>> IT’S BEEN 60 YEARS since a Winnipeg construction firm set a new national record for building a house in the fastest possible time — having maintained a breakneck pace while finishing, landscaping and decorating a two-bedroom home in just 19 hours and 10 minutes. Fast forward six decades, and both the house and the company are still here, proof of the foresight and industriousness that for years have kept the city’s housing market on the map. Back in 1957, on the evening of Saturday, Sept. 20, a crew of about 200 contractors and workers from Quality Construction Co. Ltd. (now Qualico) assembled at a property on Cherry Crescent in Windsor Park, where they were flanked by a giant one-armed clock that for the next 20 hours or so would mark their progress. At stake were the bragging rights behind Canada’s fastest home build, a record at that point held by a Toronto outfit that had completed a house in 21 and a half hours a few months earlier. Quality Construction’s attempt to break the record coincided with National Home Week in Canada, and served as a focal point for that year’s Parade of Homes in Winnipeg. Cont’d on page 42
Parade of Homes FALL 2017 7
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