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Dundas east of Coxwell

I

interchange42

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Anyone have any history of Dundas Street East in instant recall, or somewhere easily accessible?

I am wondering about the section between Coxwell Avenue and Kingston Road. I know that part of it used to be Maughan Crescent. Does anyone know if the rest of Dundas was plowed through that section all at one go, or were there any other streets that were subsumed by it? Does the name Apple Grove mean anything in that regard?

Thanks in advance to the History experts!

1842
 
Dundas ended E of Broadview until the mid-50s, when it was plowed under the tracks and all the way through to Kingston Rd...
 
From a 1928 map that I have:

Dundas started at Ossington

Working east:

Arthur Street to Bathurst

St. Patrick from Bathurst to McCaul

Anderson Street from McCaul to University

Agnes from University to Yonge

Wilton from Yonge to the Don River

Elliott from the Don to Bolton

After that it gets patchy. Large open lots with a few small east west streets intermixed that might be Dundas today such as Whitby, Dickins, Dagmar, Duel, Apple Grove and Ashbridge.

Actually just checked google maps and half of Dagmar still exists as does all of one block Dickins. The others were swallowed up. Also a small part of Edgewood right at Kingston was taken over.
 
Here's what it looks like in 1948 from a "Toronto Visitors Guide", which includes TTC and Grey Coach maps as well as a street map. The map isn't great for it does not have many street generics - just the names themselves.

Dundas is Dundas now between Ossington and Broadview and a bit to the east. Dundas still does not meet itself at Bathurst (a jog via Bathurst), otherwise it is through.

Dundas ran east to Boulton. It becomes Whitby up to the CN tracks.

There's nothing from the CN line to Jones, except for between Marjory, where it's not clear if the road is an alley or part of Doel (between Dagmar and Mallon)

Doel - Jones to Alton, Applegrove from Greenwood to Rhodes (1 block west of Coxwell) One block gap to Coxwell.

Then for one block, it's Ashbridge between Coxwell and Maughan Crescent. Dundas takes over a small portion of Maughan, and as Ed comments, Edgewood.


Tidbit: Ossington between Dundas and Queen was part of the Dundas Road originally, which started at Queen - helps to explain why Dundas starts to curve west of there - was not a straight grid road.
 
And also provides some insight as to why Ossington starts at Queen. Interesting.
 
interchange time to reward us with an explaination as to why you needed this info.

questioning bond james bond 007
 
Why can't it be simple curiosity? After all, that Maughan Crescent situation *does* stand out...
 
Here's your answer: one of our map customers gave us a call and asked about it. We don't have an archive of older maps here (before 1978 anyway) and neither have I put together a comprehensive collection at home. I knew at least a couple of you would have some easily accesible maps though, so thank you for all the replies - our customer will be happy to hear the answer!

grateful 42
 
The Allery on Front Street East has a great series of large format maps of Toronto from the late 19th's century - they show old street names, how the lots were divided, municipal wards - for example, in the one for my hood you can see how what is now St. James' Park was divided up and where the alleys were.

The whole set would look great framed and hung together.
 
Small Ponds

I have been looking into this area as well. What I have found out is that Orchard Park on Dundas St E was once Smalls Pond. It stretched from Queen St E north past Dundas St E, then known as Applegrove and Maughan. The portion of the pond that stretched north east towards Kingston Rd was called Serpentine. Cool :)
West of Coxwell was Ashbridge. At some point Ashbridge, Applegrove and the south side of Maughan became Dundas St E all the way to Kingston Rd.
I found maps of this area at the Toronto Archives. They show that there was a foot bridge that crossed Smalls Pond at the end of Applegrove that took pedestrians to Maughan Cresent.
There are some pictures still around of the pond and people skating in winter time.
I am trying to find out when this street name change happened and if there are any pictures of Applegrove at that time. I own a house on that stretch and have been researching when it was built and would love to find some pictures of my house.
 
The ponds received their water from Small's Creek, which still flows today, in the open, in parts.

You'll see traces of its just south of East Lynn Park (flowing down the low-point between people's back yards, before it becomes a an open brook in a ravine, just south of there........it wanders under the railway corridor and follows a ravine south to Gerrard Street, which comes out just to the west (but still facing Fairmount Park/Bowmore School.

Its then buried, briefly, below said park before reemerging south off Newbold avenue where it has a very short open reach before diving under Gainsborough and the No Frills Parking Lot.....from whence it never reemerges.

My understanding is that the stream probably began just north of Danforth Avenue, flowed through to the ponds, and then somehow made its way to the Lake, but I'm not quite sure how.
 
06_01_02BeachesRiversMap.jpg


There we go!

PERFECT!

That shows Small's Pond, and Small's Creek and all the other buried creeks in the Beach! :D
 
OT,

That 1894 map is pretty interesting. Considering that nobody had a car, and electric streetcars were a relatively new invention, Toronto was quite sprawly - I think it had about 200,000 people at that time - which is far less than the number of people occupying that same space today. It looks like Toronto stretched from about Woodbine to Runnymede. That's a 3 hour walk for somebody who's relatively fit, and I don't think many travel options existed that were faster than walking speed back then.
 
Yeah, it's very interesting. Love the hi-res, and being able to see all of the streets/alleys which are still with us today (particularly since I grew up in Cabbagetown). Much of the downtown is the same, save for Dundas.

They did have horse-drawn carriages...that would've been much faster than walking. Dunno how much of the roads were cobblestone (or brick?) versus dirt back then. Considering Toronto's moniker of "Muddy York", I'd assume it to be dirt. So I guess travel would've been fairly slow.
 

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