Evocative Images of Lost Toronto

[thecharioteer]

Great selection, deepend! I love the change in scale from picture to picture, from stockrooms, to schoolboys, to fires, to railroad tracks, to arenas, to a woman on a bridge. It's like a Toronto version of "Cavalcade" as the decades speed by.

 

[thecharioteer]

Here's a picture of something we're unlikely ever to see again:

 

[LowPolygon]

Here's a picture of something we're unlikely ever to see again:

wow...
you're absolutely right--we'll never see that particular product again. i wonder where the whales were being harvested? likely to have been either the far North or Newfoundland. it seems like a product that wouldn't have taken hold in a big way--as i don't think us Southerners ever really developed a taste for it....

 

[adma]

This image really intrigued me because of that precocious Moderne add-on to the old fire hall...then it dawned on me: that's the fire hall tower co-opted for the St. Charles Tavern on Yonge St! (And that tall Victorian to its left still stands.)

 

[College Park]

This image really intrigued me because of that precocious Moderne add-on to the old fire hall...then it dawned on me: that's the fire hall tower co-opted for the St. Charles Tavern on Yonge St! (And that tall Victorian to its left still stands.)

The fire tower has worn quite a selection of skirts.

 

[LowPolygon]

This image really intrigued me because of that precocious Moderne add-on to the old fire hall...then it dawned on me: that's the fire hall tower co-opted for the St. Charles Tavern on Yonge St! (And that tall Victorian to its left still stands.)

by god--you're right! i thought it looked oddly familiar...

 

[thecharioteer]

Couple more views of the venerable St. Charles tower:

1949:

1959:

 

[Conrad Black]

And now we know why the corner south of the St Charles is newer and only one floor. Fire!

 

[LowPolygon]

Couple more views of the venerable St. Charles tower:

i hadn't noticed that Jokeland was no longer with us. that's a shame--twas a veritable Yonge street institution. now we have a store selling 'fortune and strength' in its place. all in all, not necessarily bad things to be selling, but a bit of caveat emptor is probably appropriate in this instance. also, big phat thumbs down to the EIFS entombed St. Charles. oh god, when will be free of this pox on our facades?? it looks absolutely horrible.

if i had my way, the inventor of that stuff would be in the witness protection program---along with the guy who invented Clippy the Office Assistant...

 

[smuncky]

compositionally, i love this photo.

 

[LowPolygon]

compositionally, i love this photo.

i am very fond of it as well. i love the early photos of the approach to the city, along the lakefront, when it was still largely rural....

i like these shots too:

 

[adma]

also, big phat thumbs down to the EIFS entombed St. Charles. oh god, when will be free of this pox on our facades?? it looks absolutely horrible.

if i had my way, the inventor of that stuff would be in the witness protection program---along with the guy who invented Clippy the Office Assistant...

Though granted, it isn't like the previous phase or two of predecessor facades were any better (i.e. post- the 50s version). And at least this BIAish "facade improvement" came with the long-awaited tower restoration. (Personally, I find the stuccoish treatment of the Victorian facade to the left more unfortunate.)

And don't be *too* hard on EIFS...IIRC from a heritage standpoint, its origins are actually a bit illustrious (think Old Warsaw, etc). Of course, that's no excuse for crimes commited in its name, but...

And now we know why the corner south of the St Charles is newer and only one floor. Fire!

And the one-storey taxpayer replacement actually looked quite elegant for a one-storey taxpayer--with tenants to match (Renault and Hughes-Owens, especially). If you look carefully, bits of old elegance remain in the form of granite and limestone facings here and there.

Interesting, too, from the St Charles' 50s neighbours that this was once evidently some kind of "radio row"...

 

[Edward Skira]

Sam The Record Man started off as a radio store and the original location was around College and Yonge.

 

[thecharioteer]

I think that nothing is more evocative of old Toronto than the sound of a horse going down a street on a quiet summer night. Though we've talked bout what the smell of 19thC Toronto must have been, it's interesting to imagine the sound of the pre-WWI city. Toronto was a city of horses, from the old nag pulling the garbage wagon to the "four-in-hand" pulling the aristocrats of Jarvis Street:

Sight-seeing 1905:

H.A. Massey's carriage 1905:

Beaumont Road, Rosedale:

The horse market:

Kensington:

 

[Uncle Teddy]

And then the whole world as they knew it changed.