Miscellany Toronto Photographs: Then and Now

[CanadianNational]

I've been doing some digging around about artists in Toronto - I'm amazed to find that a number of them lived or visited around where I have my home.

Oscar Wilde spoke at the Allan Gardens pavilion in 1882. David Milne - the great Canadian painter - lived at the Sheldrake, and his sketches of it's interiors are now visible in the AGO's David Milne area.

What' I've been trying to find is information on the former Tudor Hotel on Sherbourne Street.
Wynham Lewis - a leading english modernist - both writer and painter, lived there.


From Canadian Literary Landmarks
By John Robert Colombo:

"The Lewises took a room for $14 a week at the Tudor Hotel on Sherbourne Street, south of Bloor. In his novel Self Condemned, in which Toronto is satirized as 'Momaco' he depicted the Tudor Hotel as the Blundell Hotel, and when the Tudor Burnt in 1943, he described the conflagration. (He referred to this time as his 'Tudor Period.') Thereupon the Lewises rented a room at the nearby Selby Hotel, which is still standing. Lewis also rented a bed-sitting room further south on Sherbourne which he used as his studio for his portrait and other painting.
...At one point he rented a studio at 22 Grenville Street.

 

[enelemcee]

Hello everyone...long-time follower of this thread! A quick question here:
I wonder if the G. A. Stimson building from this picture is the same as the Admiral Appliance building some years later.

 

[r937]

How can you not love this music video?

indeed, it's fabulous

i muted the annoying piano and vocals and thoroughly enjoyed the images and editing

the kid smoking on bay street down from old city hall is a classic

 

[Mustapha]

I've been doing some digging around about artists in Toronto - I'm amazed to find that a number of them lived or visited around where I have my home.

Oscar Wilde spoke at the Allan Gardens pavilion in 1882. David Milne - the great Canadian painter - lived at the Sheldrake, and his sketches of it's interiors are now visible in the AGO's David Milne area.

What' I've been trying to find is information on the former Tudor Hotel on Sherbourne Street.
Wynham Lewis - a leading english modernist - both writer and painter, lived there.


From Canadian Literary Landmarks
By John Robert Colombo:

"The Lewises took a room for $14 a week at the Tudor Hotel on Sherbourne Street, south of Bloor. In his novel Self Condemned, in which Toronto is satirized as 'Momaco' he depicted the Tudor Hotel as the Blundell Hotel, and when the Tudor Burnt in 1943, he described the conflagration. (He referred to this time as his 'Tudor Period.') Thereupon the Lewises rented a room at the nearby Selby Hotel, which is still standing. Lewis also rented a bed-sitting room further south on Sherbourne which he used as his studio for his portrait and other painting.
...At one point he rented a studio at 22 Grenville Street.

CanadianNational, I'll only add Hugh Garner to this conversation. I must read Cabbagetown again; it's been years.

Your avatar, is that Lindsay Wagner? She'll air in locally shot episodes of Warehouse 13 soon. Lovely unassuming lady. A no ego actress; a real pro on set.

 

[Mustapha]

Hello everyone...long-time follower of this thread! A quick question here:
I wonder if the G. A. Stimson building from this picture is the same as the Admiral Appliance building some years later.

Hi enelemcee, yep, you are right:

Welcome.



.

 

[Mustapha]

indeed, it's fabulous

i muted the annoying piano and vocals and thoroughly enjoyed the images and editing

the kid smoking on bay street down from old city hall is a classic

Lovely video effect at 4:02; at the SE corner of King and Roncy.

 

[Mustapha]

http://www.flickr.com/photos/43021516@N06/sets/72157625996980690/

 

[CanadianNational]

Thanks for mentioning Cabbagetown, Mustapha.

And yes, that is Ms. Wagner in my avatar. I was in love with her as The Bionic Woman growing up.

 

[Mustapha]

Happy Thanksgiving to everyone.

Being of Chinese descent I can't help but find myself in Chinese restaurants sometimes (and oftentimes; in Fish and Chip shops , and, United Dairy, but, I digress). Here I am doing my thing cutting my meat intake. This place is on Dundas a couple blocks west of Augusta. I've been going for years and highly recommend.

In that vein, here is an awesome Flickr set of Hong Kong Then and Nows.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/old-hk/sets/72157608410017743/


.

 

[PapaBob]

R100: "Shopped" or not ?

Greetings, Mustapha, Goldie, JT et al...
I happened across this thread while looking for an image of the old Toronto Police Number 2 Division station. I have almost no information: "Dundas/Bay until about 1949, when it was amalgamated with Number 1 Division (Court Street)." I was unable to find anything in Goad's or Mights 1922 (which lists only Headquarters). In any event, I was so enthralled by what I found that I went to the start of the thread and read all the way through, and "what a long, strange trip it's been"! I lived and worked in Toronto for most of my life until 2007 when I retired and moved to Cape Breton Island, so I feel a strong sense of connection and nostalgia riding the "Then and Now" time machine. Side trips to New York, London, Poland and Boston (among others) have been amusing and educational (edifice edification ?).
I am not well positioned to contribute to the "Now" side, but I have some photos and documents in my collection which might be of some interest as "Then" material.
Permit me to offer my opinion of this photo. In the absence of evidence to the contrary, I accept it as genuine for the following reasons: 1) why else would that fellow be standing on top of the streetcar ? [OK, I know he's on the railway overpass, but that's how it looked at first] 2) all the other rubber-neckers are looking in the same direction (towards the dirigible) -furthermore, the light source direction and intensity is consistent between the buildings and the dirigible.

Thank you so much for a wonderful thread. I wish you continued success and "confusion to our enemies".

Well, how ironic ! Shortly after posting (my first ever) I took a further look at images I had saved a few days ago. I found "Old Number Two" at 57 Agnes St. (formerly St. Agnes, later Dundas - but I don't know if the numbers remained the same after the transition to Dundas). On the south side, third door east of Terauley (later to morph into Bay St.) -again, I don't know if Terauley was widened or realigned and the corner building might have fallen victim.
Any more information or leads would be much appreciated; this is verging on an obsession !

Thanks again, everyone !

I was browsing Wikipedia's main page today. In their 'On This Day' section there was an article about the crash 82 years ago of the British R101 dirigible.

I remembered that there are a number of pictures in the Toronto Archives of R101's sister ship - R100 - which crossed the Atlantic and visited Toronto in 1930.

The picture below - showing her serenely drifting above approx. Yonge and King - may or may not show the actual R100 - there were many retouched - we would say Photoshopped now - versions.

So, on to the picture.

http://books.google.ca/books?id=2fA...wBw#v=onepage&q=r100 visit to toronto&f=false

 

[Mustapha]

Hello PapaBob, thank you and welcome.



Bay was widened in 1927 or so. There are Toronto Archive pictures of this neighbourhood referring to the widening. Along this stretch of Bay the sidewalks were cut back; no buildings were demolished.

Your police station no.2 interest: I'm wondering if one of the buildings - there are two - on the right of the photo below - might be your long lost station. One has a pair of very tall doors opened - for police vehicular use perhaps? It also looks like police station architecture. [Have you come across this picture?] There is another building to its right but we are only given a tantalizing glimpse. A Canadian Tire store/Ted Rogers Ryerson classrooms building is there now. I can tell you your police station was not there in the early 1960s - it was a parking lot up until the Eaton Centre was built. Part of the land assembled by the Eaton family in preparation for their Eaton Centre plans? Perhaps those with longer memories can add info as to its date of demolition.

A bit of history about Toronto's Police c1885:

http://books.google.ca/books?id=eEU...q=agnes street police station toronto&f=false



Some personnel information about our police force in 1884.

http://books.google.ca/books?id=v4IZ...tation&f=false



Some of our police and Chief Draper posing for a 1930 era portrait. The Archive notes for this photo: "Item consists of one photograph. Chief Draper is at right. A researcher has identified the location as 69 Dundas Street West, east of Police Station 2, which was at #75-85, between Yonge and Bay streets."

Interesting bio about Chief Draper. I didn't know he and and I worked for the same company - Abitibi paper.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dennis_Draper


Your old photos... we await your kind indulgence.

 

[Goldie]

Hello PapaBob, thank you and welcome.

Your police station no.2 interest: I'm wondering if one of the buildings - there are two - on the right of the photo below - might be your long lost station. One has a pair of very tall doors opened - for police vehicular use perhaps? It also looks like police station architecture.

Those large doors certainly indicate a firehall or police station, don't they (see attached detail)?

 

[PapaBob]

Wow, thanks! You've given me a lot to chew on. I've seen the picture with Chief Draper before but had no idea where it was taken. My next step was going to be research on Eugenio D'Angelo's "travel agency".

You're bang-on with the tall doors. They match with the single photo I'm working on: it's one of those "panorama" shots (I'm a real sucker for them !) "Officers and Men, No. 2 Division, October 4th, 1931" 26" x 7". I'm always reluctant to take them out of the frame but I will scan this one (might take three passes) and I will share it. soon. I promise.

"Toronto: Past and Present" and the newspaper clipping are more grist for my ever-ravenous knowledge mill. Thanks again.

Coming soon to a forum near you: scans of "Military Hospital Staff, Chorley Park, 1943" "Royal Canadian Dragoons, Stanley Barracks, 1931"
"Air Force course, 1107 Avenue Road (former Eglinton Hunt Club) 1942" "Royal Flying Corps, University of Toronto, 1918" ...and a few more.
These are all panoramic photos and of course the buildings are not the primary subjects. All of the photos in my collection are original in that they were printed very soon after exposure. Some are sun-bleached, most are in original frames, too, so the process of dismounting and scanning or photographing is painstaking -to say the least.

I wish I had the equipment + skill + software to share my collection like the picture of the 48th Highlanders overseas battalion in 1916 = http://www.archives.gov.on.ca/english/on-line-exhibits/war_panoramas/big_01z.htm = Anyway, as time permits, I will share what I have.

Retirement means that I have all the time in the world to do anything she wants.

 

[Mustapha]

Those large doors certainly indicate a firehall or police station, don't they (see attached detail)?

Thanks for this closeup Goldie. If that isn't a Police Station, you would have to wonder what in the world it is...

 

[Mustapha]

Then and Now for October 9, 2012.



Then. RL Patterson residence. Built 1885. c1910 picture.

Now. May 2012. Ina Grafton Gage [nursing] Home. Two O'Connor Drive.

History of the home here:

http://www.toronto.ca/involved/statutorynotices/archive2010/feb/hl_020410_1.htm


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