VERNON, Ernest Daniel (1872-1941) was born in London, England and attended public school and junior college there. In 1888 he came to Canada with his mother and two brothers and settled at Salmon River, Nova Scotia, near Truro, and began to advertise himself as an architect in Colchester County (Truro Daily News, 12 Jan. 1892, 3). He lived in Halifax in 1893-94 'where for several years he studied architecture' and in 1895 he opened a furniture store on Prince Street in Truro, a business that he operated successfully under his own name until his death in 1941. Vernon also maintained an architectural practise for nearly forty years in that town, but the quality of the work is inconsistent and uneven. His practise was patronized by several locally prominent clients including Frank Stanfield, the local member of the Nova Scotia Assembly, for whom he designed a sumptuous residence in the Queen Anne style. His scheme for the Colchester County Hospital (1925) is an unprepossessing and tame interpretation of the Gothic revival style. Vernon died in Truro on 20 November 1941. The Colchester County Museum in Truro holds a small collection of his drawings (obituary in the Daily News [Truro], 21 Nov. 1941, 4; biography in M. Rosinski, Architects of Nova Scotia: A Biographical Dictionary, 1994, 275; inf. Mrs. R. Freve)
TRURO
VICTORIA HOTEL, Prince Street, major addition for A.H. Learment, 1894-95 (Truro DaIly News, 20 Dec. 1894)
DOMINION STREET, residence for Frank Stanfield, 1903 (dwgs. at Colchester Co. Museum, Truro)
VERNON & CO. FURNITURE STORE, Prince Street, 1911 (dwgs. at PANS)
WILLOW STREET SCHOOL, 1914-15 (C.R., xxviii, 9 Sept. 1914, 66, t.c.; Truro-Hub of the Province, 1915, 16, illus.)
CENTRAL FIRE HALL, Young Street, addition, 1915 (dwgs. at Colchester Co. Museum, Truro)
ST. JOHN'S ANGLICAN CHURCH, Church Street at Prince Street, new Parish Hall, 1916 (Evening Mail [Halifax], 15 July 1916, 12, t.c.; dwgs. at Colchester Co. Museum)
PROTESTANT ORPHAN'S HOME, Bible Hill, 1918 (Halifax Herald, 15 May 1918, 2, t.c.)
ALICE STREET SCHOOL, 1921 (C.R., xxxiv, 15 Dec. 1920, 47-48; dwgs. at Colchester Co. Museum)
MARITIME HOME FOR GIRLS, Aberdeen Street, 1920-22 (Evening Mail [Halifax], 9 July 1919, 26, t.c.; C.R., xxxiv, 21 April 1920, 57; and xxxviii, 30 July 1924, 756-58, illus. & descrip.)
COLCHESTER COUNTY HOSPITAL, Willow Street, 1925 (C.R., xxxix, 15 July 1925, 702-03, illus. & descrip.; xli, 12 Jan 1927, 24-5, illus & descrip.; dwgs. at PANS)
VICTORIA ROAD, residence for W.H. Faltenhine, 1938 (C.H.G., xviii, Aug. 1941, 19, illus.; dwgs. at Colchester Co. Museum)
PRINCE STREET, residence for E.D. Vernon, architect, 1940 (C.H.G., xvii, Aug. 1941, 18, illus.)
ELSEWHERE
FALMOUTH, N.S., renovations to the Anglican Church Rectory, 1896 (Canadian Churchman, xxii, 19 March 1896, 181)
COVERDALE, N.B., Home for Deliquent Women, 1925 (C.R., xxxix, 25 Feb. 1925, 48)