History
Trinity College circa 1852, referred to as Old Trin
Founding
In 1827, Bishop John Strachan, an Anglican deacon who arrived in Canada in 1799, received a Royal Charter from King George IV to build King’s College at York (now Toronto). At the time the British Empire was being reformed along financial and religious lines, and one of the goals of the “new system” was to form churches (by way of land grants) and schools in all of the colonies. However, York was so small at the time that there were no funds available for actually building the college, and the first classes were not held until 1843.
In 1848, the first local elections were held, and the land grants to the churches reverted to “crown” ownership. Strachan withdrew his support for the school when, in 1849, the school was secularized and became the University of Toronto on January 1, 1850.