1916 – Curran Block, Brandon, Manitoba

Designed by local architect David Marshall and constructed in 1916 for hardware merchant Joseph B. Curran. On the main floor was commercial space, with residential apartments on the upper two floors. Built in two parts, subtly different from each other and united by a central pediment. Marshall has an interesting backstory.

“…was born in Kirkentillock, Scotland on 23 May 1879 and articled to James Lindsay, a prominent Glasgow architect. He obtained his architectural education at the Glasgow School of Art and emigrated to Canada in 1906 where he settled in Montreal and joined the firm of Hogle & Davis. The partners in this Montreal firm sent him to Manitoba to supervise the construction of their designs for various branches of the Merchants Bank. He arrived in Brandon in early 1907 and may have been employed as an assistant to W.H. Shillinglaw, the leading architect in western Manitoba who was to later invite Marshall to form a partnership in 1911 (see list of works under Shillinglaw & Marshall). After serving overseas in the Canadian Army during WWI, Marshall opened his own office in Brandon in 1920 where his best known work was the Collegiate Gothic design for the Citizen’s Science Building on the campus of Brandon College, 1922-23. By 1927 he had moved to Chicago, presumably to continue to practice. He was last recorded in New Zealand in 1951 where he had taken up residence.”
Biographical Dictionary of Architects in Canada