Evocative Images of Lost Toronto

[Goldie]

If you liked those pics you might also be interested in some of these full-frontal(backal?) rear-views (all mostly in the east end):
www.panoramio.com/user/2045784/tags/~ rear-views

Those images of 'back yards' clearly illustrate the reason for my fond desire to travel by GO train as often as possible.
The back yards of homes and factories, visible from trains, are so interesting and cannot easily be admired from a car travelling by on the road.

 

[Tewder]

That's so odd Goldie, and yet I totally agree.

 

[Earlscourt_Lad]

Those images of 'back yards' clearly illustrate the reason for my fond desire to travel by GO train as often as possible.
The back yards of homes and factories, visible from trains, are so interesting and cannot easily be admired from a car travelling by on the road.

I agree as well. Years and years ago, when I was 7 or 8, my father and I took the train to Montreal, and I recall him saying you always saw the "business end" of cities when you travel by train. It's something that's always stuck with me, along with the image of steam coming out of the then active Gooderham & Worts as we rumbled out of Union.

 

[wwwebster]

...the car crash actually occurred on the old Huntley Street Bridge...

Don’t know why it didn’t occur to me earlier to check Google News:

http://news.google.com/newspapers?i...5517,1383500&dq=huntley+bridge+accident&hl=en

The article identifies the driver as “Dr. J. L. Davidson,†but the city directories list his name as Dr. John L. “Davison,†at 20 Charles Street East (a house designed by John Francis Brown, built in 1896). The date of the accident was apparently Saturday, December 21st, 1912.

 

[Goldie]

Don’t know why it didn’t occur to me earlier to check Google News:

http://news.google.com/newspapers?i...5517,1383500&dq=huntley+bridge+accident&hl=en

The article identifies the driver as “Dr. J. L. Davidson,†but the city directories list his name as Dr. John L. “Davison,†at 20 Charles Street East (a house designed by John Francis Brown, built in 1896). The date of the accident was apparently Saturday, December 21st, 1912.

You're a great researcher, wwwebster! Thanks.
It's nice to have it all together (attached)

 

[r937]

The date of the accident was apparently Saturday, December 21st, 1912.

he was using a broken mayan calendar which was off by 100 years

 

[Vito81]

growing up in EY, i spent a lot of time at shoppers world...in the 80s i remember, eatons and all the stores there...i drive by now and am fascinated by the exposed brick...
does any remember that right near the corner of VP and Danforth, they used to have those travelling fairs....there used to be a raised circle with some cemented in tracks there...(gone now to Burger King new building) always wondered what that was...
one other thing about the inside of that mall, does anyone remember the Yellow Hot Dog Stand right around Eatons and that Shoe store near the North exit into the mall by eatons?

 

[thecharioteer]

Photos by Bob Whalen from the 1970's:

And more recent:

 

[thecharioteer]

Some more Bob Whalen photography of the Eaton's Queen Street store from the 70's:

 

[chriskayTO]

Anyone know what "The Hub" was in Eaton's?

 

[thecharioteer]

Anyone know what "The Hub" was in Eaton's?

I'm wondering if it was the tunnel to the Annex?

Two pics of the end:

Note that the portion of the store being demolished above was actually the old Adams Furniture Store, whose building was taken over by Eaton's

 

[adma]

"The Hub" sounds to me like "subterranean youth department", kind of like what 3 Below became in the successor store.

That Albert Street and Yonge Street interior lettering really strikes me as something that might have been ill-appreciated in the 70s, but definitely appreciated today...

 

[junctionist]

Some more Bob Whalen photography of the Eaton's Queen Street store from the 70's:

Does anyone know what font is used for the street name signage seen in these photos?

 

[mattelderca]

"The Hub" sounds to me like "subterranean youth department", kind of like what 3 Below became in the successor store.

That Albert Street and Yonge Street interior lettering really strikes me as something that might have been ill-appreciated in the 70s, but definitely appreciated today...

A coworker and I were just discussing the Hub. our combined memories seem to point to a cafeteria. A real old school cafeteria where the workers would also eat. We could be mistaken.

 

[LowPolygon]

Does anyone know what font is used for the street name signage seen in these photos?

Those letterforms wouldn’t have had a name per se, as ‘fonts’ didn’t really exist in the way that we understand them today; they were rarely anyone’s intellectual property, and they weren’t licensed or distributed in any way because there was no way of doing so, or any need to.

Those letters would have been initially designed by, and drawn by hand and then scaled up, to be formed out of metal or possibly even cut out of wood. I suppose there is a possibility they could have been made out of an early plastic like Bakelite, but I’m not sure what kind of moulding technologies might have existed back then. the Yonge Street sign looks to be made out of plexiglass which is interesting, and poses a question as to whether this sign might be from a later date than the Albert Street one, because as far as i know plexiglass wasn't all that commercially available until after 1945.

These particular letterforms are a beautiful example of the 'moderne' style that dominated in the later 1920’s-30’s; they pre-date the classic ‘high modern’ international-style forms of sans serif like Helvetica that began their ascendancy after WW2.

Anyway, it’s likely that these beautiful letters were a one-off, created out of whole cloth in Toronto by some anonymous talented long dead soul.