Building for Labor: Hintonburg’s Plank and Frame CottagesMain MenuPrefaceIntroductionManchesterville: the Origins of a Working Class SuburbSocial Forces and the City Beautiful MovementThe “Workingman's Cottage”: a TypologyBuilding Techniques of the Worker’s Cottage: Plank Frame ConstructionBuilding Techniques of the Worker’s Cottage: Plank Frame Construction IIPeople and PlacesFurther Reading
108 Pinhey Street
1media/KS_HH1_thumb.jpg2025-10-13T00:56:38+00:00Anonymous101Credit: City of Ottawa Archivesplain2025-10-13T00:56:38+00:00Anonymous
Walking around the streets of Eastern Hintonburg one building type is ubiquitous: small and narrow 1.5/2 story homes, known as worker’s cottages. Ostensibly “mundane” or “ordinary” homes - a house type that seems to have always existed - they in fact date to the turn of the 20th century, and the earliest urbanization and densification of Hintonburg. It might seem strange to call these homes cottages given the modern association with rural leisure and vacationing sites, but the term cottage here allows us to situate these homes more broadly within the history of late 19th-early 20th century housing for working people. This type of housing bears the name cottage, in that it is a format of housing dating back to English rural farming and estate cottages, first built by landed gentry as outbuildings for their employees.
You can use the infographics on the next page to orient yourself, and browse a particular building or topic that interests you, and then learn more about it - or for a narrative approach begin with the introduction, which will then bring you into the origins of “Manchesterville” and the first worker’s cottages. Highlighted on the map are other important local sites or amenities at the turn of the 20th century, which interconnect with the homes to create a fuller picture of working class life in Hintonburg.
