He Lost the Mayor's Race Twice. Today 12 Acres of Downtown Toronto Carry His Name: Nathan Phillips

In December 1954, Nathan Phillips, a haberdasher's son from Cornwall, Ontario, won by fewer than four thousand votes and became Toronto's first Jewish mayor. This video tells the full story: his Yiddish campaign card in Ward 4; the Mother's Day in 1929 that took his eleven-year-old son; the 1951 and 1952 defeats; the five-dollar entry fee that came back in pesos and kroner; Eero Saarinen pulling Viljo Revell's design from the 1958 discard pile; the Chinatown cleared for the square. It ends where the story stands now — the name survived a 2005 bid to sell it, and in June 2026 the square hosted World Cup crowds. — SOURCES: "Nathan Phillips" — The Canadian Encyclopedia https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/nathan-phillips "Nathan Phillips (politician)" — Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathan_Phillips_(politician) "Phillips, Nathan" — Encyclopaedia Judaica via Jewish Virtual Library https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/phillips-nathan "Toronto City Hall" — Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toronto_City_Hall "1954 Toronto municipal election" — Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1954_Toronto_municipal_election "1952 Toronto municipal election" — Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1952_Toronto_municipal_election "Cornwall - First Jewish Settlers" — Ontario Jewish Archives https://ontariojewisharchives.org/exhibits/osjc/communities/cornwall/earlycommunity/ "A Step Forward in Time: Viljo Revell's Winning Design" — City of Toronto Archives https://www.toronto.ca/explore-enjoy/history-art-culture/online-exhibits/web-exhibits/web-exhibits-local-government/a-step-forward-in-time-torontos-new-city-hall/a-step-forward-in-time-viljo-revells-winning-design/ "What's There at Nathan Phillips Square" — City of Toronto https://www.toronto.ca/services-payments/venues-facilities-bookings/booking-city-facilities/city-squares/nathan-phillips-square/whats-there-at-nathan-phillips-square/ "Grand Designs: The Toronto City Hall and Square Competition 1958" — Toronto Public Library https://tpl.ca/blogs/post/grand-designs-the-toronto-city-hall-and-square-competition-1958/ "Happy Birthday Toronto: In with the New - Toronto's City Hall Design Competition" — Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library, University of Toronto https://fisher.library.utoronto.ca/fisher-blog/happy-birthday-toronto-new-torontos-city-hall-design-competition "The Belfast of Canada" — The Christie Pits Riot https://www.christiepitsriot.org/the-belfast-of-canada/ "Riot at Christie Pits" — Read the Plaque (Heritage Toronto plaque text) https://readtheplaque.com/plaque/riot-at-christie-pits "Civic Symbol: Creating Toronto's New City Hall, 1952-1966" (University of Toronto Press, 2015), Christopher Armstrong — the standard history of the competition and construction "Mayor of All the People" (McClelland and Stewart, 1967), Nathan Phillips — his own memoir