BECKWITH, Ernest Ralph (1879-1963) lived and worked in Kingston, Ontario, at first as City Engineer (in 1907-08), and then as consulting engineer and architect under his own name from 1909 until 1921. Born in Colchester, Essex, England on 3 December 1879, he operated an office there as an architect from 1900 until 1904. One of his pupils in his office was Alfred J. Magdin (1881- ) of Colchester. Beckwith emigrated to Canada in 1905 and joined the Ontario Association of Architects during the following year. He moved to Ottawa in 1906 and worked as a staff architect with the federal Dept. of Marine & Fisheries (O.A.A., Proceedings for 1906, list of members). He was appointed City Engineer for Kingston in 1907, but resigned his post in early 1908 (Canadian Engineer [Toronto], xv, 6 March 1908, 178). At the time of his resignation, it was noted that “...his chief success in the architectural profession has been the erection of a City Hall costing $350,000”, presumably a reference to a new city hall building in the Colchester region of England.
In 1909 he opened an office as a consulting engineer and architect in Kingston. One of his first projects was preparing a design for a substantial hotel costing $150,000 utilizing the new construction technology of reinforced concrete and hollow terra cotta tile floor plates (C.R., xxiii, 3 Feb. 1909, 21), but it is unclear if this project was ever built. In 1910 he was in a brief partnership in Kingston with William H. Godwin as Beckwith & Godwin, "Contracting Engineers & Architects" (Daily British Whig [Kingston], 26 April 1910, 2). His largest project in the city was for the Orpheum Theatre, Princess Street, 1909, a three storey classical revival building which still stands today as of 2020. Beckwith moved to Ottawa in 1921 but no information has been found on his architectural activity there. In 1923 he was listed as a clerk with the federal Department of the Interior (City of Ottawa Directory, 1923, 233). He later died in Morrisburg, Ontario on 5 December 1963 (death notice, Ottawa Journal, 7 Dec. 1963, 30; inf. Ontario Association of Architects). A detailed biography of Beckwith was published in the Daily British Whig [Kingston], 21 July 1906, 2; inf. Robert Hamilton, of Hamilton, Ont.)
(works in Kingston unless noted)
ORPHEUM THEATRE, Princess Street, opposite Sydenham Street, 1909 (Daily Standard [Kingston], 13 July 1909, 8; Hardware & Metal Journal [Toronto], xxiii, Jan.-March 1911, 309, illus. in advert.; Jennifer McKendry, Architects Working in the Kingston Region 1820-1920, 2019, 15, biog. & illus.)
VICTORIA STREET, west side, pair of brick dwellings, for Isaac Allen, 1910 (Daily British Whig [Kingston], 20 April 1910, 5; and 26 April 1910, 2)
CLARENCE STREET, at King Street, commercial block for an unnamed client, 1910 (Daily British Whig [Kingston], 26 July 1910, 2)
NAPANEE, ONT., office building for the Napanee Iron Works, 1912 (Daily Standard [Kingston], 4 March 1912, 4, t.c.)
KENSINGTON PLACE, residence for Thomas F Harrison, 1912 (Daily Standard [Kingston], 8 April 1912, 2)
CENTRE STREET, residence for Thomas F. Harrison, 1912 (Daily Standard [Kingston], 8 April 1912, 2)
ABERDEEN STREET, residence for Harry M. Wilder, 1912 (Daily Standard [Kingston], 8 April 1912, 2)
EARL STREET, residence for George Boyd, 1912 (Daily Standard [Kingston], 8 April 1912, 2)
ONGWANADA FRATERNAL LODGE HOUSE, King Street West at Pembroke Street, additions for Lt. Col. Arthur B. Cunningham, 1912 (Daily Standard [Kingston], 8 April 1912, 2)
INVERARAY, ONT., a new parsonage for the Methodist Church, 1912 (Daily Standard [Kingston], 14 Sept. 1912, 4, t.c.)
SOLDIER'S HOME, for the Kingston Veterans Association, 1916 (C.R., xxx, 31 May 1916, 46)