1912 Manitoba Legislature Competition

The present grand building had its origin in December, 1911, when the provincial government decided to call competitive drawings for the new provincial capitol. All architects in the British Empire were permitted to bid by the terms of the competition and on the closing date in the spring of 1912, 67 sketches for the proposed building had been submitted. The judging of these drawings was at once undertaken and by elimination, all but five were passed up. After further consideration and expressions of opinion by outside architects, these five were reduced to two- the drawings of Frank Simon of Liverpool, and F. S. & W. H. Maxwell, of Montreal

In order to secure a competent authority to make the final decision, the Manitoba government engaged Mr. Leonard Stoke, past president of the Royal Institute of British Architects, to determine which of the two suggestions was the most acceptable. In his judging, Mr. Stoke was unaware of the identity of the two architects and based his decision solely on the merits of the respective drawings. As a result of his careful determination, the scheme of Mr. Simon was accepted and he was instructed to proceed to draw up specifications upon which tenders might be called.