[adma]

Development started moving out into what's now 905 in the 70s, really. The atmosphere south of Eglinton was decided hostile to development by 1965, and it shows in the downtown we have today, I think. It's broke, it hasn't created a net new job in my lifetime, and it's fusing its helium with pathetic projects like Dundas Square. If it weren't for yuppies wanting condos that keep the rest of us from ever having a hope of seeing Lake Ontario again, I don't think a building permit would have been issued after 1980. Most people who want to build something new these days look to Vaughan or Mississauga, or even beyond. "Donut Centre, what a hole" (thank you, Looney Tunes).

Between your present comments on Toronto and your comments elsewhere on Hamilton, I'd swear you're in cahoots with this crowd...

 

[adma]

I remember an insanely manic, animated TV commercial with a catchy song ("Hop on a bus we're Eatons bound .." I think the lyric was ) showing little art-decoesque people in tight jackets and baggy pants jumping onto snake-like transit vehicles that hopped and looped across the landscape downtown to Eatons. It think it was early 1970's, before the Eaton Centre opened. Very Fritz the Cat, acid trippy, keep on truckin'. Some agency must have fun with that one, in the dying days of a department store's last bid for creativity and connection to a generation of young baby boomers with a bit of money to spend.

I do seem to recall in early childhood some Eatons ad in the flapper/sheik manner of John Held Jr...

 

[Lone Primate]

Between your present comments on Toronto and your comments elsewhere on Hamilton, I'd swear you're in cahoots with this crowd...

Well, I wouldn't mind.

 

[Urban Shocker]

Yes, adma, that's it exactly.

 

[Skeezix]

I'm starting to think it was a shame that we lost the old Eaton's building on Queen Street. I'm too young to remember it, but that picture at least gives it a real dignified look from Yonge.

IIRC it wasn't very pretty inside, certainly not as nice as the Simpson/Bay store. I remember the basement feeling like Honest Ed's.

The old Eaton's store was falling down. I read in Rod McQueen's book that they had to fill some of the stairwells with concrete to give it more support. That and they painted the red brick battleship grey in the last few years. I think the photos make it look better than it actually was at the end.