ANGLIN, James Penrose (1876-1932), active in Montreal, Que where his name appears variously as an architect (1900-01), then as a building superintendent (1902-07), and as a contractor (1907-32). Anglin was born in Kingston, Ont. on 20 February 1876 and was educated at public and high schools there. He learned the building trades as an apprentice to William Rogers, a local carpenter in Kingston, from 1889 to 1893, and then studied at Queen’s University where his name appears as a student in local directories from 1895 to 1897 (Directory of Kingston, 1895-96, 94).
In 1898 Anglin moved to Montreal and was employed as assistant to Robert Findlay from 1898 to 1901. After completing his architectural training in 1901, he took a position with the Bank of Montreal as Superintendent of Architecture at their head office in Montreal, and held this post from 1901 to 1905. Much of his time was taken acting as local site supervisor to McKim, Mead & White, the leading architectural firm in New York City, as they carried out the major additions and alterations to the Bank of Montreal Head Office Building in Montreal. He also worked closely with Sir Andrew Thomas Taylor, and the firm of Taylor & Gordon, who designed virtually all Bank of Montreal branches across Canada from 1884 to 1904. When Taylor left Canada in late 1904, Anglin then organised a new architectural department within the Bank of Montreal, overseeing the design and construction of bank branches from 1905 to 1907. He appears to have also had a particular interest in design and architectural history, and in early 1907 he presented a lengthy paper to the annual convention of the Province of Quebec Association of Architects on the subject of the development of the Corinthian column capital in contemporary architecture (C.A.B., xx, March 1907, 39).
In 1907, the Bank of Montreal decided to hire the Montreal firm of Peden & McLaren to design all new branches for the bank in Canada from 1907 to 1911. Anglin had, by then, decided to leave the Bank in late 1906, and he started his own business as a contractor and builder, in partnership with A.F.Byers, as Byers & Anglin. In January 1913 this firm became Anglin’s Ltd., and it grew rapidly until 1919 when it merged with the American construction firm of Norcross Brothers of Worcester, Mass. to become Anglin-Norcross Ltd. Over the next 50 years, it became one of the largest and most successful construction companies in Canada. Anglin died while on vacation at Lanthier Fishing Camp near L’Annonciation, Que. on 15 May 1932 (obituary The Globe [Toronto], 17 May 1932, 5; biog. and port. in Montreal Old and New, 1915, 421-22; biog. and port. in Who’s Who in Canada, 1922, 123).