"The Sault Ste. Marie District Courthouse, completed in 1922, is prominently located on Queen Street, the main street in downtown Sault Ste. Marie. The imposing, symmetrical, three-storey structure is built of orange-brown stone and brick. It is set back from the street on an elevated site and approached by a circular driveway.
Designed by Frank R. Heakes, at the height of his career as Chief Architect of the Ontario Department of Works, the Sault Ste. Marie District Courthouse is a fine, and largely unchanged, example of Beaux-Arts Classicism combined with fine workmanship, material and attention to detail. The imposing nature of the structure demonstrates the economic confidence of the Sault at the end of the Clergue Industrial Period (1894-1911) and the Provincial desire to symbolically demonstrate the power of the judicial system.
The courthouse is a landmark because of its striking architecture and prominent setting in downtown Sault Ste. Marie. There has been a courthouse on the site since 1843.
Key character defining elements that define the building’s Beaux-Arts Classicism design include:
– its symmetrical southern elevation, presenting a classical facade to Queen Street (the other elevations are plainer versions of the southern facade)
– its temple front facade, consisting of ionic columns supporting a brick pediment
Key character defining architectural elements of the design of Courtroom 1 include:
– classical double cube dimensions
– the subdivision of its walls with double pilasters
– Corinthian capitals
Key character defining elements that reflect Heakes’ architectural style in courthouse design include the building’s:
– broad central staircase with oak panelling and wrought iron railing
– stained and/or painted glass ceiling over the staircase, illuminated by an exterior skylight
– intricate and detailed plaster mouldings
– woodwork and finishes
Key character defining elements that relate to the building’s landmark location include its:
– elevated position
– set-back on the site
– circular drive through a park-like setting
– prominent downtown location close to other important public sites such as the Post Office and the Sault Ste. Marie Cenotaph." – info from Historic Places.
"Sault Ste. Marie (/ˈsuː seɪnt məˈriː/ SOO-seint-ma-REE) is a city on the St. Marys River in Ontario, Canada, close to the Canada–US border. It is the seat of the Algoma District and the third largest city in Northern Ontario, after Sudbury and Thunder Bay.
The Ojibwe, the indigenous Anishinaabe inhabitants of the area, call this area Baawitigong, meaning "place of the rapids." They used this as a regional meeting place during whitefish season in the St. Mary’s Rapids. (The anglicized form of this name, Bawating, is used in institutional and geographic names in the area.)
To the south, across the river, is the United States and the Michigan city of the same name. These two communities were one city until a new treaty after the War of 1812 established the border between Canada and the United States in this area at the St. Mary’s River. In the 21st century, the two cities are joined by the International Bridge, which connects Interstate 75 on the Michigan side, and Huron Street (and former Ontario Secondary Highway 550B) on the Ontario side. Shipping traffic in the Great Lakes system bypasses the Saint Mary’s Rapids via the American Soo Locks, the world’s busiest canal in terms of tonnage that passes through it, while smaller recreational and tour boats use the Canadian Sault Ste. Marie Canal.
French colonists referred to the rapids on the river as Les Saults de Ste. Marie and the village name was derived from that. The rapids and cascades of the St. Mary’s River descend more than 6 m (20 ft) from the level of Lake Superior to the level of the lower lakes. Hundreds of years ago, this slowed shipping traffic, requiring an overland portage of boats and cargo from one lake to the other. The entire name translates to "Saint Mary’s Rapids" or "Saint Mary’s Falls". The word sault is pronounced [so] in French, and /suː/ in the English pronunciation of the city name. Residents of the city are called Saultites.
Sault Ste. Marie is bordered to the east by the Rankin and Garden River First Nation reserves, and to the west by Prince Township. To the north, the city is bordered by an unincorporated portion of Algoma District, which includes the local services boards of Aweres, Batchawana Bay, Goulais and District, Peace Tree and Searchmont. The city’s census agglomeration, including the townships of Laird, Prince and Macdonald, Meredith and Aberdeen Additional and the First Nations reserves of Garden River and Rankin, had a total population of 79,800 in 2011.
Native American settlements, mostly of Ojibwe-speaking peoples, existed here for more than 500 years. In the late 17th century, French Jesuit missionaries established a mission at the First Nations village. This was followed by development of a fur trading post and larger settlement, as traders, trappers and Native Americans were attracted to the community. It was considered one community and part of Canada until after the War of 1812 and settlement of the border between Canada and the US at the Ste. Mary’s River. At that time, the US prohibited British traders from any longer operating in its territory, and the areas separated by the river began to develop as two communities, both named Sault Ste. Marie." – info from Wikipedia.
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