The Spencer Mansion: A House, a Home, and an Art Gallery By Robert Ratcliffe Taylor Touchwood, 204 pp., $19.95
For starters, let's be clear about what Spencer Mansion really is. It wasn't built as a mansion for the Spencer family, and it's not used by the Spencers today. It's not even a mansion, in the normal sense of the word.
To be fair, various Spencers lived in the Moss Street home for more than half a century, so it's understandable that the family name has been attached to it.
When Alexander and Theophilia Green built the house back in 1889, they named it Gyppeswyk, which is old English for Ipswich, a village in England. After David and Emma Spencer bought it, they called it Llan Derwen, which is Welsh for "under the oaks."
The building could also be considered Government House, since it was the official residence of Lt.-Gov. Thomas Robert McInnes and his successor, Sir Henri-Gustave Joly de Lotbinière. They needed a place to stay after Cary Castle, the real Government House, burned down in May 1899.
In November 1951 - 61 years ago this week - the stately residence became home to the Victoria Arts Centre, the forerunner of today's Art Gallery of Greater Victoria, thanks to a generous donation by Sara Spencer. The gallery has been there ever since, which gives it the greatest claim of any occupant to date.
Robert Ratcliffe Taylor's book, The Spencer Mansion: A House, a Home, and an Art Gallery, simplifies things, referring to the building as Gyppeswyk, the name given to it when the first coat of paint was fresh.
Taylor covers the rich history of the building in great detail. But it is not simply the story of the house, as fascinating as that might have been.
Taylor provides plenty of information on the occupants of the mansion, including the usual suspects (the Greens and the Spencers) as well as the less likely ones, the hired help who ensured that everything ran smoothly, well into the art gallery era.
The mansion was designed by architect William Ridgway Wilson, known for several other mansions in the Rockland area as well as the Church of St. John the Divine. He is probably best known for the original wing of the art gallery, whatever we choose to call it.
Many other people have played important roles in preserving the building over the years, even though it has been changed so much that it is not eligible for official heritage status. Let's not forget that at one time, not that long ago, Victoria didn't hold its grand old houses in high regard. We lost many classic buildings before the community realized that these old houses needed to be restored and preserved.
The one we call the Spencer Mansion is a special place, since it is open to the public. The reality of our history is there for us all to see.
Stuart Stark deserves credit for determining the original paint scheme - dark oxide red, dark green and pale salmon. The mansion was returned to its original colours when new versions were developed, and christened Spencer Red, Gyppeswyk Green and Moss Street Coral.
When it first became an art gallery, the collection had to be crammed into the mansion itself. Today, there are seven modern galleries, and they provide a more secure and fireproof location for the gallery's vast collection.
The mansion has changed many times over the years, as Taylor makes clear. We can expect further evolution in the years ahead, because the gallery will need even more space as its collection of 17,000 pieces continues to expand.
The Spencer Mansion tells the story thus far. It's a highly readable account of a real Victoria landmark.
Dave Obee, the editor-in-chief of the Times Colonist, is the author of Making The News: A Times Colonist Look at 150 Years of History. The book's official launch was in Gyppeswyk.
