By Chris Bateman
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How Toronto learned to love the patio
For all the time Torontonians will spend sipping lager and pinot on patios this summer, it would be easy to conclude that the people of this city have...
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How Toronto invented the PC, then forgot about it
The Royal York Hotel, September 25, 1973. Computer experts Mers Kutt, Gordon Ramer, Ted Edwards, and Reg Rea are standing around a small machine about the...
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Stadia mania: Toronto’s six-decade quest for a civic stadium
The Stadocentre, Metrodome, Astrodome, and Tower Dome: Toronto historically has had no lack of imagination when it comes to dreaming up gleaming...
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Stairs to nowhere, trap streets, and other Toronto oddities
There’s a set of stairs on Greenwood Avenue that lead nowhere. At the top, a wooden fence at the end of someone’s back yard blocks any further...
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“Fun and frolic” at a Toronto double hanging
“The morning broke dark and gloomy, and with the first faint streaks of early dawn the workmen were industriously employed in making ready the...
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The transformer next door
The lights are on but there’s no-one home at 640 Millwood Rd. The two-storey suburban home near Bayview and Eglinton doesn’t exactly stand out among its...
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Welcome to your private nuclear fallout shelter
In 1959, the builders of Regency Acres, a 700-home subdivision in Aurora, Ontario, offered something no other homebuilder in the country could: a private...
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This is what the Toronto subway tastes like
Union Station tastes like fried onions. James Wannerton knows this because he tastes words. Due to a rare and unusual neurological condition called...
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The great Toronto bridge swap of 1928
The Canadian Pacific Railway had two 243-ton problems in early 1928. Its two newest and most powerful locomotives were due to be ready for the...
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The horror of the Rupert Hotel fire still lingers
The fire had been burning out of control at the Rupert Hotel for 17 minutes before someone called 911. As flames and acrid smoke filled the corridors of...
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The grim history of the Ku Klux Klan in Toronto
Two men in hooded Ku Klux Klan uniforms flash Nazi salutes on a porch. Beside them, a woman with “white power” tattooed crudely across her chest stands...
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The slow and deadly evolution of Toronto’s crosswalks
Crossing the street in Toronto has been a potentially deadly challenge for almost a century. Until the 1950s, when the number of automobiles dramatically...