HYDE, George Taylor (1879-1944), a partner in the successful Montreal architectural firm of Nobbs & Hyde from 1910 to 1944. He was born in Montreal on 23 August 1879 and graduated from Montreal High School in 1896. That same year he enrolled in the Architecture Dept. at McGill University, and later graduated in 1899. He worked for a brief period of a few months for the firm of Taylor & Gordon in Montreal, then moved to Boston, Mass. where he studied architecture and engineering at Massachusetts Inst. of Technology, obtaining a Bachelor of Science degree in 1901. He worked with a variety of architectural, engineering and construction firms in Boston, and later in Pittsburgh, Penn. where he was employed as President of the Keystone Sand & Supply Co. Ltd. in 1904-06 (Pittsburgh City Directory, 1904, 817).
In 1907 he returned to his home town of Montreal and became a registered member of the Province of Quebec Association of Architects in November 1907, then opened an office under his own name in late 1907. It was during this period that he also collaborated with Percy Nobbs on their first commission together, for the design of the original University Club building on Dorchester Street West, 1907-08 (Gazette [Montreal], 30 March 1908, 5, descrip.). This article noted that the Club building was completed "...under the supervision of Prof. Nobbs of McGill, and Mr. G.T. Hyde, and a quiet unobtrusive scheme of decoration has been carried out".
He was a talented and capable designer, and he received more than a dozen commissions for residential, commercial, industrial and ecclesiastical projects, and his list of clients included members of the wealthy Birks family, as well as the Tiffin family and the Redpath Estate. Many of his original drawings from this period of 1907 to 1910 have survived, and are now held within the Canadian Architecture Collection at McGill University, and show him to be a skilled delineator and draftsman. His knowledge and talent was already known to Percy Nobbs, a Scottish-born architect who had arrived in Montreal in 1903, and Nobbs invited Hyde to form a new partnership in 1910 (see list of works under Nobbs & Hyde). Their joint practise flourished, and over the course of the next 34 years their firm made a substantial contribution to Canadian architecture, with major works executed in a distinctive Scottish Baronial style, or in a refined Beaux Arts style.
During this period, Hyde also served a term as President of the Province of Quebec Association of Architects in 1928, and the following year he was elected as a Fellow of the Royal Inst. of British Architects in London, England. After 1939, he held the post of construction supervisor of various buildings for the Wartime Housing Ltd. within the Province of Quebec. Hyde died at Ste. Agathe des Monts, Que. on 23 June 1944 (obituary Gazette [Montreal], 24 June 1944, 14; biog. and port. National Reference Book, 1929-30, 216-17; biog. Who’s Who in Canada, 1936-37, 544; inf. Province of Quebec Association of Architects; inf. Royal Inst. of British Architects, London). A full list of early works by G.T. Hyde from the period of 1907 to 1910 was published by McGill University in their Finding Aid to the Nobbs Collection, entitled: Percy Erskine Nobbs and His Associates - A Guide to the Archive, 1986, pp. 69-74.
George T. HYDE (works in Montreal unless noted)
UPPER PEEL STREET, pair of houses for Herbert M. Marler, 1907 (Le Prix Courant [Montreal], 1907, Week No. 34, p. 42; Montreal Daily Star, 10 Jan. 1921, 16, descrip. in real estate advert.; dwgs. at McGill Univ., Canadian Architecture Collection)
THE UNIVERSITY CLUB, Dorchester Street West at St. Monique Street, for McGill University, extensive alterations to a residence formerly occupied by George Sumner, 1907-08 (Gazette [Montreal], 10 Jan. 1908, 5, descrip.; 30 March 1908, 5, descrip.). N.B. This Club should not be confused with the University Club later erected on Mansfield Street in 1912 (see list of works under Nobbs & Hyde)
BIBLE HOUSE & TRACT SOCIETY, Union Avenue, for the Montreal Bible Society, a retail store and dwelling for the General Agent J.H. Carson, 1908 (C.R., xxii, 1 July 1908, 25; Gazette [Montreal], 29 Jan. 1909, 9, descrip.)
McGILL STREET, near St. Maurice Street, a five storey warehouse for the Redpath Estate, 1908 (Le Prix Courant [Montreal], 1908, Week No. 30, p. 42)
WESTMOUNT, residence for the architect George T. Hyde, Westmount Avenue, 1908 (dwgs. at McGill Univ., Canadian Architecture Collection)
WESTMOUNT, residence for W.L. Fraser, Strathcona Avenue, 1908 (dwgs. at McGill Univ., Canadian Architecture Collection)
PINE AVENUE WEST, residence for T.P. Howard, 1908 (Le Prix Courant [Montreal], 1908, Week No. 45, p. 187; dwgs. at McGill Univ., Canadian Architecture Collection)
COTE DES NEIGES ROAD, near Pine Avenue, residence for David A. Lewis, 1908 (Le Prix Courant [Montreal], 1909, Week No. 15, p. 40; dwgs. at McGill Univ., Canadian Architecture Collection)
JOHN WATTERSON & CO., Murray Street, a new warehouse block, 1908-09 (Le Prix Courant [Montreal], 1908, Week No. 48, p. 38; Const., ii, Dec. 1908, 62; C.R., xxii, 30 Dec. 1908, 28)
BELVEDERE ROAD, residence for Preble McIntosh, 1909 (dwgs. at McGill Univ., Canadian Architecture Collection)
WESTMOUNT, two pairs of semi-detached houses for Thomas Lamb, Montrose Avenue, 1909 (dwgs. at McGill Univ., Canadian Architecture Collection)
LIVINGSTONE PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, Atlantic Avenue at Hutchison Street, Parc St. Louis, 1909 (dwgs. at McGill Univ., Canadian Architecture Collection)
UNION AVENUE, near Berthelet Street, extensive alterations to residential block for Charles Lester Tiffin, 1909 (Le Prix Courant [Montreal], 1909, Week No 28, p. 42)
LACHINE, QUE., private school for the Dissentum School Trustees, 1909 (C.R., xxii, 11 Aug. 1909, 20, t.c.; and 15 Sept. 1909, 22)
CANADA PAINT CO., William Street, near Chatham Street, a four storey warehouse, 1909 (Le Prix Courant [Montreal], 1909, Week No. 49, p. 40)
MATTHEWS-LAING LTD., stables for the Laing Packing Co., Mill Street, 1909-10 (C.R., xxiii, 1 Dec. 1909, 23)
CEDAR AVENUE, near Cote des Neiges Road, residence for J. Earle Birks, of Henry Birks & Sons, 1909-10 (C.R., xxiii, 22 Dec. 1909, 23; and C.R., xxiv, 23 Feb. 1910, 23)
WESTMOUNT, 4 pairs of semi-detached houses for T.P. Howard and Preble McIntosh, Montrose Avenue at Clarke Avenue, 1910 (dwgs. at McGill Univ., Canadian Architecture Collection)
WESTMOUNT, two houses for J.H. Scott, Roslyn Avenue, 1910 (C.R., xxiv, 2 Feb. 1910, 23)
WESTMOUNT, residence for Mrs. F.E. Devlin, Rosemount Avenue, 1910 (dwgs. at McGill Univ., Canadian Architecture Collection)
WESTMOUNT, two houses for Mrs. P.M. DeGruchy and Mrs. R.A. Winters, Grosvenor Avenue, 1910 (dwgs. at McGill Univ., Canadian Architecture Collection)
VALLEYFIELD, QUE., addition of a Parish Hall for the Presbyterian Church, 1910 (dwgs. at McGill Univ., Canadian Architecture Collection)
OUTREMONT, row of three houses for Robert Neville Jr., Bloomfield Avenue, 1910 (Town of Outremont b.p. 329, 31 May 1910; and b.p. 331, 2 June 1910)
PEEL STREET, north of Ste. Catherine Street West, a 3 storey retail store & commercial block for R.H. Bryson, 1910 (Montreal Daily Star, 8 Oct. 1910, 20, illus. & descrip.)