The Lawrence House

In 1892, William F. Lawrence built the beautiful Queen Anne mansion on Christina Street that Sarnians still know as the Lawrence House. It cost $30,000 to build. Highlights include a large alcove stairway, five spacious second floor bedrooms and a third floor tower children’s game room. Exterior features boast the conical tower, circular bay windows in the domed southeast corner turret, finials and the decorated chimney. The Lawrence House also features stained glass windows and decorous woodwork and ornamentation. Sarnians who drive along Lawrence Avenue or visit the Lawrence Park neighbourhood in Toronto likely never make the connection with the Lawrence House on Christina Street, or the Lawrence Lumber yards that once sat at the foot of Christina and Devine Streets in the 1950s. But it’s the same celebrated family. 

The violence and the break with Britain that was the American Revolution did not command the loyalty of every citizen of the newly declared United States. Many citizens who could not so easily shed their loyalties to the Crown uprooted from their homes and came to Canada. 

Colonel John Lawrence was one of these United Empire Loyalists. He settled first in Fredericton, New Brunswick. Here, his wife gave birth to a son; Peter. In 1791, the Lawrence family moved again, this time to the town of York in Upper Canada. Here, he was given land grants from the British government. Colonel Lawrence’s grants encompassed 200 acres located on what is today the east and west side of Yonge Street between Eglinton and Lawrence Avenues – the heart of today’s uptown Toronto. 

The Colonel was industrious and prospered. He engaged in farming, and built tanneries and lumber mills. In 1812, his son Peter married Elizabeth Cummer, and they settled in Willowdale. Elizabeth and Peter Lawrence would raise 10 children, five sons and five daughters. 

In 1870, Wanstead was a tiny community in central Lambton County, just east of Wyoming. Wanstead would not become well-known until 32 years later when it was the scene of a horrific rail accident, but it was here that Peter’s son, Jacob, came to establish a sawmill and lumber company in that year. In 1873, Jacob moved to Watford, built more mills there and in the surrounding area, and eventually established a lumber yard in Bothwell under the name Jacob Lawrence and Sons. 

Jacob moved to Sarnia in 1878 and bought a sawmill on the St. Clair River. On his death in 1885, his son William F. Lawrence arrived to manage the business. He expanded the business even further, bringing in lumber by ship from the French River district of Northern Ontario. The company specialized in fire sash windows, doors and cabinets. In 1902, Lawrence’s brother, Henry, was killed in the Wanstead train wreck tragedy, and the company became Lawrence Lumber. 

William F. Lawrence died in a car accident in 1922. The business was finally taken over by Laidlaw Lumber, putting an end to the four-generation pioneer lumbering side of the Lawrence family.