weeks ago I had a note from a reader asking if I had any recollection of a Second World War fighter aircraft that was on display somewhere close to Ontario Place. He seemed to recall that it was located near HMCS Haida, the iconic Canadian warship that had been given a home along the Ontario Place waterfront back in 1970 after five years moored at the foot of York Street.
And, his note went on, not far away there was another artifact from the Second World War, an Avro Lancaster bomber that had sat, rather forlornly, perched atop a concrete pedestal since the mid-1960s.
Having joined the staff of the CNE in 1974, I was familiar with the small collection that had accumulated just across Lake Shore Boulevard, a collection that, to some people, was starting to look like a museum dedicated to the Second World War. And perhaps that was the problem. War is not something certain people wish to celebrate, even though it brought the lifestyle we now treasure.
But back to the gentleman’s original question: the fighter in question was, in fact, one of the more than twenty thousand Spitfires produced between 1936 and 1947. The “Spit” was a favourite of many RCAF pilots.
This Second World War Supermarine Spitfire was on display next to HMCS Haida at Ontario Place from 1972 to 1973. (Photo courtesy Richard E. Dumigan.)
The same aircraft is now a feature attraction in an aviation museum in Malmslatt, Sweden.
The Internet advises that the model on display on the Toronto waterfront was a rare Mark XIX variant (designated numerically as PM627), of which only 225 were produced. It served with the Royal Air Force from 1945 to 1951, then with the Indian Air Force from 1953 to 1957, after which it was displayed in a museum in New Delhi.
In 1971, the aircraft was purchased by a member of the Canadian Fighter Pilots Association and shipped to Toronto, where it was put on display at the recently opened Ontario Place. There it sat from 1972 until 1973, when it was relocated to the Ontario Science Centre, where it remained until 1980. It then spent a couple of years in California before becoming part of a complicated trade that had “our” Spitfire sent to an aviation museum in Sweden in exchange for five (!!) other vintage aircraft.
As for the Malton, Ontario–built Lancaster (designated FM104) it was taken down from its pedestal in 1999 and transferred to the Canadian Air and Space Museum at Downsview. The future of this artifact, and the museum itself are, pardon the expression, up in the air.
In 2003, HMCS Haida, now a National Historic Site, began welcoming appreciative visitors at its new and friendlier home located at Pier 9 in Hamilton Harbour.
Makin’ Tracks Through History
July 15, 2012
I’m pretty sure that by now anyone who drives the streets throughout downtown Toronto is aware of the ongoing closure of the busy Queen and Spadina intersection. And those TTC passengers who ride the 501 Queen streetcar will be given a special treat each day for the next week or so as they discover other parts of the downtown core as their vehicle manoeuvres around the closed intersection. It’s all part of a major improvement program to upgrade sections of the Spadina streetcar right-of-way prior to the introduction of the TTC’s new Legacy model vehicles later this year. Similar improvements and modifications to other parts of the system to accommodate the new Legacy cars are to come.
The history of street railway service on Spadina goes back more than 130 years to the day in 1878 when horse-drawn streetcars operated by the privately owned Toronto Railway Company (TRC) began carrying packed passenger cars over steel rails that had recently been laid on the stretch of Spadina Avenue between King and the fast-growing community around the Spadina and College intersection.
The city continued to expand northward, and in 1883 the Spadina route was extended all the way north to Bloor Street in order to serve what had only a few years earlier been rural countryside.
Then, in 1891, the Spadina line was incorporated into what the TRC had established as the Belt Line, a route that ran horse cars both ways on
Bloor, Sherbourne, King, and Spadina, forming a “belt” around the city. On December 15 of the following year, the horse cars operating on the Belt Line were removed and newfangled electric streetcars introduced. This was the city’s fourth all-electric route.
Looking north on Spadina Avenue over Queen Street in 1924. Note the streetcars-only right-of-way down the centre of Spadina. The building on the northwest corner of the intersection was the site of one of the city’s first silent movie houses. It was called the Mary Pickford Theatre in honour of the world-famous Toronto-born movie star. The present building houses a McDonald’s restaurant.
Road and streetcar track repairs all up and down Spadina Avenue are nothing new. These men are hard at work in the summer of 1902, and note, doing it without today’s mandatory safety equipment. In the distant background is Knox College, thankfully still a city landmark. The streetcars are operating on the popular Belt Line route.
(Both photos City of Toronto Archives.)
In the summer of 1923, the new Toronto Transportation Commission, not quite into the second full year of its mandate, discontinued the Belt Line and introduced a new Spadina route on which it operated double-end electric streetcars, initially between Bloor and Front and then, after 1927, over a new bridge that carried traffic over the busy railway corridor that still exists. An interesting feature of the TTC’s new Spadina streetcar line was the fact that it featured double-end streetcars and crossover tracks at either terminus, thus precluding the need for loops to change direction. A similar way of changing direction will be featured on the new Eglinton Crosstown, Sheppard East, Finch West, and Scarborough RT light rail routes, all of which are scheduled to open in or before 2021.
Streetcar service on Spadina came to an end (but, as it would turn out, only temporarily) in the fall of 1948 when a serious shortage of electricity throughout the province prompted the TTC to replace the Spadina streetcars with buses.
Then, in a rather strange turn of events (especially in light of the fact that the TTC had decided to eliminate all of Toronto’s streetcars by 1980 before reconsidering and deciding instead to retain its streetcars), plans were announced in 1992 to convert the Spadina bus route back to streetcar operation. This new streetcar route began operating on July 17, 1997.
This 1910 Idea Was a Real Lifesaver
July 22, 2012
As we enjoy the warm (often hot) weather months, it’s particularly sad to learn about the numerous drownings that occur in our lakes and rivers or closer to home in someone’s peaceful and beckoning backyard swimming pool.
While it’s a difficult subject to write about, the eradication of these more often than not preventable accidents has been a concern for decades. In fact, in his letter to the mayor of Toronto back in 1910, Robert John Fleming, the general manager of the privately owned Toronto Railway Company (predecessor to today’s TTC), stated that in his opinion every boy and girl should learn to swim. And to back up his conviction, Fleming declared that his company was prepared “to place at the disposal of the boys and girls of the city on every
