My Toronto is not the mayor - part two

This 1950s postcard looks north into the city from islands just offshore. The substantial pile on the left, the Royal York, opened in 1929, was the largest hotel and, briefly, tallest building in the British Empire.

On the right, the thirty-four floor art deco Bank of Commerce, completed in 1931, held the title of the Empire's tallest building until 1962.

If you click on the picture below, you can just see the Bank of Commerce, now surrounded by more modern additions.

Valleys, locally called ravines, make a city, which initially seems flat, more appealing.

Toronto sprawls along Lake Ontario. You can see the unmistakable CN Tower, completed in 1976 and, until 2010, the world's tallest tower.

It's easy to forget you live by one of the world's largest lakes unless you wander down to the shore. 

In 1958, Toronto had 1,317 'entrances and clearances' of foreign ships. 

Containerization changed that. Now a handful of oceangoing ships arrive and the old port is a mix of condominiums, parks, marinas, bars and 'cultural destinations'.

As for the empty silos beyond the yachts, they await redevelopment. 

A ferry returns to the city from the islands. Mostly parkland, the islands also have a small residential community. 

At the harbour's narrow western entrance, the journey between mainland and Toronto Island Airport is 121 metres. It's said to be one of the world's shortest ferry rides.

What is now Toronto (the word seems to be an Iroquois term for a fish weir) was first visited by Europeans in the early 1600s. The French briefly established a trading post here in 1720. The British arrived in the 1780s, supplemented by former American colonists wanting to remain under the crown after the Revolution. They found themselves in a village then called York or 'Muddy York' as the roads, really tracks, were appalling.

As an aside, my Loyalist ancestors left a comfortable middle-class life in Rhode Island for the wilds of New Brunswick. I like to think of them - and it's really not a stretch - as political refugees.

The old cottage below, surprisingly close to the downtown core, employs a Union Jack as a curtain. 

This is Yonge Street, Toronto's traditional main drag. It was laid out by the Lieutenant-Governor of Upper Canada (now Ontario) in the 1790s. Yonge was once said to be the world's longest street (1,896 kilometres, all the way to far northwestern Ontario). Although the Guinness Book of Records backed the claim, it was really the result of creatively tacking on an early two-lane highway. The culprit is unknown, but I suspect a 1930s bright spark in a tourism office.

Anyway, Yonge's no longer in the Guinness Book and, by far, not the busiest of Toronto's traffic-clogged roads. Just as well as it passes under my bedroom window.

Below, a military parade marks the two hundredth anniversary of the War of 1812. The conflict, between Britain and the States, inevitably involved what is now Canada. American troops briefly occupied Toronto and made off with 'the Mace', symbol of parliamentary authority. In 1934, Franklin Roosevelt (whose summer home was on a New Brunswick island) returned it. A decent gesture as the British had burned the White House, in part as retribution for Toronto's sacking.

The pipe major's from the 48th Highlanders.

In a young city, old buildings are few. Here's the 1834 Bank of Upper Canada.

The Prince of Wales (later Edward VII) visited in 1860, a very big deal.

Up the street from me is a pioneer cemetery. Among its inhabitants are film star Mary Pickford's grandparents. Pickford ('America's Sweetheart') was born in Toronto. 

A little over a century after those fleeing the United States first arrived in 'Muddy York', the roads were much improved. The city was prosperous enough to afford posh manhole covers. This one from 1889 still serves on Bay Street.

In 1914, Toronto's citizens were still largely of British origin. When Britain declared war, Canada was automatically included. From a country of eight million, more than sixty thousand would die. The city cenotaph, showing traces of snow, is modelled on the one in London. Poppies lie on the grass after a commemorative ceremony.

In the 1930s, ties with the 'old country' remained strong. Edward VIII was briefly king before abdicating; his reign was so short that this Toronto post office is one of the Empire's few buildings to display his cypher. 

Attitudes change: an early Canadian Coat of Arms from the 1870s, displaying close heraldic links to Britain, is plunked in some downtown shrubbery.

At Toronto City Hall, a seagull impertinently roosts on Winston Churchill's head.

One's almost surprised to come across a surviving, well polished plaque announcing the British Colonial Building.

Toronto's first Anglican (Church of England or Episcopal) church became a hospital during the aforementioned War of 1812 and later was looted by American troops. 

Its successor, St. James Anglican Cathedral had its first service in 1853. It's where the Queen worships when in town. On her last visit, she was accompanied by me. Well, to be honest, she was accompanied by me and a horde of other journalists. 

I took the Cathedral picture on a gloomy day. I like the 'gothicky' feel and it is Gothic Revival. 

It wasn't too long ago that the Anglican Church was where the Canadian Establishment had a weekly, restrained, polite encounter with God. From my Toronto boarding school, we were marched to a packed Anglican church Sundays.  Then, when most Canadian boys were swinging baseball bats, we went back to play cricket.

Now, Anglicans are a vanishing denomination and the Catholics (with the help of fervent Filipino-Canadians) and evangelicals multiply.

Occasionally, I nervously scoot past this downtown evangelical church with its unsettling sign.

Perhaps I exaggerate. Canada is very secular - much less religious than the United States. And, although inevitably different from when I was young, the country's changing composition is mostly, I think, a good thing. 

Of course, this means that Canadian believers are not just Christian. A minaret shares space with a beer hoarding. Perhaps not in Saudi Arabia, but in Toronto. 

But one thing doesn't change, the religion of money.  The old Bank of Commerce, which we saw earlier, is just off Bay Street, Canada's Wall Street. The reddish building behind the Bank of Commerce is the Bank of Nova Scotia. Canada's major banks emerged from the Great Recession with reputations enhanced. Long criticized for being stodgy, conservative and, well, just too unaggressively Canadian, they found themselves hailed as temporal saviours of the country's economy.

Further down Bay Street is the Royal Bank of Canada and that gold is real gold. Windows are coated in gold leaf, which helps with insulation.

More high-rise buildings are sprouting here than in any other city in the United States and Canada. Oh! And that includes New York. Newspapers write of Toronto's 'Manhattanization'.

A construction helicopter flies through city canyons.

From my living room alone, I recently counted seven building site cranes. The neighbouring skyscraper was topped off three or four years ago. 

As thousands move downtown, space can be a problem in newer condominiums and not just for humans. In an area popular with younger people, I came across this 'dog playground'. No frisbee throwing here.

Everywhere, it seems, there is demolition.

As in many cities, architectural vandalism was a common crime. Wonderful buildings were replaced by depressing anonymities. Happily, less often so. The 1893, Romanesque Revival  Broadview Hotel, in its latter days home to a locally (in)famous strip club, has been saved and may become a boutique hotel. The electric cables are for streetcars.

The Broadview Hotel's in an area experiencing 'gentrification''. Middle class homes and condominiums go up and an area loses sometimes attractive grittiness. Not the place to discuss the topic, but it is contentious.

In one such neighbourhood, I found this 'Die Yuppie Scum' graffiti outside a condominium sales office. 

A reminder that this is not a definitive view of Toronto. It is my view of Toronto and there is more to come.