The Restored Interior
Earlier this year, the federal government once again opened the station doors to the public, offering brief tours of the building seven days a week. The twenty-minute public tours focus primarily on the interior spaces furnished for Senators’ use. These include the Senate Chamber, originally the railway’s main concourse, three committee rooms, and a mezzanine with a spacious lounge and a branch of the Parliamentary Library. The guide's narrative focuses on details of the Senate's day-to-day business, Senators' qualifications, and the Senate's role in parliamentary government.
Among the other tidbits of information, visitors are told that one original requirement (in the Constitution) to qualify for the Senate was a financial one. A Canadian citizen had to have a net worth of at least $4,000, and to own "real property" with a value of at least $4,000 in the province for which they are appointed. This is not a major issue today, but it was in the 19th century since, in 1935, for example, the average personal income in Canada was $313 a year. Even twenty-five years later in 1960, the average income was only $1,672 (Statistics Canada). No doubt Senators were a select and wealthy elite.
Today the public enters the building off Rideau Street, and the visit begins near the top of the grand stairways leading down to the Great Waiting Room. The walls on both sides are hung with historical portraits from the collections of the House of Commons, Senate Heritage Collection, and National Capital Commission. The tradition of royalty and privilege prevail in the choice of wall decoration. Prominent portraits include Queen Victoria early in her reign, by British painter John Partridge in 1842; and Queen Elizabeth II by Lilias Torrance Newton in 1957 (the first Canadian commissioned to paint portraits of the Queen and Prince Philip). The opposite wall displays portraits of the Speakers of the Senate from recent years. Also on the wall nearby is The Speaker’s Arch and Seniority Board, a wooden artifact from 1885 with names of the Speakers in chronological order. It includes a label claiming it as “one of the oldest treasures in the Senate from the Centre Block on Parliament Hill."
At the bottom of the stairs is an entrance leads to the Chateau Laurier tunnel, part of the original plan. We are now in the Grand Waiting Room. A wooden bench topped by a pair of Tiffany-style lamps sits in the middle of the cavernous space. Perforated bronze panels add richness to the walls while acting as facades for two committee rooms; as well as acoustic baffles for sound that would otherwise reverberate in the huge hall (Cogley 2019). They are also a nod to Canada's natural heritage and regional diversity. The panels have photographic images of Canadian landscapes – Moraine Lake in Banff National Park, Cape Race in Newfoundland and Labrador, and a logging train on Vancouver Island.
In this area are nine historical portraits of French kings from the 16th, 17th, and 18th centuries. When asked about their relevance here, our tour guide explained that the British royal portraits on the station’s upper level (Queen Victoria and Queen Elizabeth II) and the French kings on the lower level (the earliest from the time of Jacques Cartier) represent the two founding cultures of Canada.
In fact, these royal British and French portraits are part of a large collection amassed by Senator Serge Joyal and donated to Parliament (M-D Smith 2017). Joyal has an exceptional interest in history and heritage preservation, is a major collector of material culture, a very active advocate and participant in saving historic buildings, and a major donor to Canadian museums (sergejoyal.sencanada.ca). However, from the perspective of critical heritage studies, he is a participant in "authorized heritage discourse" (Smith, 29), which scholar Laurajane Smith defines as focusing attention on "aesthetically pleasing material objects, sites, places...that current generations 'must' care for, protect and revere...to forge a sense of common identity based on the past" (Smith, 29). By incorporating these portraits in the décor, a historical and social legitimacy is given to the English and French ruling classes in determining the meaning of Canadian heritage. This exemplifies an authorized heritage narrative, as discussed above, which “works to limit broader debate and subsequent challenges to established social and cultural values” (Smith, 12, 160-161).
By contrast, the décor in the Senate Chamber and three committee rooms features the maple leaf motif. The rooms have walnut doors carved with maple-leaf patterns, which were created by hand-carving wood with ten different leaf patterns based on native Canadian maple tree species. Maple leaf shapes also adorn a decorative cast glass wall separating the Senate Chamber from the antechamber, a space senators use before a “call to session.”
Nearby a small collection of artifacts includes the busts of Cairine Wilson and James Gladstone, two remarkable senators who were “firsts” – Wilson as the first woman appointed to the Senate, and Gladstone as the first Status Indian Senator. Gladstone, a Progressive Conservative
from the Northwest Territories, was appointed in 1958, two years before Status Indians won the right to vote in Canada, and he pressed tirelessly for improvements to the Indian Act and for the Indian Franchise. Wilson, born into a wealthy and influential Liberal family in the 1930s, successfully fought a male establishment, advocating not only for women in politics but also for the admission of refugees to Canada during and after the Second World War – a time when anti-Semitism and anti-immigration sentiments were widespread. The senators’ busts have been set in a roped-off area. There is no mention of their significance by the tour guide, nor is there any visible written information about their important contributions to Canadian social values.
This page has paths:
- Making the Past Present: Union Station Restoration – A Political Facelift? Maegen Sargent
- Bibliography Maegen Sargent
- Conclusion Maegen Sargent
