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COPYRIGHT 2005 Geological Association of Canada
SUMMARY
The Manitoba Legislative Building was designed by Frank Worthington Simon, assisted by Henry Boddington III, architects from Liverpool, England. The building style is neoclassical, incorporating Greek, Roman and Egyptian motifs and elements. Construction was completed early in 1920 and the building was dedicated July 15, 1920, on the fiftieth anniversary of the Province.
The building is located in central Winnipeg, close to the north bank of the Assiniboine River and rests on 14 m of glacial Lake Agassiz clays over till and limestone bedrock. The mass of the building is supported by 421 concrete caissons that extend through the clays to indurated till or bedrock. Steel frames rest on the caissons and support bearing walls constructed of bricks manufactured from Manitoba shale and clay.
Dimension stones decorate the bearing walls inside and outside, and the floors and stairways within. Each type of stone has its own decorative characteristics and each records geologic processes at different times in Earth history. The predominant dimension stone both outside and inside the building is Manitoba Tyndall Stone. Grey, pink and red Tennessee marbles are from the southern Appalachians. Botticino marble was quarried in the foothills of the Alps in northern Italy. Ordovician black marble and Verde Antique are from the Vermont-New York region in the northern Appalachians. Missisquoi marble is from quarries in southern Quebec near Philipsburg, and also represents a northern Appalachian source.
Bedford limestone, used for most of the statuary, is from south-central Indiana. Butler granite from Ignace, Ontario, was used for steps and floor surfaces of all four porticos. Red marble breccia, used to decorate most fireplaces, may have come from northern France.
SUMMAIRE
L'edifice du Palais legislatif du Manitoba a ete congu par Frank Worthington Simon, assiste de Henry Boddington III, deux architectes de Liverpool en Angleterre. I1 s'agit d'un edifice de style neoclassique comprenant des elements et des motifs grecs, romains et egyptiens. Sa construction s'est acheve au debut des annees 1920 et son inauguration a eu lieu a l'occasion du cinquantieme anniversaire de la Province, soit le 15 juillet 1920.
L'edifice est situe au coeur de Winnipeg, non loin de la rive nord de la riviere Assiniboine, la geologie environnante consistant en une couche d'argile du lac Agassiz de 14 m d'epaisseur reposant sur du till et un socle calcaire.
Le poids de l'edifice repose sur 421 caissons de beton qui s'enfoncent jusqu'au till consolide ou jusqu'au socle. Des structures d'acier appuyees sur ces caissons supportent le poids des murs de briques fabriquees avec des schistes argileux et des argiles du Manitoba.
Des pierres de taille parent les tours porteurs a l'exterieur comme a l'interieur ainsi que les planchers et les escaliers interieurs. Chaque type de pierre de taille presente des caracteristiques particulieres, et chacun temoigne de processus geologique d'une epoque particuliere de l'histoire de la Terre. La pierre de Tyndall est celle qui predomine tant a l'exterieur qu'a l'interieur. Les marbres gris, roses et rouges du Tennessee proviennent du Sud de la chaine des Appalaches. Les marbres de Botticino ont ete extraits du piemont des Alpes dans le Nord de l'Italie. Les marbres noirs et les porphyres verts antiques proviennent des Etats du Vermont et de New York, au Nord des Appalaches. Les marbres de Missisquoi ont ete extraits de carrieres du Sud du Quebec pres de Phillipsburg proviennent aussi du Nord des Appalaches. Les calcaires de Bedford qui ont ete principalement utilises comme materiau statuaire proviennent du centre-sud de l'Etat d'Indiana. Les granites de Butler provenant de Ignace en Ontario ont ete utilises pour les marches et les planchers des quatre portiques. La breche de marbre rouge qui a ete utilisee pour la decoration de la plupart des foyers pourrait provenir du Nord de la France.
INTRODUCTION
The geology of the Manitoba Legislative Building encompasses the subsurface geological conditions of its site, and the source and characteristics of the dimension stones and of other geological materials used in its construction.
The first Legislative Building was opened in 1871. This humble, roughhewn log building was destroyed by fire on December 3, 1873. A second, architecturally-designed Legislative Building was completed in 1884. It served the legislative requirements of Manitoba for a short time only. Rapid growth of the province in the early 1900s led to the need for a much larger building. Consequently, in 1911, plans for the third, and current, Legislative Building were set in motion.
A history of the design competition, site selection, planning, financing, political controversy, and construction of Manitoba's third Legislative Building is in the remarkable book Symbol in Stone (Baker, 1986). The following are some highlights.
A competition for the design of the building was won by the team of Frank Worthington Simon, assisted by Henry Boddington III, architects from Liverpool, England. The site selected in Winnipeg is near the Assiniboine River, immediately east of the Osborne Street Bridge (Fig. 1). The building is neoclassical, incorporating Greek, Roman and Egyptian motifs and elements. Bodnar (1979, p.136) described it as "exhibiting a graceful simplified quality, Beaux-Arts in its arrangement of masses and spaces, but more complex in its treatment of plan and dome." The plan of the building is in the form of an H. The mass of the building is supported by concrete caissons that extend to indurated till or bedrock. Structural brick piers faced with dimension stone comprise the exterior walls, and structural brick piers faced with dimension stone or plaster, are used for the interior walls. Floors are concrete, covered by dimension stone or terrazzo.
[FIGURE 1 OMITTED]
Construction began in 1913. The general contract for construction was awarded to Thomas Kelly and Sons in July 1913. In January 1915, after a delay caused by the start of World War I, a review revealed financial and contractual improprieties, and the Kelly contract was terminated. Furthermore, problems with defective caissons delayed construction. It was not until the end of 1916 that new tenders were called to complete the construction. The new general contractor was J. McDiarmid and Company. Figures 2 and 3 show the different stages of construction.
[FIGURE 2 & 3 OMITTED]
By February 1920, the new Legislative Building was completed. It was dedicated July 15, 1920, on the fiftieth Anniversary of the province. Figure 4 is a current view of the front of the building.
At completion, a list of costs was issued by the Manitoba Department of Public Works (Table 1, Anonymous, 1921). Baker (1986), with the benefit of an historical review, estimated the cost as $9,379,000, not including interest on the debt after the dedication and opening.
SITE FOUNDATION CONDITIONS Excavation of the Foundation
On July 21, 1913, two steam shovels began excavating the sub-basement at the site of the new Legislative Building. Excavation took 31 days, although seven days were lost because of rain and equipment breakdowns. After five days of excavation, the design plans were modified by, 1) moving the site of the Legislative Building 13 m southward toward the Assiniboine River and away from the main access artery, Broadway Avenue, and 2) raising the terrace adjacent to the building by 0.6 m, and the building by 0.3 m, thus reducing the depth of excavation from 2.5 m to 1.5 m (Manitoba Royal Commission, 1915). Raising the building added an additional 0.3 m of cut stone along the perimeter of the building. During excavation about 16,000 [m.sup.3] of soil were removed. Some of the excavated soil was probably used to add a raised terrace adjacent to the Legislative Building.
Foundation Conditions
The stratigraphy underlying the Legislative Building was documented in logs from eight test holes sunk in 1912 and 1913 (AM, GR 3085 G8106, Item 176), logs acquired during caisson excavation (AM, GR 3085 G8100, Item 6, AM, GR 3085 G8107, Item 549) and logs acquired during later examination of selected caissons (AM, GR 3085 G8105, Item 121, AM, GR 3085 G8105, Item 122, AM, GR 3085 G8106, Item 196, AM, GR 1609 G8014, File 3 Item 2). This later examination was in response to cracks that developed in the floors and walls of the Legislative Building during construction, particularly along the north outside wall under both wings and the north portico. These logs revealed a stratigraphy consisting of bedrock, commonly overlain by indurated till and unconsolidated boulder clay, overlain by grey and yellow clay and capped by a thin black loam.
The bedrock underlying the Legislative Building consists of carbonate rocks of the lower part of the Fort Garry Member of the Red River Formation (Baracos and Kingerski, 1998). The depth to bedrock is 14 to 15 m from the top of the horizontal steel frame resting on the caissons (i.e., grillage), except under the north part of the building where it occurs at 14 to 20 m (Fig. 5). Bedrock...
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