FAIRN, Clifford William (1877-1969), brother of the prominent Nova Scotia architect Leslie R. Fairn, was born in Waterville, N.S. on 19 February 1877 and was recorded as an architect under his own name in Dartmouth, N.S. and across the bay in Halifax, N.S. in 1909-10. He was educated at Truro Normal School, then moved to Massachusetts to attend the Commercial High School at Worcester. Upon returning to Canada, he spent three years in St. John's, Newfoundland as Instructor at the Methodist Manual Training School (Evening Mail [Halifax], 8 Aug. 1907, 2, biog.), and then moved to Darmouth, N.S. in August 1907. He may have trained in his brother's office in Aylesford, but later opened his own practise in 1908. A biography of C.W. Fairn was later published in the Evening Mail [Halifax], 25 May 1911, 1. For reasons which are unclear, he left Nova Scotia in the autumn of 1911 and moved to Calgary where he became a partner in the office of Hay & Fairn, Architects (see list of works under Charles E. Hay). He later returned to Nova Scotia after 1920, and appears to have abandoned the profession, choosing instead to pursue a career in automobile sales. He later died in Wolfville, N.S. in 1969 (biog. in M. Rosinski, Architects of Nova Scotia, 1994, 197).
HALIFAX, N.S., Lawlor Building, Water Street at Portland Street, alterations and extensive remodelling, 1909 (Evening Mail [Halifax], 27 Jan. 1909, 2)
HALIFAX, N.S., Thomson Groceries Ltd., alterations to retail store, 1909 (Evening Mail [Halifax], 27 Jan. 1909, 2)
DARTMOUTH, N.S., Victoria Public School, Wyse Road, 1910-11 (Evening Mail [Halifax], 2 Feb. 1911, 1 & 2, descrip.)