History
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The oldest bit of Toronto subway opened 50 years ago
50 years ago this week, a special gasoline-powered TTC subway car trundled east along an unfinished Bloor-Danforth line towards the maintenance yard at...
By Chris Bateman -
Toronto’s rebel mayor and his pirate admiral
William Lyon Mackenzie ran for his life. His rebellion had failed. It was a disaster. His rebel army was crushed on Yonge Street. His headquarters at...
By Adam Bunch -
The fall of Sir Henry Pellatt, king of Casa Loma
A carved marble fountain of child figures supporting a dolphin, a solid bronze buffalo head, and hundreds of champagne flutes, wine glasses, and ceramic...
By Chris Bateman -
A tour of Queen & Spadina a hundred years ago
It has been nearly 200 years since the intersection of Queen & Spadina was born. When the two roads first met, Toronto still wasn’t even a city...
By Adam Bunch -
Archival film of the 1990 Toronto Pride celebration
Today at Noon the City of Toronto kicks off Pride Week by raising the rainbow flag at City Hall and to celebrate here is a new video of the 1990 Toronto...
By Shawn Micallef -
A dizzy history of revolving restaurants in Toronto
Nothing epitomizes space age urbanism quite like the revolving restaurant. Imagine sitting at the top of a modern skyscraper, the lights of the city...
By Chris Bateman -
The Canadian stop on the London Underground
This is Canada Water Station. It’s a stop on the London Underground. It’s right near the River Thames, in the middle of the city, just a...
By Adam Bunch -
A proud history of sidewalk superintendents in Toronto
Between 1931 and 1939, the construction at Rockefeller Center in New York City was a magnet for curious onlookers. America was mired in the depths of the...
By Chris Bateman -
Toronto’s founding dog — and how he almost got eaten
It was the summer of 1793. The summer our city was founded. On an early Tuesday morning, as the late July sun rose above Lake Ontario, a British warship...
By Adam Bunch -
First Canadian Place: 40 years on top in Toronto
First Canadian Place has been the tallest skyscraper in Canada for four decades now. At 298.1 metres from sidewalk to rooftop, the brilliant white tower...
By Chris Bateman -
Remembering the Great Toronto Fire of 1904
It was a miserably cold night, with bitter gusts of wind and a light snow even though it was the middle of April. And about an hour after sunset, things...
By Adam Bunch -
Good Reads: Spring 2015 Edition of Fort York’s newsletter Fife & Drum
The spring edition of the Friends of Fort York’s quarterly newsletter, Fife and Drum was released recently. Loads of maps and pictures in this issue, and...
By Shawn Micallef