Portrait: H.V. Dalling

Horace Dalling (b. 1854) was a master jeweller/watchmaker who operated in downtown Woodstock (near the present site of Home Hardware) in the late 19th century. Evidence suggests that Mr. Dalling was in business from the early 1880s until at least the Fall of 1907.

Among his most note-worthy accomplishments; in 1886 -- before the telephone was commonplace-- Dalling installed a private telephone line between his shop and his home to be used by himself and his family. The cable used to facilitate the line was strung across tree limbs from the town square, along Connell Street to the Dalling residence. Not long afterwards the Bell Telephone Company of Canada (founded only six years earlier) sent an employee to investigate the Dalling phone system. Bell agreed to open a small telephone exchange in the jewellery shop, but not before first threatening Mr. Dalling with a lawsuit for infringing on the company's patent. A twenty line switchboard was installed in the store and Dalling's existing system was upgraded and expanded with the latest equipment. And so it was that Horace V. Dalling became a Bell agent and the manager of Woodstock's first telephone exchange.

Other interesting items relating to H.V.:

In January of 1887 Dalling began installing electric door bells in the homes of Woodstock residents.

In 1889 he purchased a deer captured near Monticello by Fred Moore in order to attempt to domesticate the animal. No word on how well that worked out for Mr. Dalling.

In February of 1891 Mr. Dalling was among a number of downtown merchants (occupants of a wooden building owned by B.B. Manzer) who suffered losses in a fire. After the fire was extinguished Dalling, along with the Baileys of the Bailey Brothers Shoe Store, treated the firemen to a dinner of oysters. Mr. Dalling's losses were estimated at $150. Adjusted for inflation, this amount would equal over $3,000 today.

The Canada Pacific Railroad Co., in 1893, selected H.V. Dalling to act as official inspector of clocks and watches for this district. Said the Carleton Sentinel: "Horace will be found right, every time."

Beginning in 1900, local golfers who won the club championship were awarded the Dalling Cup. The championship trophy was "a very handsome silver cup, engraved, and mounted on an ebony base."

In 1907 Dalling's son Cliff took up the family business, purchasing a jewellery firm in Saskatoon.

There are no records stating exactly when Mr. Dalling passed away, but a likely estimate is that it was sometime between 1915 and 1930.


Illustration of Dalling's store by John Campbell of Woodstock