Fire Insurance Plans...

[Steve]

I'm a fanatic about maps, blueprints and plans. Particularly, historic ones. So, when I first learned about fire insurance plans (FIP) at the Lambton Room, I was truly excited.

FIPs are detailed scale plans that were produced in Canada primarily by Charles E. Goad, who was a civil engineer and surveyor. He made these plans for the benefit of insurance underwriters, who used them to determine fire risk and protection measures in built up urban areas. The plans were produced on bristol board sheets, starting in the late 1800s until the early to mid 1900s. They were updated regularly with either new sheets, or with revision slips that were pasted over areas that had changed since the original survey. They are large scale (typically 100 feet to the inch). They typically show street layouts, homes, railway tracks and structural details not seen in any other map or plan still available.


Fire Insurance Plans are now online!

The Lambton Room holds a nice collection of FIPs of Lambton communities on the original bristol board sheets and I've photographed most of them. But, now the Library and Archives Canada site (LAC) (formerly, the National Archives) has scanned and posted a huge collection of FIPs from across Canada.

Here's an example of what the FIPs from the LAC look like. This one is of my hometown, Wyoming in 1906:

Wyoming FIP 1906


Here's a link to the FIP archive at the LAC. It has the Ontario list of maps expanded. Keep an eye open for Lambton communities:

FIPs Online at Library and Archives Canada


See below for a list of Lambton FIPs available online at the LAC site. Also, keep in mind, not all FIPs held at the Lambton Room are available online, or in in the LAC collection, so if you don't find a FIP you're looking for, contact the Lambton Room.


Hope you find these FIPs as fascinating as I do...

Feel free to post links to your favourite FIPs in this thread...

[Laurie]

So excited to see this! I also love maps!

[Steve]

For those looking for a comprehensive list of what FIPs are still extant and where they're held, the following publications are available:

• Catalogue of Canadian fire insurance plans, 1875-1975 - Dubreuil, Lorraine ; Woods, Cheryl A. , Association of Canadian Map Libraries and Archives - 2002
  
  
• Canadian fire insurance plans in Ontario collections, 1876-1973 - Fortin, Marcel, 1967- ; Dubreuil, Lorraine ; Woods, Cheryl A., Association of Canadian Map Libraries and Archives - 1995
  

both of which provide a list of places, dates with revision dates, creators, plans and sheets, and the names of the institutions where the plans are held.


I haven't been able to find copies of either of these publications online, yet. If anyone comes across them, please post the links here...

In the meantime, your local library may be able to get these for you through inter-library loan.


Cheers, Steve


Update: I've since been able to borrow a copy of the Catalogue of Canadian fire insurance plans, 1875-1975 and have recorded all entries pertaining to Lambton FIPs available in Canadian collections. If you require this info, feel free to contact me.

[Steve]

Here's an attachment with an image of the Archives Ontario search page, that gives a detailed description of Fire Insurance Plans, the holdings at the Archives and other research information...

Attachments:

[Steve]

Below you will find a list of Lambton County fire insurance plans currently available online at the Library and Archives Canada website.

The links point to the actual FIP images online. If the LAC holding description for the FIP is required, go to the (alphabetic) master list of Ontario FIP holdings here and choose the plan required.

• Alvinston 1896
  
  
• Arkona 1896 1906
  
  
• Brigden 1894 - #1 1894 - #2 1906 - #1 1906 - #2
  
  
• Courtright 1896 1906
  
  
• Florence 1898 1906
  
  
• Oil City 1896
  
  
• Oil Springs 1894 - #1 1894 - #2 1906 - #1 1906 - #2
  
  
• Port Lambton 1900
  
  
• Thedford 1900 1906 - #1 1906 - #2 1906 - #3
  
  
• Wyoming 1906 - #1 1906 - #2 1906 - #3
  

If you find broken or erroneous links, or discover that LAC has added more Lambton FIPs to its online collection, please contact me, or post here.

Steve

[Steve]

As related here, I'm a big fan of Fire Insurance Plans (FIP). The Lambton Room has a nice collection of Lambton area FIPs, including Petrolia for the year 1925.

However, the era in Petrolia that really fascinates me as a student of built heritage is the 10 or 15 years beginning just before and spanning the turn of the 19th century; about 1890 to 1905. This era represents, more or less, the peak of Petrolia's 'oil era' development; the era in which the money made years earlier in the boom of the '60s and '70s was put to work building the Petrolia we still, in large part, recognize today. This is the Petrolia of brick and stone and iron. This building spree - a second generation of major development, that began about 1880 - replaced the clapboard shacks of the oil boom town with Victorian streetscapes, soaring church steeples, luxurious mansions and huge industrial works.

Now, that's not to say that this era was a rosy one. Quite the contrary. It was an era of great change and transition. The oil 'boom' was long over and production had been steadily declining for years by the 1890s. There were clouds on the horizon, culminating in the transfer of the vast Imperial Oil Company works to Sarnia in 1898, after the company was purchased by Standard Oil.

So, by 1898 the peak had been reached. With the departure of Imperial Oil, Petrolia would enter a long period of decline. It took decades for the town to rebuild its economic foundations. It could easily be argued, that it has yet to regain, let alone surpass, that peak of development reached in the 'gay '90s'.

Therefore, what I really wanted was a FIP showing Petrolia during this peak of physical development. From the Catalogue of Canadian fire insurance plans, 1875-1975 I knew that there were extant copies of the 1898 Petrolia FIPs held at the British Museum. But, purchasing scans of these FIPs would cost over $600! Fortunately, the catalog indicated that the British Museum had lent their copies to the then National Archives of Canada to be photographed. I couldn't find any reference to these on the LAC online catalog, but by contacting the LAC, I was able to arrange to purchase high resolution digital copies for $120!

What a worthwhile purchase! These FIPs show Petrolia as it was right at the summit of its development and as it would turn out, right on the cusp of its fall. These FIPs are dated May 1898, just 2 months before the Standard Oil purchase. Thank goodness on that timing, as one of the highlights of these plans are that they show the entire property of the Imperial Oil refinery at its greatest extent.


Other highlights include:

• structures still standing on what would soon be Victoria Park.
  
  
• The original Petrolia Electric Company building on

[/b]Lorne Ave.

[/li][li]Stevenson's Boiler & Engine Works on Centre St.

[/li][li]The home of D. Noble on Petrolia St. at Tank St.

[/li][li]The first Christ Church on Railroad St.
[/li][/ul]

I'll be looking forward to using these FIPs for Google Earth overlays and eventually, in the recreation of Petrolia 1898 in 3D...

Here's the key page of the FIPs. The coloured areas show the coverage of the 7 sheets.

(click to enlarge)

Library and Archives Canada