NAGLE, Thomas Warren (1864-1940), a building contractor and architect who was active in Ingersoll, Ontario from c. 1880 until 1916. He was born in Dereham Township, Oxford County on 28 December 1864 and he received his training in the building trades. By 1900 he was listed as the owner and operator of a large planing mill in Ingersoll (Union Pub. Co., Ingersoll Town Directory, 1900, 44). In 1909 the Library Board of Ingersoll held an architectural competition for a new Carnegie Library. The winning design was submitted by James S. Russell of Stratford, and the Perth County Archives still holds a complete set of his drawings for his proposal. However, the Carnegie Foundation in Pittsburgh rejected his scheme, likely because the design was deemed too costly, and the Town of Ingersoll submitted another design prepared by the partnership of Nagle & Mills, Architects. This consisted of Thomas W. Nagle, who had teamed up with another local contractor Walter Mills (1851- 1914). Their scheme was a surprisingly sophisticated Edwardian composition wrapped on three sides with tall, wide windows allowing daylight to flood into the reading rooms. The façade was trimmed with Corinthian Stone, an artificial stone manufactured in nearby Guelph, Ont. Completed in 1910, a photograph of the completed library building was published in the Annual Building Number of the Contract Record & Engineering Review [Toronto], 8 March 1911, 54, but was credited only to Thomas W. Nagle, Architect.
Nagle remained active in Ingersoll until 1916 when he left Canada and joined other ex-patriate residents of Ingersoll who had escaped the ravages of the Canadian winters to set up business in sunny Southern California in the town of San Bernardino. This included David Kilpatrick, architect, and Thomas H. Goff, architect, both of whom continued to practise architecture in San Bernardino after leaving Canada. Nagle was recorded as a “foreman carpenter” there in 1920, and he later joined the General Electric Co. as a foreman in their electrical appliance factory. He died in San Bernardino, California on 25 August 1940 and was buried at Bellevue Memorial Park Cemetery in that city (obituary San Bernardino Daily Sun, 27 Aug. 1940, 12).
NAGLE & MILLS, Architects
INGERSOLL, ONT., Carnegie Library, Charles Street East near Thames Street South, designed 1909 by Nagle & Mills; completed in 1910 by Thomas W. Nagle; library closed c. 2010; building converted to banquet hall, and still standing in 2022 (London Free Press, 17 June 1909, 11, t.c.; Ingersoll Chronicle & Canadian Dairyman, 17 June 1909, 6, t.c.; C.R., xxiii, 23 June 1909, 21, t.c.; xxv. 8 March 1911, 54, illus. in advert.)