deal with complaints against the school law; to provide uniform and approved text-books in all forms; to recommend suitable plans for schoolhouses and books for school libraries. The position was continued under the Act of 1850 when, also, a clause permitted freeholders and house-holders in every school section to decide whether the school should be maintained by fees or be declared free and this in turn led to the free or public school legislation of 1871. Under this latter Act, and for five years more, the office of Chief Superintendent was retained.

The holders of this important office had not been numerous. In 1842 Hon. R. S. Jameson, Vice-Chancellor of the Province,

was first appointed with Rev. Robert Murray as Assistant Superintendent; when the change came in 1843 the Provincial Secretary -Hon. S. B. Harrison-was Chief Superintendent with Rev. Dr. Egerton Ryerson as Assistant Superintendent, in 1844, in succession to Mr. Murray; after the next change in the law (1846) Dr. Ryerson was appointed Chief Superintendent of Education and this post he retained with a dominating control over all the forces of Provincial education until his retirement in 1876. J. George Hodgins was his chief Assistant and in 1855 was formally appointed Deputy Superintendent of Education—a position he retained until the change of 1876.

In this year the entire educational system of the Province was taken over by the Government and placed under the control of a political Chief responsible to the Legislature for his policy and administration. It was an absolute and revolutionary change. Dr. Ryerson had constructed the machinery, framed the regulations, ruled and developed the system without regard to party or party government and, until about 1868, he had pretty much his own way. The new policy was, however, recommended by him, the clauses of the 1876 legislation were compiled and endorsed by him; the plan was, he considered, the best means of handing over his work to others. Writing in 1872 he reviewed what had been accomplished as follows: "The system of popular Education in Ontario has opened a Free School to every child in the land and proclaimed his right to its advantages; it has placed a school-house in nearly every neighbourhood and, in hundreds of instances, made the school-house the best building in the neighbourhood; it has superseded the topers and broken-down characters, so common as teachers of a former era, by a class of teachers not excelled in morals by the teachers of any other country and who, as a whole, compare favourably in qualifications with those of any State in America; it has achieved a uniformity of excellent Text Books, earnestly sought for by educators in the neighbouring States and has spread throughout the land books of useful and entertaining knowledge to the number of nearly a million of volumes; it is the nearest approach to a voluntary system of any Public School system in the world; and it has developed larger resources than that of any other State in America, in proportion to the wealth and number of its inhabitants."

The new arrangements provided that: "There shall be a Department of Education, which shall consist of the Executive Council, or a Committee thereof appointed by the Lieutenant-Governor, and one of the said Executive Council to be nominated by the Lieutenant-Governor shall hold the office of Minister of Education." The following were placed under the control of the new Department-(1) Elementary Schools, including Kindergartens, Public and Separate (Roman Catholic and Protestant) Schools; (2) the Training of Teachers including County Model Schools,