JB's Warehouse & Curio Emporium

This post offers supplementary material for a recent Torontoist article , which you should read first before diving into this post. Cartoon by Andy Donato, the Toronto Sun , January 30, 1988. One of the pleasant surprises I discovered while researching this story was that all of Toronto’s major newspapers agreed that the Supreme Court of Canada made the right decision to kill the existing federal abortion law. There were notes of caution (the Sun ’s editorial strongly recommended counselling on alternatives and birth control, while the Star suggested some controls would be necessary), but they weren’t accompanied by troglodytic language. I was impressed by the Sun ’s coverage—it was very even-handed, to the extent of a point/counterpoint piece where representatives from pro-choice and anti-abortion groups were given space to state their views side-by-side. There was one exception, and it’s a doozy.

From November 2011 through July 2012 I wrote the "Past Pieces of Toronto" column for OpenFile, which explored elements of the city which no longer exist. The following was originally posted on May 27, 2012.  Front cover of special number of The Eaton News showing Eaton’s College Street. City of Toronto Archives, Series 682, Subseries 1, File 34. Once upon a time, a major retailing family decided that College and Carlton Streets would replace Queen Street as the city’s main east-west artery. They intended to erect one of the world’s largest retail/office complexes at the southwest corner of Yonge and College. Though reality intervened, the end result, the Eaton’s College Street store , was hardly a letdown. Eaton’s began assembling land at Yonge and College prior to World War I. When construction began in 1928, Eaton’s envisioned a seven-storey base housing a store topped by an office tower rising 670 feet into the sky. While all of Eaton’s merchandise and of...

This post offers supplementary material for a recent Ghost City column written for The Grid , which you should read first before diving into this post. Source: The Globe , September 10, 1915. Besides Mayor Tommy Church, at least two other people spoke during the September 9, 1915 cornerstone ceremony for the Canadian Pacific Railway's new North Toronto station. CPR general manager A.D. MacTier thanked everyone for their assistance in initializing the project: “I hope that through this gathering I may be able to get to know your city officials, businessmen and the public generally, believing as I do that only by much personal friendship and knowledge of each other’s aims and needs can that mutual understanding and respect be created, without which the proper amicable relations between a large public utility and the people of a great city can neither be created nor maintained.” Also speaking was jurist William Mulock, who referred to the ongoing conflict in Europe. Accord...

This post offers supplementary material for a recent edition of Historicist posted on Torontoist , which you should read first before diving into the following text. Headline, the Toronto Star , December 18, 1958. Accompanying several of the stories I drew upon were plenty of  screaming front-page headlines. Or at least there were in the Star and the Telegram - it appears the Globe and Mail thought they were below their sober, reserved standard. TTC Chairman Allan "Lampy" Lamport soon caused enough problems for the transit provider on his own when he resigned his position several weeks later.

Click image for larger version of the front page of the May 2, 1993 edition of the Toronto Star . I expected to run into honking cars galore. Given last night was do-or-die time for the Maple Leafs, I figured there would be mass celebrations if they managed to survive the first round of the playoffs. In the checkout line at the Vic Park and Gerrard FreshCo, the customer ahead of me asked the clerk if she had heard any game updates. She had—it looked like the boys in blue were headed to victory. Mentally noting that the game was almost over, I anticipated running into happy, honking fans spilling onto the streets. Drove west along Danforth. Nothing. Deciding I wanted to discover the result organically, the dial on my radio developed an allergy to hockey games. The streets were still quiet when I reached home. No honking in the distance as there was when the Leafs won their first match in the series. Overtime, perhaps? A quick glance at social media told me all I nee...

From November 2011 through July 2012 I wrote the "Past Pieces of Toronto" column for OpenFile, which explored elements of the city which no longer exist. The following was originally posted on April 15, 2012. Advertisement, the Globe and Mail , January 22, 1948. The man probably struck the staff of Fran’s on St. Clair Avenue as eccentric. Most nights, he dropped into the 24-hour diner around 2 a.m., bundled up in a heavy coat regardless of weather, gloves covering his hands. Whether he spoke through his scarf or not, the order was the same every time: a plate of scrambled eggs. Given his nocturnal habits and its close proximity to his apartment, pianist Glenn Gould became a Fran’s fixture . Catering to the habits of night owls like Gould was one reason the original location of Fran’s stayed in business for 61 years. As longtime customer Shirley Olejko told the Star when the restaurant closed in 2001,”when you were partying, after a long night you came here ...

This is the first and last reference to Kenny Rogers in this post. Apologies to  fans of "The Gambler" hoping for more. Tomorrow marks a decade since I jotted my first random thought online. The site has waxed and waned, from periods of prolific posting to a depository of reprints from defunct outlets. What started as an attempt to resurrect my university journal writing habit became the launch pad for my current writing career, even if many early entries were little more than text messages which I later wiped out. The earliest screen capture I could find of the site, snapped June 2, 2004. The ongoing process of reformatting and cleaning up old entries has revealed plenty of changes over the past decade. In May 2003, I had long dropped the notion of working at Canadian Tire’s head office for two years before moving on to something else. By year four, a comfort zone had set in. Yet old creative impulses reassert themselves. Writing had been a painful process since ...

  Source: the News , December 15, 1911 Initially I thought this piece was typical advertorial copy of the period. Reading on, a couple of things jumped out at me: no reference to a specific distributor/manufacturer, no mailing address, and no customer testimonials. It's a legitimate story about the latest innovations in facial massage technology. It's easy to see why this invention never caught on - if the facial contraption fell off, drowning was a giant risk. If anything, this contraption resembles a proto-snorkel -- the inventor might have better directed his energy to developing deep-sea diving equipment.

While processing a pile of backlogged vintage ads awhile back, I encountered a set of spots from a batch of mid-1980s issues of Maclean's promoting a period creamy liqueur. Each ad listed 21 favourite items of models straight from Eighties central casting. Which made me think: what would a list of 21 of my favourite things look like? I loathe making "favourite" lists of any sort. Compiling "top ten" lists makes me shudder. Yet I love reading them. Go figure.

ITEM! If it's the first weekend in May, it's time for Jane's Walk . In just six years the annual event has grown from a handful of strolls around Toronto to walks in 25 countries. I've enjoyed the walks I've joined, and decided this year to lead one . Toronto has long enjoyed one of the most competitive newspaper markets in North America. With no fewer than three major competing dailies at any time since the 1870s, Toronto readers are accustomed to a broad range of editorial viewpoints. Our papers have been run by a cast of characters including philanthropists, labour and social activists, political parties, comic strip enthusiasts, lousy businessmen, and Fathers of Confederation. The behind-the-scenes stories were often as dramatic as those that were printed in the pages of publications bearing banners like Empire , Globe , Mail , News , Star , Sun , Telegram , and World . This walk will look at the sites where the news was produced, and how thos...

Source: the Telegram , March 22, 1922. The same day that the Toronto Star heralded the work of Frederick Banting, Charles Best, J.B. Collip, J.J.R. Macleod and their associates for giving those afflicted with diabetes a "message of hope," this disgusting "medical breakthrough" appeared in the Telegram . I believe the same technology has been employed in fiction to cure vampirism. I also don't doubt that stories like this warmed the hearts of casually racist readers, or those who might have believed such a quack invention would truly improve humanity.

From November 2011 through July 2012 I wrote the "Past Pieces of Toronto" column for OpenFile, which explored elements of the city which no longer exist. The following was originally posted on March 4, 2012. “Meet me at the Shell Tower” pamphlet, circa 1955, City of Toronto Archives, Fonds 261, Series 756, File 50, Item 1. Oil can giveth, and oil can taketh away. That might be the easiest way to sum up the story of the 36-metre-high clock tower that provided Canadian National Exhibition visitors with a great view of the city and a foolproof meeting spot for 30 years. Born from sponsorship by an oil giant, the landmark died to make way for a car race . Designed by architect George Robb , the modernist Shell Oil Tower was the first building in Toronto to utilize welded-steel construction. It quickly proved a popular attraction following its debut in 1955, thanks to promotional pitches like this one: There’s a new landmark at the “Ex.” It’s the Shell Oil To...

From November 2011 through July 2012 I wrote the "Past Pieces of Toronto" column for OpenFile, which explored elements of the city which no longer exist. The following was originally posted on March 17, 2012. Demolition of Leslie Street ramp viewed from north side of detour, looking south-east, photographed by Peter MacCallum, January 20, 2001, City of Toronto Archives, Series 572, File 77, Item 4. As work began on the eastern extension of the Gardiner Expressway in 1964, the man whose name graced the highway was proud of the road that became one of his legacies. “You know,” said Frederick Gardiner, “I used to lie in bed dreaming in Technicolor, thinking it was too big. Now I know it isn’t. Maybe in 20 years time they’ll be cursing me for making it too small. But I won’t be around to worry then. Right now, I’ve come up smelling of Chanel No. 5.” Outside of some nearby residents who missed what Globe and Mail columnist Michael Valpy called their “private free...

Source: The Grid , April 18-24, 2013. Yep, that's me in the contributor profile section of The Grid this week. Pretty good company here - it's funny both of us chose "war on the car" as the City Hall debate we're tired of. The piece associated with this profile is online for your reading pleasure...or, if you're in Toronto, grab a copy from your friendly neighbourhood box.

This post offers supplementary material for a recent edition of Historicist posted on Torontoist , which you should read first before diving into the following text. Can you spot the Laura Secord shop in this picture? Click image for larger version. Streetcar track work at Queen, King, and Roncesvalles, April 23, 1923. Photo by Alfred Pearson. City of Toronto Archives, Series 71, Item 2058. For a chain whose locations spread quickly across Toronto, finding good, close-up shots of a Laura Secord store from the City of Toronto Archives' online selection was like looking for a needle in a haystack. There's a sign here, a shop hidden behind hydro poles there, and generally good landscape shots where a Secord store is only a tiny portion of the picture. A Laura Secord shop hiding behind a pole at the southeast corner of Yonge and Bloor. Maybe it was feeling shy when this shot was snapped on September 9, 1926. City of Toronto Archives, Fonds 200, Series 372, Subseries 3, I...

From November 2011 through July 2012 I wrote the "Past Pieces of Toronto" column for OpenFile, which explored elements of the city which no longer exist. The following was originally posted on February 19, 2012. Cover detail from Honest Ed’s Story by Jack Batten (Toronto: Doubleday, 1972) Honest Ed Mirvish had a giant beef with his restaurant empire on King Street West. A 500-ton-per-year-sized beef. Chosen as his signature dish due to the simplicity of cooking and serving it, the affordable roast beef dinners Mirvish devoured amid the bric-a-brac at Ed’s Warehouse and its sister restaurants kept actors, businessmen, theatregoers and tourists well fed for over 30 years. Diners enjoyed Yorkshire puddings, canned peas, Salvation-Army seating, galleries of forgotten actors and Tiffany-style lamps, but only so long as men donned a jacket and tie. Long after most Toronto restaurants abandoned formal dining dress codes, Ed’s Warehouse stuck by its fashion policy...

From November 2011 through July 2012 I wrote the "Past Pieces of Toronto" column for OpenFile, which explored elements of the city which no longer exist. The following was originally posted on April 8, 2012. Bata Headquarters, Don Mills, circa 1965-1969. City of Toronto Archives, Fonds 217, Series 249, File 356, Item 023. Thomas Bata was proud that the Don Mills headquarters of his shoe empire was designed so that it couldn’t be expanded. He believed that the role of headquarters was not to dictate corporate policy, but to act as catalyst for stimulating new approaches to marketing and product development. “In outlining our specification to the architect,” he wrote in his autobiography Bata Shoemaker to the World , “we insisted that the building should be designed so that, if we were ever tempted to spawn a huge bureaucracy, we would be thwarted by the lack of space and immovable walls.” While Thomas Bata’s vision was fine as long as his company retained the p...

Source: Daily Mirror (overseas edition), April 4, 1953. One of the oddest Easter images found kicking around the ol' Warehouse. If the egg was smaller, it would be tempting to label this post "Giant Mutant Baby Altered by Nuclear Test Attacks Innocent Easter Egg." As it is, it's as goofy as a shot in the same browning bound edition of the British tabloid featuring Orson Welles wolfing down a bowl of spaghetti . Perhaps the Mirror should have sponsored an eating contest between this chocolate-loving child and the movie auteur.

From November 2011 through July 2012 I wrote the "Past Pieces of Toronto" column for OpenFile, which explored elements of the city which no longer exist. The following was originally posted on March 11, 2012. Temple Building, probably between 1967 and 1970.  Photo by Ellis Wiley. City of Toronto Archives, Fonds 124, File 2, Item 53. One of the sections marked "Temple Building" above the entrances survives as a ruin at The Guild. “Want to go see a monument destroyed?” the Globe and Mail asked readers in its July 6, 1970 editorial. “Go down to the corner of Bay and Richmond streets and watch them make gravel out of the Temple Building . It won’t go easily or prettily because it wasn’t built with destruction in mind. It was intended to last like the Pyramids, one of the wonders of a young country, a great stone tribute to an Iroquois who became supreme chief ranger of the Independent Order of Foresters (IOF) in 1881.” Oronhyatekha liked whatever he ...

When I hit my teens, I started imitating my father’s interest in building a healthy music library. It started with an occasional cassette, then the gift of The Beatles 1962-1966 (aka “The Red Album”). During a stop at Sam the Record Man on a grade eight trip to Toronto—a stop I insisted the group I was with make, even if it cut into others’ precious time at Yonge Street head shops—I bought my first large haul of pre-recorded music, some of which is now laughable but was influenced by peers at the time—Poison’s Open Up and Say...Ahh!  anyone? In early 1990, my father clipped an article from the Detroit News listing record stores worth investigating on future cross-border trips. Both of us, along with my sister, would rapidly expand our collections thanks to at least two stores listed in the piece. Twenty-three years on, most things associated with this article are gone. Nearly all the stores profiled. The massive tape collection I built up. My father. Yet, along wit...