[lenaitch]

I don't have many memories from youth. I lived for the first few years near the old Danforth yards and my grandfather worked there in some capacity. I only have one memory of a steam locomotive in line service from visiting an aunt who lived on a street that dead-ended against the tracks in the area of Coxwell. I then moved to Willowdale which was pretty sterile fairly new suburbia. I do recall the York Sub. going in.

As but one example, there were better uses for much of the land than railway yards; but it was an unfortunate decision not to leave connecting track between the mainline and the roundhouse.

But that's how cities and their industries become developed around the world in the days of rain and sail - from the core out, and the convergence of rail and marine transportation is also traditional and common. The days when 'industry' and 'manufacturing' were heavy, labour- intensive and often dirty (remember the stockyards on Keele?) I agree that leaving a connection to the roundhouse was a missed opportunity. At least they kept the roundhouse.

I do miss a lot of the old city - the low rise streetscape of Yonge between Finch and Sheppard, unmanaged valley lands that made youth somewhat of a survival course (we used to catch fish in the Don in what is now G. Ross Lord Park. RCAF Station Downsview with actual fighter jets! But growth demanded change and the economy itself changed. I do believe: however, future residents, urbanologists and historians will question the wisdom of buildings with a virtually complete glass facade. I am convinced that will come back to haunt.

 

[LPCI]

Edward: "What a dire looking place."

For those of us who remember (as youths) the 1950s and 60s, the Toronto waterfront was a place of joy and adventure.
When we went there to board a ferry to the Islands, it was in anticipation of the unique boat trip to a strange land.
And trips to that part of Toronto were necessary in order to enjoy a baseball game at Maple Leaf Stadium or the CNE Stadium -------great fun!
Of course, we only saw the waterfront from ground level, unlike that aerial image.
I don't think we took any notice of the RR yards and tracks as we went thru the underpasses to the water's edge.

And, by the way, I think that area of Toronto is even more exciting today because of the tremendous changes that have taken place.
Am I the only one who is pleased by modernity?

I too was a youth in the 60’s when I lived in TO. Passed through the waterfront often to go to the Islands, or the yacht club. Exciting in its industrial way. Then a few years ago I took my grandson to Fort York and I hadn’t been that way for at least 20 years. I was gobsmaked by the changes! The condos, the parks, the Martin Goodman trail, neon lights under the Gardiner! Awesome. I’d love to live there one day.

 

[steveintoronto]

Some very rich discussion happening here. It's not just the pictures that are 'evocative'...it's also the evocation painting pictures. The two dimensional pics are taking on another dimension of storytelling:

I do miss a lot of the old city - the low rise streetscape of Yonge between Finch and Sheppard, unmanaged valley lands that made youth somewhat of a survival course (we used to catch fish in the Don in what is now G. Ross Lord Park. RCAF Station Downsview with actual fighter jets! But growth demanded change and the economy itself changed.

We're sharing memories! lol...you're an old guy too!

But to try and define a context to rationalize my feelings by: As much as I miss the past, and I'd love to visit, I don't know if I could live there again. Maybe I could given the chance, but what I don't miss was the feeling of being unable to change the present (at the time) let alone the future. I now have that confidence, that self-assurance. And that's priceless. I'm not sure I could trade that to live again in the recollections.

I do believe: however, future residents, urbanologists and historians will question the wisdom of buildings with a virtually complete glass facade. I am convinced that will come back to haunt.

I agree insomuch as glass isn't a very tough building material (usually, it can be very tough, but that's the exception). Already we're seeing the folly of poorly fitted glass panes on condos. In a period of a meteor shower and particles getting through en-masse, we're in deep doo-doos. Even freak wind-storms or inclement weather, let alone unruly social events.

Thinking about the Twenties though, what a time to be an explorer! Standard of living in developed nations was quite high, we overlook that in judging the past, but so much of the Globe was a mystery to be 'discovered'.

Is this the end of the Boater and the dawn of the golden age of the Titfer?

I had to look that up! So that's what those hats are called: "Titfers".

References[edit]

1. ^ Geoff Tibballs (2008), “Tit for tat”, in The Ultimate Cockney Geezer’s Guide to Rhyming Slang, London: Ebury Press, Ebury Publishing, →ISBN, page 182:
   Tit for tat hat / The phrase ‘tit for tat’ […] emerged as a rhyme for ‘hat’ in the late nineteenth century and was subsequently condensed to ‘titfer’ around 1930, in which form it enjoyed unparalleled success at a time when virtually everyone wore a hat.
   

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/titfer

 

[lenaitch]

Such deep philosophical discussion. The period of my youth was undoubtedly a simpler time, or so it likely seemed since all of the world's goings-on weren't so readily at our fingertips; television was in its infancy and what kid read the paper? All of the Cold War brinskmanship was mostly lost on us (although I do remember the air raid sirens). It was simpler in the sense that my dad could have a good government job, be a single parent and own a house in the city, all on a high school education. I could fix a car or bike simply on acquired knowledge and a few tools.

I will confidently guess that those of us waxing nostalgic for 'the good old days' are likely white males; for others it was likely not so much.

If I must, I will say the 80s are my nostalgic time. Not so much for the state of the world but where I was in my life and career. I had the experience and confidence to do anything that confronted me. My first house was only slightly more that what I paid for a deck and some landscaping a couple of years ago. I am not involved in any world-changing causes and strive to influence or change no-one. I'm retired; looking forward to motorcycle season and grumping at those damn young whipper-snappers and their funny music.

 

[steveintoronto]

This pic is fascinating. Note the steam mule! The load of steel is being delivered on the streetcar tracks. Anyone have more information to add to this?

 

[Goldie]

East Toronto Band, at Metropolitan Methodist (United) Church -1908 -TPL

 

[DSC]

Since it is 1908 AND photographed on 12th July I assume the band in Goldie's post above was off to (or back from) the Orange parade!

Not all that many 'Orange" parade photos at Archives but here is one.

 

[Goldie]

The Orange Parade was pretty popular in 1867.
King St. E. looking e. from w. of Yonge St. - TPL

Still popular in 1924.
Looking e. along Queen St. W. from Bay St. -TPL

 

[lenaitch]

This pic is fascinating. Note the steam mule! The load of steel is being delivered on the streetcar tracks. Anyone have more information to add to this?

Interesting. Bridge steel being delivered using streetcar tracks. I always thought one of the reasons the streetcars used a wide gauge was to prevent freight operations on the streets. Perhaps civil works were considered acceptable.

 

[steveintoronto]

Interesting. Bridge steel being delivered using streetcar tracks. I always thought one of the reasons the streetcars used a wide gauge was to prevent freight operations on the streets. Perhaps civil works were considered acceptable.

Many systems used their rails to deliver freight. At one time, the Toronto gauge was used all the way up to Sutton and that allowed the shipping of 'truck produce' down to the St Lawrence Market from farms along the RoW. This was more common with the "Radial Lines"...being standard gauge, and acquisition of freight vehicles and interchange with actual railways much easier and common. Radial lines used the 'wrist coupler' for instance, and pneumatic brakes.

The TTC (not yet formed in 1914) used, to my knowledge, only electric powered freight and utility vehicles, but this would have been a predecessor, possibly even standard gauge, and perhaps not even electrified yet, it's hard to tell from that pic, which I lifted from Pinterest and if someone can locate the Archives original, we can blow it up from a higher resolution source.

What I have discerned is that the lead trailer has a seating position in the front, like a stage coach, and I can only presume it was built either for being horse drawn, or electric, but in this instance, ostensibly not yet electrified, it was drawn by an upright boiler steam mule (locomotive). Although the photo states "St Clair" do we know for a fact this is actually *on* St Clair? And if so, where?

I'm taken aback as to how pristine those houses are in the background....and yet again the question tugs: "Was life better than we assume back then?"

A side point from observation: Those horses! That loco/mule must have been hissing, we clearly see the steam, and yet those horses are perfectly comported.

I continue to dig on details for this pic. Any help most appreciated.

Addendum: I took that pic sourced from Pinterest and enlarged it in Shotwell, enough to tell that there's a headlamp on the first trailer/vehicle. That indicates it being designed to run on electricity, but I can see no sign or a base for the transom pole, which were usually just in front or behind the driver position.

Note again the date on the pic: 1914.

History
The Toronto Civic Railways opened the St. Clair streetcar route in 1913 along St. Clair Avenue West between Yonge Street and the Grand Trunk Railway crossing (near today's Caledonia Road) to serve small developed areas in a newly annexed section of the city. Previously, the only streetcar service near this area was the Davenport line of the Toronto Suburban Railway (along Davenport Road) and the Avenue route of the Toronto Railway Company (ending at Avenue Road and St. Clair Avenue). At the east end of the St. Clair line, passengers could connect with the radial cars of the Metropolitan line of the Toronto and York Radial Railway running on Yonge Street. The St. Clair line was double-track but had no loops or wyes; thus, all streetcars were double-ended.[3]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/512_St._Clair

Here's the map for the Civic Railways:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toronto_Suburban_Railway#/media/File:Toronto_rail_1921.jpg

There's still ambiguity on the gauge!

But let's assume that it is as the above link claims, TTC gauge, then an earlier version of this track vehicle may be what the St Clair pic displays:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/45/1917_Toronto_TTC_Queen_and_Bond.jpg

And poetically, there's the Orange Building in the background!

Note the rails being used, and this might be for reasons of the originating jurisdiction for that particular line, but that is standard mainline rail, not streetcar rail with the inside gutter to protect the wheel flange space when paving is used between the tracks. Streetcar rail is clearly used in the St Clair pic. There is always the possibility that the rail shown above being lifted is actually being replaced, not placed.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d5/Szyny_Głogowska_RB2.JPG

 

[DSC]

Interesting. Bridge steel being delivered using streetcar tracks. I always thought one of the reasons the streetcars used a wide gauge was to prevent freight operations on the streets. Perhaps civil works were considered acceptable.

Particularly since the bridge was also going to have streetcar tracks on it.

This is taken from George Street South, looking up across Front St to the Christie Bakery (now George Brown's St James Campus).

 

[steveintoronto]

This pic is fascinating. Note the steam mule! The load of steel is being delivered on the streetcar tracks. Anyone have more information to add to this?

OK! Some people are adept at using them, I find most institutional search engines an exercise in masochistic slashing and intellectual self-harm, and that includes the Archives, Reference Library, and most any other *non-intuitive* data-bank search. I spent a good half an hour going in circles at the on-line Archive.

Google saves the day, yet one more time.

HomeMedia1914 – jan 23 – St. Clair Avenue – Wells Hill bridge, delivering steel
1914 – jan 23 – St. Clair Avenue – Wells Hill bridge, delivering steel

https://torontoguardian.com/2017/01...ir-avenue-wells-hill-bridge-delivering-steel/

This was from a series of spectacular Archive shots on snow-storms, the above and its companion the only two at the Guardian in this article. There may be more at the Archive...if I can ever get it to work as intuition would allow.

But already now, we know a lot more about "the bridge". IIRC, reading about the Nordheimer, it was originally spanned by a bridge before someone had the brilliant idea (and I'm being very sarcastic) of filling that section in, and blocking the ravine, and splitting off the Cedarvale Ravine from the Nordheimer, a real impediment to this day for persons wishing a walk of bliss from Eglinton down to Summerhill and further. The St Clair subway station, private high school and Loblaws all stand like thugs in the way of free movement. What have they done in the name of progress?

Searching the Google map co-ordinates and Street View offers few if any clues as to which direction we're looking here. I think east in the latter pic, and west in the former. That row of houses in the first pic? On the left in the second. One of the give-aways is the dormer roof details. Without more pics, it might not be possible to accurately discern the lay of the land and buildings, so much radically changed since these pics.

https://www.google.ca/maps/place/We...7d45db9447c2c1!8m2!3d43.6812021!4d-79.4147128

Btw: I now consider it possible that the vertical boiler "mule" in fact is on tracks, but not pulling the following vehicle and bridge section following it. Vehicle could be gasoline powered, and the following bridge section on sleds.

Concrete posts have been installed to carry electricity along both streets in the latter pics, so catenary may be coming later.

More pics for a context, ostensibly 1911, and 1912 according to source copied, but from the same Archive series as above:

https://www.blogto.com/city/2013/09/what_st_clair_avenue_used_to_look_like_in_toronto/

Note the single track! This still the Civic Railway, this stretch wasn't twinned until the TTC takeover almost a decade later.

 

[Goldie]

City Hall Ceremonies..............
City Hall opening -1899 -TPL

George V visit to Toronto, -1901 -TPL

Andrew Carnegie arrival at City Hall -1906 -TPL

 

[Goldie]

"New" City Hall

 

[lenaitch]

This pic is fascinating. Note the steam mule! The load of steel is being delivered on the streetcar tracks. Anyone have more information to add to this?

Such research!

Regarding the headlight in the 'lead' car (which I can't see), it could be oil/acetylene.

Regarding the calm horses, team horses of that era were generally quite used to people, clattering wheels and other distractions; it was their working environment (either that or they are too damned tired to care). Today the moniker is 'bombproof' and they are a joy to deal with. I have a very vague recollection of horse-drawn milk delivery when we lived downtown and they would pretty much start and stop on their own since they knew the route. The driver would have a weight on a line (a 'hobble') that he could drop on the road but rarely needed it.

Regarding the speculated as poles for electrification, in the "Google' photo in post 3917, there looks to be separate poles for phone (the tall pole with multiple circuits) and newer shorter poles with what looks like 3 conductors, split-phase+neutral electrical. I don't know what the world was like back then regarding utilities sharing poles.