Winnipeg’s Main Street in the early 1900s was still mostly mud and prairie gumbo, crosshatched by narrow wagon wheel tracks — vestiges of a frontier past as it teetered on the cusp of becoming one of North America’s most robust cities.

In spring 1903 it crossed that threshold.

That’s when the corner of Main and William Avenue, the edge of a former creek bed, was chosen as the site for what would become western Canada’s first skyscraper.

Construction of the Union Bank building marked a leap forward for the young city. Though it stood just 11 storeys tall, it towered over the two-and-three-storey buildings fronting Main.

When completed in November 1904, it was the second-tallest building in the British Empire. And for the next two years it was the tallest building in Canada, according to Heritage Winnipeg. 

“The statement it made was that Winnipeg was changing. We were progressive. We were a player, we were important to Canada,” said Cindy Tugwell, executive director of Heritage Winnipeg.

Union Tower, as it became known, easily topped the eight storeys of the Merchants’ Bank building, which opened in 1902 at Main and Lombard Avenue.

Demolished in the 1960s for the Richardson Building, Merchants’ Bank was considered by some as the west’s true first skyscraper. However, those under 10 storeys have historically not been considered as such, according to Encyclopaedia Britannica.

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