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James Headly Acland fonds
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James Headly Acland fonds

  • UTA 1002
  • Fonds
  • [195-]-1976

Records documenting Professor Acland’s research, publication and teaching activities. Includes notebooks, scripts and draft papers, photographs, slides, and negatives. The fonds is dominated by over 4000 prints and negatives documenting his research interest in and publication of his book The Gothic Vault and the book Building by the Sea written with Eric Arthur on the study of maritime architecture on Canada’s east coast. Also included are numerous prints of Toronto where Acland was active in the preservation of historic buildings such as Old City Hall.

This accession documents to a limited degree James Acland’s research, teaching and publications. It is limited because very little of his textual records survived, although there is a good number of notebooks that were mostly likely used for lectures. Records relating to his architectural conservation work especially relating to saving Old City Hall are held at the City of Toronto Archives.

This accession does however give a good representation of Acland’s photographic work that formed the basis of his research and publications. There are extensive photographs and negatives relating to The Gothic Vault as well as Building by the Sea. There is a large collection of photographs taken on a trip to Europe in 1964. These would have most certainly been used for research and teaching. All the images in this collection are well identified in terms of their location and site. However, few give specific dates. It is assumed that most of the images were taken through the 1960s and some in the early 1970s.

Sometime after his death, a collection of 25,000 slides was donated to the University of Toronto and was distributed among 15 departments. A catalogue of these slides was prepared by the Centre for Medieval Studies and published in 1984: Catalogue of the James Acland Slide Collection. Only a few slides were donated with this accession and it is possible they are duplicates of what is found in the larger collection.

Acland, James Headly

Course materials and notebooks

This series contains one file of course materials such as outlines, reading lists, lecture schedules for courses Acland taught at various institutions. Courses for the University of Toronto School of Architecture include 2.23 The European Tradition of Framed Building, 2.24 Mediterranean Tradition, 2.26 The House, 2.27 Residential Patterns 222 and 322 History of Architecture.

Acland’s notebooks, which he most certainly used for lectures, document the subject matter of the courses and the way in which Acland organized his lectures. There are eight in total, illustrated with his original sketches.

Resource cards

This is a series of index cards that are colour coded and grouped by country. Most cards contain architectural drawings copied from books but some are hand drawn by Acland. There are also postcards showing buildings and some notes. These were most likely used to organize his research and supplement his lecture notes found in the notebooks.

Conservation work

To a limited degree, the two files making up this series document Acland’s involvement in the Canadian Inventory of Historic Buildings. Included are some inventory forms completed by students in the 1970s, and an article about the project written by Acland and published in Ontario History, Sept. 1971. Photographs most directly related to his conservation work in the Toronto area are found in Series 10.

Publications

This series documents two books and one article. The first publication is Building by the Sea, limited edition photographic study of Maritimes architecture with foreword by E.R. Arthur and plates by J.H. Acland published by University of Toronto Press 1962. One large file contains the outline, notes and a photocopy of an early draft. Soon after the two authors published “The Maritimes” in the Journal of the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada, July 1963. A copy is found in this series. Photographs relating to these two publications can be found in Series 7.

The third publication is Medieval Structure: the Gothic Vault (1972). This work was a culmination of all his research on middle ages architecture. Included is the original publication agreement, some original drawings, and long narrow tabs with rough sketches of the illustration that were being considered for the book. These were most likely used to organize and select the illustrations. A copy of the book has been kept with the papers. For photographs related to this publication see Series 8, 9 and 12.

Box /001 (19) – (22) and /005 for illustrated markers.

Essays, talks and scripts

This series contains draft manuscripts, outlines and related correspondence of talks given by Acland such as “The Medieval House” (1974), and Architecture and “The Arrogant Towers” (1967). Also there are scripts and related correspondence for CBC programs in which Acland was involved including Explorations, Man in a Landscape and A Sense of Place. Some files include slide lists and original drawings.

Biographical file

This series is one file containing a copy of his birth certificate, a C.V., a Fellowship Leave Application, a publication list, and a biography written around 1976. Documents give a good overview of his career and achievements.