Postcard Memories is a weekly series of historic postcard views and photos submitted by Marcel Rousseau.
Some were previously published by the Orillia Museum of Art and History and in the book Postcard Memories Orillia.
The Orillia Free Library opened in 1911, shortly before this photo was taken. In 1864, a public meeting was held and a committee formed to establish Orillia’s first library.
The Mechanics’ Institute and Literary Association was organized and occupied various halls around the downtown for the next 45 years. In 1895, the name was changed to the Orillia Public Library and It continued to rent space until a Carnegie grant was obtained to build this limestone and brick structure.
This was the library’s first municipally-owned building. The first floor of the Town Hall was also built from Longford limestone and was completed in July, 1874. The police lockup was on the ground floor and the council chamber and offices on the second floor.
The Opera House was destroyed by fire in the summer of 1915. War restrictions made it difficult for the town council to raise funds to rebuild the new theatre.
The first attempt to raise $50,000 was turned down by the ratepayers, but by March, 1916, a modified plan, requiring a debenture of $35,000, was approved. The new town hall was completed, without the tower, in March of 1917.
