Walking tour to celebrate Toronto's first Black politician

A new walking tour this summer will celebrate the legacy of a man who literally changed the face of Toronto's politics, Canada's first elected politician who wasn't white: William Peyton Hubbard.

Elected as a City Alderman in 1894, Hubbard served until 1914, including stints as acting mayor of Toronto. But east end resident Lanrick Bennett was embarrassed to say he'd never heard of him until the 2010swhen Hubbard's name was put forward in a park naming contest in Riverdale.

In 2016, a park at Broadview Avenue and Gerrard Street E.was officially named Hubbard Park. This summer, Bennett is organizing a historical walking tour from Hubbard's former residence on Broadview to the park, which will be lead by fellow east ender Marie Wilson, who initiated the campaign to name the green space after him.

"As a parent, I want my kids to understand that there are people that look like them that were around, that were here, that came before," Bennett said.

"They were fighting the good fight back then."

The tour is part of a series of Black history walking tours that Bennett will be hosting this summer to coincide with Emancipation Day in August, called #HearThis. This week, he was awarded a $1,000 grant from the charities Toronto Foundation and Volunteer Toronto to organize the walks.

He will also be digitizing the routes so people can do them on their own time.

"This entire project is about amplification," Bennett said. "I don't know everything about all the history within this neighborhood and within this community, but I want people to start digging."

Park named after Hubbard in 2016

In the contest to name the park nearly a decade ago, Wilson put up flyers and approached people in the neighbourhood to tell them who Hubbard was and why they should vote for him. She learned of Hubbard from the plaque in front of his former home.

"I'm not only fascinated by history, but by forgotten history and the forgotten people in history," she said. "I think that Hubbard fell into that category. I know that there are some people who know of him and did back then, but in a big way, I don't think he was known."

At the time of the park's unveiling, Hubbard's great-granddaughter Lorraine Hubbard said it was the first, permanent public recognition of his contributions to the city.

Aside from the fact that he was the city's first Black politician, who always stood up for the underdog, she said her favourite fact about Hubbard was that he baked himself a birthday cake every year.

Hubbard was born near Bathurst and Bloor streets, after his parents escaped enslavement in America. But he didn't begin his political career until he was in his 50s, after working as a baker and cab driver.

He was elected in his second attempt in one of the wealthiest and whitest wards in Toronto, which spanned University Avenue to Bathurst Street. He was reelected 14 times.

Hubbard faced and fought racism

When others wanted them privatized, Hubbard helped keep Toronto's hydroelectric and water systems public utilities, which led to the creation of Toronto Hydro. He was also part of the city's Board of Control, a powerful four-member group at the city's executive level that advised the mayor on municipal spending.

Wilson said he was also an instrumental player in the creation of High Park.

"He was a champion of the underdog and he just felt that the poor people, the disenfranchised, needed what we now call green space," she said.

While breaking barriers, Heritage Toronto's website says Hubbard defended other marginalized groups, such asthe city's Chinese and Jewish communities, from discrimination and violence.

But being a Black man at the turn of the century, he had his own experiences of racial abuse from city councillorsfrom other cities, Heritage Toronto says. When conducting business outside the city, he was sometimes required to carry character reference letters from the mayor.

Bennett hopes that through the tour, he can provide a context of the Black history found in Toronto's east end.

"It's kind of cool to be living where we do and to know that history is around you and it'sliterally outside of your front door," he said.

For more stories about the experiences of Black Canadians from anti-Black racism to success stories within the Black community check outBeing Black in Canada, a CBC project Black Canadians can be proud of.You can read more stories here.