Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - 10 Toronto Buildings That Shouldn't Have Been Demolished: Toronto Mike'd #1468

Episode Date: April 10, 2024

In this 1468th episode of Toronto Mike'd, Mike is joined by Toronto historian Jeremy Hopkin to discuss 10 Toronto buildings that shouldn't have been demolished. Toronto Mike'd is proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, Palma Pasta, Ridley Funeral Home, The Advantaged Investor podcast from Raymond James Canada, The Yes, We Are Open podcast from Moneris, The Toronto Maple Leafs Baseball Team and RecycleMyElectronics.ca. If you would like to support the show, we do have partner opportunities available. Please email Toronto Mike at [e-mail]

Don't let them tear that dear old building down There's not another like us in the country or the town What up Miami? Toronto! BK on the beat, uh, check, uh I'm in Toronto where you wanna get the city love I'm from Toronto where you wanna get the city love Welcome to episode 1468 of Toronto Miked! Proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, a fiercely independent craft brewery who believes in supporting communities,

good times, and brewing amazing beer. Order online for free local home delivery in the GTA. Palma Pasta, enjoy the taste of fresh homemade Italian pasta and entrees from Palma Pasta in Mississauga and Oakville. The Toronto Maple Leafs baseball team, the best baseball in the city outside the dome. Join the club and purchase a membership today at MapleEafsBaseball.com. RecycleMyElectronics.ca Committing to our planet's future means properly recycling our electronics of the past. The Advantage Investor podcast from Raymond James Canada.

Valuable perspective for Canadian investors who want to remain knowledgeable, informed and focused on long-term success. Season 6 of Yes We Are Open, an award-winning Monaris podcast hosted by FOTM Al Gregor and Redleaf Funeral Home. Pillars of the community since 1921. Today, making his Toronto Mike debut is Jeremy Hopkins. Welcome Jeremy. Thank you Mike. We did meet previously at TMLX 14 at Palmer's Kitchen and it was a

great conversation. I have to admit that's the first time I realized there was this J-Ho character, Jeremy Hopkins Hopkins and I was intrigued from the get-go And since then I have seen you on the live streams at live.torontomike.com and you're like you pay attention You're engaged you are sharing fun facts in real time that amuse me personally So I just want to say what a pleasure it is to finally have you make your proper Toronto Mike debut. Very cool Well, thank you so much and uh, I love being on your live stream when I can make it It is a pleasure it is to finally have you make your proper Toronto mic debut. Very cool. Well, thank you so much. And I love being on your live stream when I can make it.

There's a lot of times I can't like, oh man, that would have been cool. Let me know those times that I'll reschedule them because I really don't want to do a live stream without Jeremy Hopkins. And I do try to drop some some helpful things there so you don't have to do too much searching if I can find a factor. If I know it off the top of my head, I try to drop it. So it's a it's a lot of fun to just sort of be there and be in the moment and and just chat along with you guys.

I want to shout out some of the the good people that are following. Oh, see, I'm trying to drop some. Now that's proof our live stream is working. So shout out to the VP of sales. Shout out to Hayref. Shout out to Basement Dweller. Hello to Andrew Ward, hello to Andy, hello to Al Grego. We'll talk about him later. He's got a gift for you that I'll be giving you, J-Ho. Very cool. And it's funny, noticed by Al Grego

is that I say the word pasta both ways in the intro now, just to cover my bases, to hedge my bets. How do you say it, pasta or pasta? I normally say pasta, but pasta comes out a lot too. It depends on how cultured I'm feeling that day. But I feel better knowing you say pasta. My default is pasta. And same here, same here, especially after I hear all the palm advertising. It's forced me that way.

It's worked. Okay. Let me just get this out of the way because we have an amazing topic today. I want to get the topic exactly right we are talking about 10 Toronto buildings that shouldn't have been demolished and Before we get to that topic. I want to learn a little more about you like like what makes you Jeremy such a You know such an expert on Toronto history and I want to learn more about some social media accounts that you manage that I am thoroughly enjoying but because we've talked about Palma pasta as I like to say they've got four locations in Mississauga and Oakville and they have sent over a large lasagna for you it's in my freezer right now you'll be taking that home with you incredible I've had some of their stuff

before at TML X 14 and it was amazing it was amazing And did you get a Great Lakes beer at TML X 14? I did I got a couple I tried out a couple I hadn't had before I had a burst and Forget the other one I had but I love burst but now the sunny side is here So sunny side a building still there. I pass it on my bike every day. We'll be discussing 10 buildings that Should not have been demolished and I'm thankful that that sunny side pavilion is still standing. Same here. I passed on on the way here and had a nice drive in going through sunny side and long branch and all the old villages that eventually were merged. Well, if you got to long branch, you went too far. Oh, wait. You're okay. Sorry. I saw the streetcars going there. I was like, okay, you went too far there.

But yeah, long branches to the west, Mimico to the right. Here I am stuck in the middle with you. In New Toronto. New Toronto, good for you. I just read a piece about Mary Berg had bought her dream home with her husband, I don't know if it's husband or partner, I don't know. But she was talking about how amazing

this Mimico neighborhood was and how much she loves living in Mimico. And I was getting so angry, Jeremy, because I I know and I won't dox her okay but I know her address my daughter's best friend in the world shares the other half of the semi and I know it's in the heart of New Toronto and I was irate am I over like should I just like accept that she's going to say Mimico for marketing purposes or should I be angry about this? What say you?

Were you irate enough to send a bunch of those fake ads out that have been hitting her lately? How did you know that was me? How did you know that was me? That's my revenge tactic. It just seemed like you were vengeful, I don't know. Ooh, I've been, I've been- Sorry, sorry to call you out on-

Exposed, okay, that was all me. But no, I wish her no ill will. I've never met her personally. But please, you know, be proud of the fact you're in the neighbourhood known as New Toronto. You don't have to say Mimico. For sure. Yes. New Toronto, it has its historic roots there.

Where I grew up in Scarborough, there's so many of the old little villages that I knew and I knew the borders of, but nobody else did. They didn't even know Scarborough ended at Victoria Park. So, you know. Wait, where's Scarborough again? Yeah, it's that away, very far. Home of the zoo, am I right? Yes, home of the zoo,

birthplace of a few famous people here and there. Stephen Page? Yeah. Maestro Fresh West? Is he, you know, was he born in Scarborough? I know he's raised in Scarborough. A lot of them were raised in Scarborough been a born there So they they were very early Fred Patterson from Humble and Fred Scarborough resident. Oh, okay, Mike Myers. Yes, the Myers boys

Okay Consmite also spend a lot of his childhood there interesting because he's buried in this shout out to Ridley funeral home Con smite this buried at Park Lawn Cemetery, which is not far from where we're chatting right now. So yeah, that's where I'm born and raised, and yeah, just basically got interested in the history of Scarborough because that's where I was, and I would just kind of wonder,

why is that street named that, and why is this place named that? And I just started digging a little bit more, and because my dad was very much into railway history, we drove into every little town that ever had a railway station. So that's how I got my local history love. And it just sprouted from there and got ridiculous

to the point where I went off on my own and ventured into just the Scarborough history. And I spent about 15 years at the Scarborough Historical Society researching and documenting a lot of the stories of people there. And that was a lot of fun. And eventually, well, I had kids and that kind of kicked me out of a lot of the volunteering. They really get in the way, right? Yeah, but get in the way. But also it was a happy getting in the way, especially

during COVID when that hit my one of my kids basically grew up a COVID baby, I guess, or COVID toddler. So sure. Okay. And it gave me some time to really spend with them and reflect on that. So can you shout out some I know that you and I want to make sure they're all attributed to you like what are you responsible for in terms of social media accounts where people who are interested in Toronto history might want to, you know, see great old pictures and learn more. OK, well, there's all my social media accounts that are under my name,

Jeremy Hopkins, or under or under Hopkins design when I couldn't get that, because I do a lot of graphic design and that sort of thing. So it mean being a Toronto historian doesn't pay the mortgage. No, it does for some people, but it does. Who are these people? Well, there's quite a few people out there that are making some coin at it and like Steve Bacon, uh, probably. Yeah. And, uh, Adam, let's see, Adam Bunch and, uh, can you tell me a little, do you spend a moment here? He's in my calendar. Oh yeah. And I haven't done my homework yet. I just know somebody and it could have been you

for all I know. Oh, somebody I trust said you need Adam Bunch on your podcast. And because I like, literally I'm at a point now Where if somebody I trust tells me I should have somebody on oh, yeah I booked them then I learned about who the hell they are like I could be having someone's grandmother on or whatever like I Wouldn't know what's going on here But Adam bunch just in a nutshell who the hell is Adam bunch and what am I gonna talk to him about well his Main gig I guess well he started off with a to our Toronto dreams project And then he eventually evolved into Canadiana and if you go on YouTube

and a few places online he tells a history of places in Canada and he's sometimes focused on Toronto but he's a little bit all over the place and every once in a while he'll do exhibits down with the Myseum of Toronto which is now Museum of Toronto they've recently changed their name and yeah. So they're not the Myseum anymore? No, they've just recently like within a week or two. Because last, I know Ed Conroy had a display there like Toronto based children shows.

Yeah, that was an incredible show too. So I was there, I recorded live there with Ed Conroy from Metro Ontario and PJ Fresh Phil. Like this was last summer. Yes, yes. I think it was last summer. Yeah. So since then they've rebranded. Yeah, yes. I think it was last summer. Yeah. So since then they've rebranded.

Yeah, yeah, just recently within the last couple of weeks. Okay. And I think they're really shooting to be the museum of Toronto and with developments with old city hall, not having the courts in there anymore. Who knows, maybe they're trying to push to get in there eventually and make that an actual city museum

like a lot of the other cities in the world have. Show note for those just joining the live stream. So I've been promoting this as a 10 a.m. start, but you got here early and I don't want to wait. This is not this is not a TV show. OK, like we don't wait till 10 and then start. Yes, you're here. We're going to roll, you know, that we record this for the podcast and if people want to come in live. But I just want to let Rob Bruce know because Rob Bruce, who of course is part of the Toast team here on Toronto Mike which is a regular monthly program with Bob Willett he says it's 10 o2 what time did you start what did I miss so yeah Rob we started early and I do want to say hello to the

Toronto Maple Leafs baseball team fanatic, Midtown Gord, who is on the live stream now. So there's a lot of good people. You're a good person. Glad to have you finally here. Thank you so much. Couple of gifts and then we're gonna start with the list. How do you wanna do it? Do you wanna go 10 to one?

How have you organized these 10 buildings that we should not have destroyed in the city? Well, really it's not a top 10 and my order is all out of whack, so we can really do which. Okay, no particular order, but can you close with a biggie? Like, I don't know. We didn't talk, of course, because I like to be surprised.

A biggie that might align with one of your sponsors, or would that work? Oh, do you want to do that? Would that work better, the very last one? Okay, I like how you think. I like the cut of your jib, okay? And I feel like when you're wearing that suit and you had the hat on, that's an expression that would be appropriate. The cut of your gym. Oh, right.

You know what I mean? Like it's an old school. Like Mr. Burns would say that. I mean, these knees or something like right. Right. Cat's pajamas. All right. And now that I see Canada Cavis here, I know I can give you your great legs. Here. So we talked about it. Oh, and I'm going to hit the camera and mess it up. But you have some great legs beer going home with you.

Very cool. Has the sunny side come out yet? It's been it's out, but I don't have it yet. Oh, but there's a Mimico beer. You know, I went out to just buy a can of that one day just because of the picture on the front, because it had the pavilion on there. Well, this one kind of has a Toronto history flavor is Dylan Mimico. Oh, and you got the Mimico Skyline, which if we were talking 15 years ago, 20 years ago, we'd be like, Mimico doesn't have a skyline, but if I'm on the Ronsi's bridge,

which I'm often on on my bike and I look, I look West, there's absolutely a Mimico skyline now it's unbelievable because I was born or raised in this city. So to see this transformation of that, you know, Humber Bay shores and Park Lawn Lake Shore area, like it's unbelievable the development there. And that's kind of a tribute to that. Very cool. Um, I, well, just driving in today, I, I saw all of those buildings that are basically depicted

here and I remember when they were all hotels and motels and they were really kind of cool because they had all the funky chairs out front and all that, that sort of thing. But I know they'd taken a downturn at the end But but yeah, it's a draft. It's a bit I survive. Are there any remaining? I don't think any of them are there anymore. I think if you get into like Mississauga you get like the Green Acres Motel and you get a couple that have kind of survived out like further west But I don't think there's any remaining but I know that's exactly what it was in that neck of the woods It was like motel motel motel. Oh, yeah

it was famous for a lot of movies shooting in there and all that sort of thing also the oh, what was it again the The dance hall that was there that memo combo. Oh, oh the dance a very old one in the in the 1940s It burned down in the 60s. So this is an important distinction We should say that we are talking about 10 Toronto buildings that were demolished. Yes. So we're not going to talk about buildings and you can talk about them in passing but if there's a building that well we miss but it burned down that's a whole different category. Oh yeah yeah and this is definitely not a top 10 this is just a random 10 I tried to pick them based on building use so it's it's not really about era it's not

really about what's the, you know, the most beloved one or anything like that. But there is some aesthetic value there that I've and also over the years of running certain sites like vintage Toronto and my own sites and just finding out people's opinions about these buildings and how much they miss them and that sort of thing. Okay. And because we're talking about buildings that were torn down, as Canada Kev points out on the live stream, that's a shout out to Ridley Funeral Home right now. These are basically dead buildings. So there is a measuring tape for you, Jeremy, from Ridley Funeral Home, pillar of this community. They've been around under a different name, as you pointed out, but they've been around at that location, 14th and Lakeshore, since 1921, I believe. So long time. Hopefully that building is never demolished.

Long, long may that building stand. Okay, so here I, here we are. It's a pillar of the community, as you know. Apparently I made that up. One day I'm talking to Brad and I say that every episode and I, for some reason I'm like, I must've got that from Brad, but no, apparently I just made it up one day and it stuck,

which is how most of this show kind of operates So we'll hold on to that for the final building. Yes, right you have oh, I want to tell you There's a great FOTM who actually is going to be rehearsing with his band in this neighborhood of New Toronto Later tonight, and I hope he's not listening. So if the cuddly Al Gregor is listening, cover your ears for like one minute. I'm gonna walk over and see if I can sneak in. I don't know how much security there is at this rehearsal place, but I'm gonna see if I can sneak in and catch the first live performance of the Royal Pains in many years. This is a big moment for me.

So he's not just a great musician and he's not just a wonderful FOTM that I can't wait to see at TMLX15 on June 27 from 6 to 9 p.m. at Great Lakes Brewery but he's also an award-winning podcaster and he went out west, he went to Calgary. He went even further west than Mimico believe it or not. He went to Calgary and he's been talking to small business owners and he's been dropping episodes for season six of yes we are open these are dropping weekly his visit with Cass Kelly or is it Kylie I'm gonna say Kylie Cass Kylie Burke and Sean Chan they own Cacks bar a unique new addition to downtown Calgary it's a neighborhood bar restaurant with a built-in podcast studio that's we need one of those right here. A business after Al's own heart and my own heart as well. And that conversation, which is awesome, is the

latest episode of Yes We Are Open Season Six. You can listen to it Jeremy in with your new Minaris wireless speaker that's going home with you. Thank you so much. If you want to subscribe easily, you can scan that QR code on the card there. Thank you to Al, thank you to Minaris, and without further ado let's get rocking here. Thank you everybody. Tell me about the first of the ten Toronto buildings we're going to discuss that should not have been demolished. Okay my very first one and I brought some pictures for the benefit of the live streamers. Love it. Is this building, if you all know Union Station downstairs or downtown? just next door to it just eat or west of it was the old Union Station and

This was built in 1873 torn down in 1927 and for a time both this station and Toronto Union Station were both standing Can I see it? Yeah sure. There you go. I don't know much about this old Union Station because I was just a kid in 1920s. Well at the time the railway was right at the lake front and there wasn't any infill so it was right at the docks. Is that front? Where are we here? That is front street is just behind it. Just behind it okay

right because I literally did this ride yesterday. But okay, so remind us where did Lake Ontario go to at this time? I'm looking at the photo, that's Lake Ontario right? Right up to where Union Station is now. And even to construct some of this platform they had to go into the mud of the harbour, so they sort of built a floating platform in the front of it. And yeah, but it was a very fancy Victorian looking building with the clock tower in the center. And it was made of white bricks. It was very light and also, I guess it was a white stone at the bottom. So over the years, we had a lot of coal, have fueling everything. So this got

tarnished very quickly. So by the 1920s, everyone thought, Oh, this old dilapidated building, it's it's just no good anymore. It's too small. They had to expand it a lot of times and it hid some of the nice features that were in here. But it's a beautiful building. It was a very beautiful building. And I just kind of thought, wow, that would be amazing if it was around still. And they repurposed it for something that was beside the the new union station,

like a marketplace or something like so many options there. But at the time, so in the twenties when they're like, oh, this dirty old thing, we don't need it anymore. We replaced it with a new union station. The thought is let's just raise it. And today perhaps we have more sensitivity to like what's a historical building we should protect.

Exactly. Yeah, we do have more sensitivity, not so much about the insides of the building, but we like the nice front. So. that's true you know it seems like there's a lot of there is definitely a lot of facades i'm going on now where uh it looks like a brand new building wearing an old pair of shoes like well you can say that about like the scotia bank arena right but you know in one of that i thought they did a pretty

good job on the inside though because you can go i drove by yesterday you can go to the shoppers drug mart that was the run me theater and they did a very good, and I know Chapters did it first, right? Because Chapters was in there before they went to Shoppers. But they did a very nice job restoring the inside elements of that beautiful Runnymede Theater. Yeah, when it's an adaptive reuse, I'm always all for that. It's great when somebody can make use of a building and not put it into landfill and reduce the carbon footprint as well

in doing that, saving an old building. I love this start because that photo is mesmerizing because it's hard to even like for us, for our generation and the boomers to even imagine that the lake went that far north in Toronto. And so do you have any insight into like when they said, okay, we're going to fill in this land. So it goes, you know, we're raising a Queens key below.

I think it kind of actually, since we're on the topic of railways, a lot of it did start with the railways. They just want an easy lake level access. And that's the easiest way to do it. You don't have to go up and down hills. You follow a lake level route. So they just kept building the lake front

because of expanded rail traffic. So at one point to get from the actual station down and touch the water, you had to cross like almost 20 tracks. And it was all on foot. And that's eventually why they raised all the tracks and made it all underneath and yeah. Okay, silly question. OK, what do I know?

But how do they decide how far south to make the store the shore? Like, like, theoretically, couldn't you go out another kilometer or whatever? Oh, yeah. Could you go to the island? You could. And who knows? Maybe Doug Ford will never know with Ontario Place. Now, don't give Doug Ford any ideas. I don't think he listens, but I do. Well, they did set a line though.

From Gooderham and Wurtz, they had a windmill line and that was their gauge for a long time. And you couldn't really tell when you're standing there where it is, but they had it drawn out on a map where people could expand their wharves to and all that sort of thing. Amazing.

I will shout out a wonderful conversation last week that Troy from Great Lakes Brewery had with the gentleman who owns the Island Cafe on Ward's Island. I just listened to that last night. So that won't count because it burned down, okay? Nobody decided to demolish that building, so it does not qualify for today's discussion. But it is interesting to hear where they're at

with all that and what are the plans for the Island Cafe. And I didn't realize until this conversation, which people can find as the latest episode of Between Two Fermenters, which is the Great Lakes Brewery podcast, but I didn't not realize the involvement of Great Lakes Brewery with that restaurant and that they would make a special lager for the Island Cafe lager and they would basically supply the Island Cafe with their delicious craft beer. So go listen to that convo and find out what's the future of the Island Cafe. What did you think of the convo?

I thought it was great and it's amazing how supportive that brewery is of the cafe. They're there to support them and try to get them some revenue while they're down and I think they're going to be there for them. Do you know what your first clue is that they actually give a shit about the community? Yes, yes. You can feel it. And when they're talking, they're actually living here and they're interacting with people and they know a lot of the people firsthand. So it's very cool. And they support independent podcasts like this for almost a decade now, which is unheard of. That's incredible.

And they're going to host us on June 27. Jeremy, I hope you can make it. It is TMLX 15. Palma Pasta will feed us. Great Lakes will buy you your first beer and will host us. And not only is this going to be the 15th Toronto Mike listener experience, I met you at the 14th. But and everybody listening is invited, by the way, not just Jeremy,

because he wears a three piece suit and has a nice tie and a nice hat. I'm definitely going to come in the suit, though that day because I've got it on my boat. Wear the hat. Because it's your birthday. I gotta do it. Okay, thank you for that. It's a milestone. I gotta see Jeremy Hopkins there. Okay, let's go to the next one. I realize I can spend a half an hour on each one, so I'm going to try to be a little more.

Well, I do have more notes on that one. I guess if you do want to see a piece of that building, it still exists. If you go to Huntsville and you look at their town hall They have the clock get out of here. They repurpose that's a fun fact our so you can go see it ticking away still today Okay, that's an amazing fact So Huntsville you can see part of the old Union Station that we tore down in the 20s And that's a that is a building that we should not have demolished looking in hindsight. Okay it was a pretty one. Nine more to go I'm loving this. Okay here's a not so pretty one which you might not recognize here because this photo here is when it was converted to Petrie's machinery company but this building that's here was hexadecagon hexadecagon 16 sided building

that was a cyclorama and this is one of the early forms of entertainment where you would go inside this building and there was a 400 I think it was four yeah 400 foot mural wrapped all around the inside of this building and it was one of the first immersive experiences that were in Toronto where you could go into this building and relive an event in history by going in there, 40 feet tall, or 50 feet tall, and go in there and just experience what it was like at the Battle of Sedan or one of these big events.

Like an IMAX experience? Yeah, it's like an IMAX experience with no projectors. It's just painted and they put little 3D scenes in front of it to give it that 3D feel where if it was a battle, they put like dead horses or like, and not real ones, but you know, sculptures in front of this to give it an experience. You never know, they did bring a lot of animals to show.

There was actually a zoo not far from here where they brought a dead whale and had it just laying there for a long time. I'll shut out that at the very end, when we finish all 10 of these buildings, by the way, I have notes from some people who when they heard this topic was coming up on Toronto Mike, they got excited and sent in their choices. So I will say one does involve horses, but we'll just put a pin in that. Where was this building located? This was actually very close to Union Station. And if you look here,

this building that's here, the taller one here is an extension of Union Station that came out onto front street. Okay. So far I love the first two in the same same hood here. And I see the trolley cars on going by here. Okay. And so by 1900 it went out of business. Other forms of entertainment came along, you know, movies and a lot of other forms came where people could

those talkies stole their time. These didn't come until the twenties, maybe 20, 28, 29. Right. But eventually got converted into a parking garage called Petrie's parking palace. And then eventually was an Avis Rent-A-Car. And towards the end, it just was torn down and people started to sort of lament about it

and remember the good old days when it was a cyclorama and all this and that. But it's a 16-sided building. And back then there wasn't really much need for that. Say that word again, cyclo. Oh, it's a hexadecagon. But you called it a cyclorama. Yeah, a cyclorama

or cyclorama. At first, when you said the word initially, I'm like, oh, it's like a velodrome or whatever. It's like you can bike bike in circles in there. And I was like, oh, yeah, we need I need one of those. Like, it sounds great to me. I did actually have a couple of those around back in the day. But yeah, this wasn't one of them. Okay, so when did they demolish it again? That was demolished in 1976, so sadly one year before I was born, I didn't get to even be in there as a baby. See, I could have been there, but I don't think I was. But how would I remember what was going on when I was one or two years old? If your parents were renting a car, maybe. That's

about it. Okay, wild. Okay, I love this so far. Give us a third building that Toronto demolished, but should not have demolished. This is one that I've had a lot of people cry about. And this is the the Temple building. It was the old Forester's building. Forester's is now located in I guess the Flemingdon area right near Eglinton and Don Mills. And that building is supposed to be designated soon. Maybe it actually has. But yeah, after they left this building, they went to the one in Flemingdon and they tore this down not too long after in 1970. Some of this building was salvaged though, and you can find it at the Gildan Park in Scarborough. I was there for an FOTM Hall of Famers wedding just last summer. Oh, wow. So you bite there and I saw that.

I probably have photos. I mean, it's so photogenic, all those pieces. But that's that's a fun fact that you can actually see that there. I was at the great wedding of Cam Gordon in M.F. Oh, wow. And it was there on that premises. And yeah, it was neat to walk around and see the old ruins and stuff. Very cool. That was one thing about the Guild Inn.

It was an inn, but it was also it started off as an artist colony. And Spencer and Rosa Clark were very much into the arts and had a lot of famous artists there on the premises. But they also when they heard these buildings were being torn down, and because they loved art, they would see the sculptural beauty of a lot of these buildings and just wanna save a piece. So they brought a lot of it back to the Guild Inn. And we'll talk a little bit more about that in the future because a couple of these other buildings

have pieces there too. Well, shout out to Basement Dweller who tells us, Cyclorama, that's the previous building, was also the name of a Styx album that featured FOTM Gowan. And I believe Gowan lives near the Guilden. He is a little further west. Yeah, well he's a bluffs guy.

So you're close enough, right? Yeah, he's a cliff side area. And yeah, we used to see him, or we used to see his wife all the time, every once in a while, when we were hanging out down there in the nineties. Well, don't be afraid to sprinkle in any FOTM trivia or fun facts here, digging it very, very much.

Okay, now we're cooking with gas here, so. Okay, so we're, I think that's all I wanted to mention. So you said that was, where was it? So this was on Bay Street, just south of Old City Hall. If you look here, that's a piece of Old City Hall right there that you can see up the street. I once got married at Old City Hall. So this was right at Richmond and Bay on the north east corner.

Oh, no, sorry. Northwest. And when did they just when did they demolish it? 1970. So what is it about us in the 70s? We just said, hey, these are these are kind of neat looking old buildings. F them. Let's get rid of these things. It was an age of modernism. And the 60s was especially bad for Toronto buildings. A lot went in in the 60s and by the 70s,

a lot of these buildings were covered in soot. They looked like derelict old buildings. They just needed a good scrubbing. Yeah, they did. And a lot of these buildings that did survive, they do a chemical wash and they look beautiful. They're amazing. I'll bet.

Now I have a question about a building that was not demolished, but was like, I was like working across the street as this construction was going on. So every day I would kind of see the updates in real time at like Avenue Road in Bloor. But what are your thoughts when they take in like an old building like the Royal Ontario Museum

and then they splash in this kind of like crystal, I think they called it the crystal, but this modern crystal jagged piece kind of gets tacked on the side. Like what do you think of that, Jeremy Hopkins? Jeremy Hopkins I think in that case, it's very close to actually being reversible. And the way that they made it, it sort of hugs the side of the building.

Jared Larkin Right. Jeremy Hopkins So really, I don't think it's doing the damage that people think it's doing. It visually looks different. But before, when it was, I guess, originally there, you wouldn't really notice it as much because it's a very classic design of the museum so this kind of makes it stand out in the area and that's I do like that the overall design of the crystal they found there was some flaws there and they also maybe

didn't realize but it's in Canada so you get some ice formation that dangerously falls on the architect of Jamaican maybe maybe. Am I out to lunch there? Maybe he's a Chinese Jamaican gentleman. I'm not sure about the background, but yes. Well, he might not. It's a chin crystal though, right? Chin crystal. You might not have considered the frost element,

but it's very decisive, right? Like you have people who kind of dig the modern splash coming out of this old building, and then you have people like you ruined it. You ruined this beautiful old building. You know, there was there was one time I was very hypocritical about anything being ripped down, about anything being changed like that. And I've I've grown and matured.

And now I've gotten to the point where I try to celebrate anything that keeps any of our history, even if it's a fraction. So we should be grateful they did not tear down the Royal Ontario Museum. Yes, because it is kind of restrictive in the way they like to display things now and be flashy. It's actually due to go through another renovation now that they've got a huge donation from a family. And they're supposed to be making a new entrance on the north side off Bloor to be more accessible

to people and provide things for free where you don't have to go into the building and pay a big admission. Okay, I love what I'm hearing here. I will also tease that I took a few minutes to think about some buildings I hope they don't demolish like that I feel might be endangered in some regard. So I will be we will chat about those at some point for sure. And I realize now like when I initially thought okay, we're gonna kick out for kicking out the 10 buildings we demolish but shouldn't have in my mind is like, this is going to be a tight hour. But now I realized Jeremy is going to take a little longer than an hour. I just hope that's okay. It's okay. I know debuts go a little bit longer,

usually because you're finding out stuff about people. And also, I find the topic fascinating. I can't you can't rush greatness. You must know this. You must know this. Okay, well, I can ramble on forever. So yeah, I'll depend on you to referee and because I want to share this video on YouTube, I've been showing great restraint because I do have a song loaded up that is a piece of unlicensed music. I do not have the rights to play, but I'm wondering if I can play like five seconds and then bring it down very quickly. I wanted to play this for you. Oh my god. So tell me, I think that's enough. I think every every Gen X are listening just had that's like the the beacon right there. What was your life

like when Pearl Jam released the monster hit Jeremy and the video was being played at One Much Music all the time and that's a great album that probably a lot of your friends Maybe yourself owned that's on 10, of course But what happened to your life when a big song named Jeremy came out? Well, like you I was very much into the grudge in the grunge scene and I still am I still love Nirvana I still have a lot of those guys and Pearl Jam great to and temple of the dog the earlier iteration I'm going home where everybody

Struck out on their own, but I was in high school and It just became one of those introduction songs that people just would sing to me But today I like I like Jeremy spoke in class today Was that a big thing in class the way the video was and the end and I wasn't exactly the most happy person back then yeah they're like oh I want videos ambiguous right I wonder if he's gonna do that well okay so the video I find to be ambiguous no it's just me talking because even this part well well that's it so yeah cuz you have to splash the blood yeah so the way I believe it's your spoke and the way I have interpreted it is that Jeremy takes his own life in front of his class.

This is how I interpret it. But there's the other side where Jeremy shoots up his class maybe before taking his own life. And they're both terrible, horrific occurrences. But you as a Jeremy, you know, in that video again, Pearl Jam, that was so big that Pearl Jam basically said, we're shutting down videos for a while. Like that was it for Pearl Jam and videos for a long time

until Do The Evolution, I think. And they're not even in that. But how do you interpret the ending of the Jeremy? Even then it was just an animation, right? It was, they got Todd McFarlane to do that. That's 100% correct. And it's a great video, but it was like their next video, but there's no Pearl Jam in it.

But that's a great song, by the way, Do The Evolution. Yes. Selling stocks on the day of the crash. Yeah. I'm going to come back to stocks in a minute. First, tell me how do you interpret the end of the Jeremy video? I thought he'd basically, I thought maybe at least he had taken out the teacher. See I see because of how he was treated by they did mention the teacher there every once in a while and at the recess ladies breast, it almost seemed like an authority problem.

Maybe not a problem with the kids. So it's great that here we are many decades later still having the conversation. I think a piece is missing I think there was an edit made that would make it less ambiguous but I always interpreted as Jeremy took his own life in front of his class, but Terrible terrible, but you know what I always um I I did enjoy getting that sung to me more than the Jeremy the Bear song. Cause I got a lot, I got a lot of that when I was a kid. Well there's a song I don't think I'll get a ding on. This was my first Jeremy song.

["Jer-a-me"] Yes, yes. I'm a bear called Jeremy. I can do most anything. I can play and I can sing. Little choo's that don't ride me. When he heard me sing, The King of Berks said to me,

Here's for you dear thing. A whistle that goes Tweet, Tweet, Tweet, Tweet, Tweet, Tweet, Tweet, Tweet. I'm a bear called Jeremy. I can do most anything. I love Jeremy the Bear. I did too. And I used to watch a lot of reruns as a kid, I realized, because that was actually from the 60s, right? Okay, because TVO was doing this to us.

I'm in the same, we're in the same boat here. And I've actually this many an episode with Retro Ontario where we dive into this, but that was kind of, I was parked in front of TVO for these blocks and and I mean I'm thinking now there was the Simon and the land of chalk drawings. Oh yes. Do you remember Fables of the Green Forest? I do. It was my favorite. And the mouths that just were open closed open closed. Yeah I loved it. Trouble, trouble. Like I still, sometimes yeah I'll yes and I'll still call with my kids I. I'll be like, trouble, trouble. And it's fables of the freaking green forest. So there's a lot of those. And then there was Dr. Snuggles. Oh, yes. Friend to the animal world. Yeah. But there's all these things that are like

etched in our brain. And I'm glad because I got exposure to it. It was a bit of a time travel there that we were exposed to. We didn't know these were from the 60s. Yeah, that's, it took me a while to clue in because I would watch Frightenstein all the time and I would be like, oh, when's a new season coming out? That was recorded like 10 years before you're watching it, buddy. Sorry. Well, you're like Rocket Robin Hood and these are not TVO shows anymore, but Rocket Robin Hood and-

Oh yeah, yeah. Hercules? Yeah, exactly. Hercules. Like how much- And Toot and Newton? How much- Herk, herk! How Yeah Newton and and dead a less and I was always wondering I was always wondering how to fit in Newton's back like it was weird. He just merged with him

Like is that why they call them to because he got stuck there Yeah, maybe but I when I think of the quantity of Hercules that we and that's Johnny Nash doing the theme song, which you might not know because you're a savvy guy, but it's a fun fact. But yeah, we had no sense that we were watching stuff that was like, I don't know, our parents were watching like this was the stuff that on TV, this is the world we live in that our kids don't understand, which is that we watched what was in front of us. Like, oh, this is on now. Therefore we're watching this because this is like the best thing on right now. And nobody can understand that. Like I have four kids and everything's

on demand now. So if they want to watch an old curb your enthusiasm or my daughter who's fallen in love with the Simpsons, like she'll jump around. I'm going to do like a season 14 or whatever. Like she's kind of like running this thing and I'm thinking, Oh my goodness, they have no idea. We would sit down and watch what's the Friar Tuck one? Oh, is that the? That was part of Rock Robin Hood. So wasteful. He would take a bite and throw the rest away. We would do the impression of him every once in a while while eating our food and we'd get in trouble.

But on a Sunday morning, Jeremy, we would watch Davey and Goliath. Okay, I would. Gee Davey. Because Commander Tom would put it on and it was the best on TV. Cause if I flipped the channels, it was usually religious programming or news. You had news religion and then you had, oh my goodness, this thing I can watch. And we watched it. It wasn't good. What did we know? It was the best

thing on and we watched it because what were we going to do? Yeah, that's all that was there. So you made the best of what you had or you went out on your bike and went out for the whole day and then came back at the end before the lights came on that that whole sort of thing. But also, I think that's why the most recent generations in recent times have been kind of hard to define because not everyone shares in it that way that they did back then.

And now it's just so much choice. It's like, how do you define like, I can define the 1920s and I'm like, oh, they were, they wore border hats and wore suits everywhere. But now it's like anything goes really. Like there's people that look like they're from the 20s like me and people that look like they're from the 80s still.

And 90s like me. Okay. They're all over the place. We're all over the place. Now you're right. There's used to be, of course, we all watch that same thing. Like this is the thing that's on, you know, know, the mash finale is tonight. Oh, we're all

going to tune in at the in real time to watch this mash finale because everyone's going to do that. The only time that seems to happen now is with a big live sporting event. So and even that it unless it's the Super Bowl or something, it's pretty fragmented. But like I'm watching Caitlin Clark trying to win her, you know, Iowa's first NCAA championship against an undefeated South Carolina team. And I'm there to watch that live in real time. And there's very few examples of where I'm like, there's appointment viewing and almost every example I have is live sports almost different time where back in the day was like, Oh, you know, Seinfeld's on tonight at nine o'clock

or whatever. We'll be there for an NBC to watch Seinfeld at nine o'clock. I remember in high school a lot of the Seinfeld watching parties like that and yeah, it was a it was a collective shared thing that people did. And it's gone now. Yes. It's out of live sports. So much rerunning though. There's a huge market in that.

All right, look, you didn't know we'd be off the building. Okay, so Jeremy the Bear, that's your theme song for a while because from the 80s, even in that. All right. Look, you didn't know we'd be off the buildings. But okay. So Jeremy the bear, that's your theme song for a while because from the eighties, even though it's an older show, that's kind of like late seventies, you're a couple of years younger than me, but we're similar vintage. We're watching that thing on TVO and I loved it very much. And then suddenly in early nine, very early nineties, Pearl Jam puts out the next Jeremy Jam and Bob's your uncle. that one's gonna live forever.

You know, you'll be forever at home drawing pictures of Mountaintop. And it didn't help because I was always drawing pictures and I was doing graphic design and art for a long time. So it was like, wow, is he creeping on me or something? Well, you escaped unscathed because you had a much happier ending than Jeremy in the video there.

Seemed a harmless little with that was that radio edit like I mean the f-bomb drops there, but I guess What what does he say in the radio edit? Does he just kind of fade out or they just cut it off? Yeah, you just hear a little bit of a little and it's kind of done or whatever. Okay. Love Pearl Jam Shout out to Bob will let the other part of the toast crew who might be the only guy I know who likes pearl jam more than I do so tune in and he's kicking out a pearl jam song next toast There's a teaser I've only seen them once and I was lucky enough for Neil Young to come out that day and do free world with them at the end at the well the ACC then

When what year do you remember oh god that was probably 2007 it was way back okay yeah okay I used to see them every time they came to town and I because I had a relationship with Eddie Vedder's guitar technician oh can we called Yoda and I had this relationship because he was customs guitar technician and we had met through that and there was a whole arrangement we had but he would leave me two tickets at the will call window every time Pearl Jam came to town and there was a whole arrangement we had, but he would leave me two tickets at the will call window every time Pearl Jam came to town and it was the best deal ever. Best deal ever. Cause I love the band and I'd see them anyways. Uh, but cool.

We digress. Let's, uh, talk about another building in Toronto that was demolished, but shouldn't have been demolished. Now this one, I think the tourist industry in Toronto really, really was disadvantaged because of this one being taken down. This is the old Toronto Star Building. It was built in 1929, came down in 1972, and it is the originator of Superman's Daily Planet. It looks like the Daily Planet building.

It was Joe Schuster. He worked there as a newsboy and it was an inspiration for him to make Clark Kent work at a newspaper. And another, I guess, fun fact, like, like you say, the very first comic, I think actually calls it the Toronto Star. And later on, they were like, oh, no, we don't want to get in trouble. So mind blows in a fun fact. I got a railing here.

We got to change it to something else planetary. Yeah let's do the planet. Yeah okay there we go. And where was it? It was at 80 King Street West. It was a very beautiful Art Deco building. We didn't really have very many in Toronto Art Deco buildings and the ones that we do have they cherish now and but yeah back then.

Why the hell did they demolish that beautiful don't tell me it was dirty I'm tired it was dirty I'm sure yes the front here did get a bit of a staining down the front but overall it was a it people didn't have the heart for it like they do now it's just not not enough time had passed at that point and it was dirty it wasn't big enough for the star they They actually had presses in the the bottom floors of this So as they expanded and they had more readership, they needed to go to other facilities and that's when they went to one one Yonge Street Wild here and one Yonge Street itself has been

Yeah, it's demolish. It's starting to turn now to everything's becoming houses in downtown. Well, I was at the Cloverdale mall everything's becoming houses downtown. Well, I was at the Cloverdale Mall. Um, very recently I bumped into FOTM Robert Lawson, who's hiding in the bushes right now in case you misstate a fact. If you get something wrong, he's going to come in and fact check you. I am deathly afraid Robert Lawson. I was with him. I hope he's not as good on music history as he is with him.

He fact checked everything. But that, that place is getting demolished. Not that that's on my list of buildings We shouldn't demolish but just you know Part of the community for a long time and it's gonna be gone soon and that building you're holding up there Looks gorgeous to me and I wish we had that in Toronto today And when you think about it now you look at the one one Yonge Street, it's dirty and you kind of think it looks dated That's how they felt about it in the 1970s. Because looking at the two billion, like,

I'll tear down one Yonge Street, but not this guy. Yeah. Like, to me, it's a whole different vibe going on. So it needs some time to marinate that style. And I think a lot of the glass and steel that's going up now, people are just not going to care about. And it won't last as long as this stone building would have if they just left it. Wow. OK, this one's that's a big one.

This is awesome. So this is another one. Sorry to cut you off there. It's OK. It's your show, man. I'm just pressing the button. This is another one that Rose and Spencer Spencer Clark saved a lot of the stone on and reconstructed it at the Guild Inn as a as a sort of sculpture. And there was a bunch of stuff left over, including some panels from this building that they just had stacked in the dirt.

And for years it just sat there and I remember going there and I even took a picture of the heap. And only recently did they take some of this, identify where it was from, but I recognized, oh, that's the little panels from over here. And they recently installed them at the Campbell House Museum down at University in Queen. So you can go to the gardens there and still see some of these panels down there.

And so there's pieces of this building all over the place, including at the Toronto Star, they actually saved a lot of the lamps that were in the front here and the ones that were in the inside. Some of those have gone to private sales now. They were, I think, five thousand bucks a piece or more, but beautiful art deco lamps that these people have restored and hopefully they find another use for because the ones that were out front of the building were just massive like just yeah.

Well you know you're reminding me that in this city we sometimes we don't save the building but we'll save the sign like this is like the compromise right it happens quite a bit like okay we're gonna save the sign. And luckily at least at the Island Cafe they saved the sign. That was one thing. I'm horrified at I never actually got to see inside the community center, but they said that they had a lot of history on the walls in there. And it was probably all original pictures. So hopefully they had copies of a lot of that stuff and and kept it safe. But I feel like maybe no, maybe no. And one of the signs that has been saved is the old

the 1050 chum that was there on Yonge Street there before they because that's a building that was demolished and that was you know the 1050 chum. We're a bit young for the heyday of 1050 chum but go ask a baby boomer about 1050 chum right? I would hear all the oldies as a kid so yeah it's it was very big even when I was a kid. But the sign survived. Just like the Sam the Record Man sign. It's uh, it's down on the back of 299 Young or sorry 299 Queen, Queen Street West. Yeah, the old uh, Much Music building. It's around the back. What are the plans for that building?

Uh, Bell. Train station or something? I think Bell wants to sell it. Isn't it designated to be some kind of a train station or uh I am I conflating stories that it was designated to be like a hub in some kind of transport system that we're building but maybe I will maybe I'll get Robert Lawson to do a little homework and get back to us we'll move on to the next building and see if anybody how about this anyone on the live stream wants to tell me what is exact what exactly is happening with 299 Queen Street, which of course is across the street from the the bar that's closing after many, many, many years at two ninety eight. Oh, the black bull, the black bull, as discussed with Ed Keenan.

So that was a recent episode of Toronto Mike. But we digress. That's interesting. The Toronto Star Building, which you got next there. What number are we on? Oh, you keeping track? I'm not keeping track. No, I think that's four. Let me see here. We are on. Maybe we need a pile for what's done and then a pile for what's to come. We're on number five. We're on number five. Number five. Number five. Okay. Now this one you might think looks like Toronto had a castle besides Castle Loma. Yeah, it looks does look like a castle, like the rocks in my chest sat there. This is the old Toronto Armouries building on University Avenue.

This used to stand right north of the, oh what is that building called? I can't think of the name right now. Right at Queen and University, it's Osgood Hall. Osgood Hall. Right north of Osgood Hall. Sorry I just had a brain fart there. Oh I have several every episode and because I won't edit it. Yeah I've been there several times for doors open but I still can't remember the name for some reason. But yeah Osgood Hall it's one of the oldest buildings in Toronto but just north of it was the the Armouries

building and from 1894 till 1963 this was sort of the hub of military activity in Toronto including the Queen's own rifles. It was the largest building in the Canadian militia for many years. They trained 250,000 soldiers through this building. A lot of soldiers and a lot of militia had good memories of this building and it had six foot thick walls. It was massive. It was basically built to withstand an explosion if there was one there. Sure. And it's gone. And it's gone. Yeah, they just didn't really want to have this downtown property anymore.

And there was a lot of opposition to the demolition at the time. But eventually they the government said, well, we need a new courthouse. We need courthouse space and this doesn't really fit what we want. But I thought that would make a good courthouse. So it looks it looks menacing. It looks like something that, yeah, you don't mess around in this building. You don't mess around in that building. And like you said, it's, you know, other than Casa Lomo, where do we have a building that looks has those kind of castle elements or whatever they're called.

But OK, wow. So it was all military through the Boer War, through World War One, World War Two, the Korean War. This was the center of military activity and military organization for that many years. Wow. Any parts survived? Like did anybody? As far as I know, no one's kept it. There may have been, there was one of the, I think the Queens O'Rifles, saved their fireplace and brought it to the new place. I think it was them. I'm not sure. But yeah, there might be some mental save, but a lot of this was too heavy really to do.

There is a similar building that's actually in London, Ontario that has been converted into a hotel. So even if they did that, that would have been something better than doing what they did. Oh, it's funny you mentioned that one in London, Ontario, because Andrew Ward on the live stream was talking about the spires are common in armories and that the one in London has that smaller. So it reminded me I drove by and I was like, what? It reminded me so much of this building, except it's still here. Yeah. And fortunately, it's still here. It's a it's a hotel but you know This is a I know I spent some time for work purposes I spent a lot of time in Frankfurt and there were large parts of Frankfurt that were destroyed by the the bombing in World War two

And they literally rebuilt it to replicate how it looked so it's like foe Like but it's fascinating because it's like, okay They recreated it so it looks like you're looking at the original buildings and that were destroyed by by war Yeah, and I always wondered like hey like maybe there is a building We'll discuss today that is so we it's so missed and we regret destroying it We could replicate it like rebuild it if you will or if that would be like what's the point? I think did that one okay? Well did that would make the cut. Yeah. Okay. Well, the cut. Yeah. Okay. Stay tuned here. Earlier, we talked about Pearl

Gems. Do the evolution. Great video. Great song. By the way, shadow to yield yield. One of my favorite Pearl Jam albums and the yield tour stopped at Molson Park and Barry. Oh, there's a place that's demolished now, Molson Park and Berry, okay, outside of our Toronto jurisdiction here. But I love the Yield album and love the tour. I still have my Yield t-shirt I bought in 98 at that concert and it's still one of my favorite concerts of all time. But there's that line, buying stocks on the day of the crash, okay? And that made me think about the Advantage to Invest investor podcast because great tips like that can be found for free in Raymond James Canada's the advantaged investor podcast hosted by Chris cook see a good FOTM himself like you Jeremy

So thank you you subs you you're already subscribing to yes We are open which is a maneras podcast but you're also gonna subscribe to the advantaged investor podcast from Raymond James Canada and you're going to bookmark recycle my electronics dot see a because I'm sure you don't want to throw out your old devices your old electronics your old cables you want to drop them off somewhere where they're properly recycled so the chemicals don't end up in our landfill that is the good work by the good people at EPRA who support Recycle My Electronics dot CA. You got your marching orders now? Jeremy you're on board here. Okay hit me with another one loving this. Okay now this is a this is

one more about the prettiness of it but a lot of people miss this building even though... I like to reveal too can I just tell the listeners? No I don't tell everybody because they most people are just gonna hear this they're not gonna see it but I don't see what you're talking about you kind of introduce it then you flip this and you show it to me and I get this moment where I'm seeing it for the first time oh I love it very cool well loving it hopefully uh the live streamers are getting a kick out of it too okay let's see they look like they're having a good time. Oh good, good. This one is the former Board of Trade building and it was at Front and Young Street right across the street from the Hockey Hall of Fame on the northeast corner where there's now a bunch of glass and steel. Glass and steel that could be the the nickname of Toronto. Okay. So this was built in 1892. It was seven stories and

originally what it was built there was a big design competition and an American firm won so a lot of people were upset about that. James and James won it. They were out of New York and it resembles the flowering Grange Exchange building in Boston Massachusetts. While they were building this, some of the architects said you can't build it that way, it's gonna, something's gonna go wrong, it's gonna collapse. And they're like no, and part of it collapsed. So they fired that firm and actually hired another firm to finish it from Buffalo, New York. They finished the job and it ended up in a very pretty building that wraps around the corner there at front.

The curvature makes it very attractive. It's an odd shaped piece of land because the way Front Street goes there it followed the lakeshore so it goes in sort of a triangular airway and you kind of have to do that to the building but it gave it a really cool look. And why did we demolish it? Well we needed a parking lot for 20 years. You know we we are similar vintage. We know in the 80s, Toronto was the land of Parking lot city. Parking lot city. It's unbelievable.

The amount of real estate we gave to parking lots. They never really thought about building up in parking lots either. They just, they had so many of them. Or down or up. It was just a level lot. Just a street level, absolutely. And the funky shape reminds Canada Cav

and myself of the Flatiron building. Oh yes, which is not even the real name of it. Everyone sort of adopted that now What is the real name of it the New York building goodermen? It's the gooder hand building right and a gooder ham of gooder ham and warts from the distillery district I'm the still you that was his office and at the time that's the other place I got married very getting in my mirror married multiple places. Yeah And yeah He used that so that he could see how the production was going at Gooder-Hammond Works. If he saw the smoke die down, he'd give them a call and say, what's going on

over there? Wow. Shout out to Joni Mitchell, who sang a wonderful song about paving paradise and putting up a parking lot. Yes. Which Kev has reminded me of on the live stream. This was the TTC head office as well for a number of years. After the border trade moved out, it was vacant for a little while,

and then the TTC moved in in 1921 when they were just starting off. By 1957, they outgrew it, and they moved up to this, a newer building up near Eglinton and Young. And yeah, it's still there today. Loving this very, very much. Loving it. That one, I think, I mean, maybe there's a few that you've shown me today that I think would be lovely additions to

the city of ours in 2024. But that one for sure, like, like, I mean, that that intersection does have the hockey Hall of Fame, which is amazing. Imagine having that at the corner. Yeah, it's kind of a literally looks like a crown. It's a it would be a crown jewel because you see it as you come into the main drag. You know, if they only knew how to clean buildings, everything got dirty and they said, let's throw it out. Yeah. It's like, do we throw out our clothes because we get a stain on it or we they get a little dirty? No, we wash our clothes and we reuse them. Right. For sure. For sure.

Thank you. We're on the same page. Nothing lasts forever. But to keep it around, keep something pretty around a little bit longer. Why not? Yeah, it's a it's better for the typically better for the environment and said to to to repair and to clean and then it is to demolish and rebuild for sure I'm a bit upset at basement dweweller though if I may share this because he says he prefers the Counting Crows version of don't know don't know what Big Yellow Taxi is. What is that name? What is the name of that song? I'm singing it in my head but Big Yellow Taxi. That's ridiculous like I feel like

booting him from the live stream. Do I have your permission J-Ho to boot Basement Dweller from the live stream? I don't know. He's pretty good to me. You can if you really want, but... Well, I wouldn't do that because your jams are your jams, but I am very... I hope this is a joke. So Basement Dweller, let me know if you're doing a bit here because I don't know any sensible, rational human being who prefers the Counting Crows version to the Joni Mitchell version. And I'm a bit upset here. Okay. Musical passions run deep. version and I'm a bit upset here. Music musical passions run deep.

Okay, very upset here Jeremy. Please, I would say cheer me up. Okay. But I don't think you can cheer me up because you're just showing me buildings and I look at these buildings and I think oh that's a great building and then you tell me it's being demolished and I can't go see it today on my bike ride. That's unfortunately the whole topic so I'm sorry. It was a joke. Basement Dweller says it was a joke. So now my mood is improving instantly. VP of sales says, few. There's a bunch of laughter. We're in good shape now.

Thank you, Basement Dweller, for giving me a heart attack. Okay. Thank goodness I'm on the blood thinners. That could have been dangerous. Okay, let's go. Okay. I think this is number six. Number six.

Or seven. Or seven. I'm sorry. I'm out of it. I'm no voice over actor. Okay, rock and roll. There's this building. It's a nice stately building called Corley Park. And I don't know if you know now, but our governor generals, when they live here in

Toronto, they stay at Queens Park. They actually have an apartment there for them to live and everything. But before then, they had buildings like this, which were called government houses. And there used to be one before this right across the street from the Royal Alex in the Metro Hall yard there that used to be basically the government house. And there was a few of them over the years, but that was the one before this one. So they built this it was very opulent in Rosedale. Now there's a place called Coralie Park in Rosedale, which has some of the remnants of this building, which is just a bridge leading along the pathway there. And yeah, so this was by the 1930s seen as

a, I guess a sign of great wealth and wealth abuse because of the Great Depression. Asterity measures were in place. Everyone looked at this building and were like those people in their big, expensive buildings, you know, having lavish parties and all this. And here I am scraping two nickels together to buy an apple or whatever. And so this actually led to the Liberal Party, Mitch Hepburn rallying. Not to be confused with the late grade standup comic, Mitch Hepburn, a different guy. That's Hepburn. This is Hepburn rallying. Not to be confused with the late grade stand up comic,

Mitch Hepburn. Different guy, that's Headberg, this is Hepburn, right? Okay. I'm not pronouncing it properly, probably. So yeah, he got elected to the Liberal Party and basically they said, well, Corley Park's days are numbered. And in 1937 it closed and they auctioned everything off

on the inside, but World War II came along and they thought, well, we could reuse this building for war purposes and they turned it everything off on the inside. But World War II came along and they thought, well, we could reuse this building for war purposes and they turned it into a military hospital. So that sort of kept its life going a little bit longer. But by 1960, Toronto bought it with plans to basically demolish it because they wanted it gone because it was gonna cost them a large amount

of money to fix it. So they did. And it was Nathan Phillips who actually led the charge to do that. And it was the 60s. There was a lot of charge going against old buildings that were costing them money at the time. So it was demolished and turned into a park.

Particularly beautiful building. I just need to get closer to look, because I'm excited. But what do you call this part here? Does that have a term for that? Or to close and and cupolas. There's a bunch of different styles there. And he pulled those names out of your hat.

Well, your hat's over there. OK, I'm like, what are those called? Because they're cool, man. It was in a French Renaissance style. And yeah, there's a few notes on there. If you if you want to. Did we save any parts of this guy? You know, we save our signs, we save little parts here. We stick it in places where cam gordon gets married

What do we got here this one? I think some fixtures were saved, but I'm not sure where they went I forget but I think some of the lamps that were inside were pretty opulent. They're I think gas leers So they you know, somebody saved some pieces gas lighting me man Okay, and then you have a lot of the demolition people you find out years later. Oh, they saved a lot of stuff, but they never really said to anybody that they did because they were supposed to put that in the dump. Oh, my goodness. Yeah.

So, you know, there's a spit, I think it's called a spit, but there's a, there's a park nearby called Sam Smith, Colonel Samuel Smith Park is the full name, but there's a, like a manmade extension into the water, like much of the waterfront or whatever. And you can, I guess that's where you were dumping chunks of concrete and stuff. Like it was put out trucked out there and to create this, uh, the spit and, uh, where I walk quite a bit and there's a place there called Wimberl point and, uh, there's, there's a sign sign there that I see in an ad actually. But anyway, if people know what I'm talking

about, I wonder how many parts of these old buildings have become like part of this island and peninsula and everything that man made. A lot of those peninsulas, yeah, they were made out of these destructed buildings and all along the Scarborough shoreline, they've tried to shore it up there and I've found tons of bricks with the actual manufacturer's name in them Right and kept them because they came from the Don Valley brick works and all those sort of places But yeah a lot of that that's the info That's the clean info that they put in there

some of the concrete they can't because They actually I didn't know up until recently that they put asbestos into concrete in a lot of the old buildings as a fireproof Measure measure because they just had to put that everywhere. So a lot of times that you'll see places being destroyed, they'll actually be wearing hazmat suits to avoid freezing that in. I was going to say, a lot of times if you just don't disturb it. Oh yeah, it's fine. Right? But once you fuck with it, pardon my French, then suddenly it's a major carcinogen and pretty dangerous.

A lot of these old radios that I've collected over the years, they have asbestos plates in the bottom to protect from heat and yeah over the years they dry out and it flakes. So you do have as long as you encapsulate it, it's fine. It's just yeah if the fibers fly in the air and get into your lungs, that's the bad part. Yeah absolutely that's the bad part there. Okay so is the next one the antipenultimate? I think I see three left right? There's three left yes. Okay because after the antipenultimate I'm gonna ask you Jeremy Hopkins a very important question no no nothing to do of any sponsors or anything but with the content of this very program Toronto mic'd so let's let's look at this

anti-penultimate building that was destroyed but should not have been destroyed okay anti-penultimate yeah anti-penultimate. Yeah, anti-penultimate. Is this the one? That's the word of the day. Okay. Well, no, anti-penultimate, whatever you decide. Okay, then this is it. I have no say in what's the anti-penultimate.

I wasn't sure if it was yours. I only have a request for what the last one is. Everything else is up to you. Okay, yeah, the last one's still the last one. Okay. This is Trinity College Okay, the old Trinity College and college. I know where the new Trinity College is if you know Trinity Bellwoods Park Yeah, this is what was there before

Like the whole like that was in the park. This was in the park The park is huge and this was just in a part of it But yeah, this was there and since this was torn down, it was built in 1852. Keevas Tully was the architect. He was very famous in Toronto for building a few of these old buildings. And they tore it down in the 1950s when they built basically a replica.

I forget where it is on the campus, but it's, yeah, it's on the campus in a new location. It looks very much the same as it's today. I, so I bike through Trinity bill. It's quite a bit and it's got the gateway, right? Which is sort of looks. Yeah, the gateway. It was the original gateway there

and they've made it a replica now and the gateway they preserve somewhere else. But yeah, the gates are the gates that were there when this was there, cause it's got that similar look. When did we decide to demolish that beautiful building? In the 1950s. I'm not sure exactly which year it probably took them a while to do that. But yeah. Toronto ain't got no class, like no sense of beauty. Come on, what's going on here? So in 1925

is when they moved to the new facility. But yeah, it didn't get demolished until the 50s. I think they wanted to keep it as well, but it didn't work out over the time. Andy says not to be confused with Andrew Ward, who's also kind of an Andy, but Andy Degrassi, fanatic has a sketch of that building hanging in her home. Oh, very cool. It's a it's a beautiful building to have up on your own. Wow. Okay. So before I because again, I do want to ask you something regarding Toronto Mike, but I do want to go back to my notes because I don't want to miss these things. So. No, I need to see the penultimate before I can decide you missed anything that was

people wanted, so I actually need to wait for that. Excuse me, but here is a few buildings that hopefully do not get demolished. I was thinking of here's one here that you and I grew up going to with our schools, okay? But the McLaughlin Planetarium, like I don't know what's going on there now. It's still there. I had, I have such fond memories of the McLaughlin Planetarium. I don't fully understand why it had to be shuttered to begin with and now it just kind of lingers there. And then I feel like one understand why it had to be shuttered to begin with and now it just kind of lingers there and then I feel like one day I'm gonna hear there's an announcement

to demolish it and build something else. But that's a building I would love to see resurrected and revitalized and not just for laser Floyd but for for all the stuff I saw so many great astronomy things and learn so much and I loved the McLaughlin planetarium. Oh same here and it had that eerie feeling when they did play some documentaries about space and they'd have those space sounds and that sort of thing. There was something similar at the Science Centre and it yeah it just gave you this sense of wow we are so small in this

universe and it was just awe-inspiring. Well, there's another one. You just mentioned the Ontario Science Centre. And that's another building that I hope survives all this current turmoil with. Another place that, I mean, I don't know what part I'm referring to specifically. I guess it's the Cinesphere and everything, but Ontario Place as a whole, and then the Ontario Science Centre in the news for for all the wrong reasons lately But these are places I would love to see preserved same here There's there's so many memories of school trips and and just fun times tied up in those there's that sentimental value

but there's also just the architectural greatness of these places that really can't be replicated today. And Raymond Moriama building the Science Centre, he basically said before he died, that place could last 200 years and have no problems. But I know it's built on a hill, you're going to have problems no matter what. And their big thing now is like, oh, that bridge isn't safe, you can't go across there. And we're going to hire all these shuttle bus people to bring you around. I think they're trying to make it as annoying as they can to be there.

That is a move, right? Like where you starve out the health system until people are like, this is broken. We need radical fixing. And it's basically, you basically destroy it so that you can justify the, uh, the overhaul. And the people that work there are incredible and they're just making the best of what they can and, and I, and I feel for them because it's, there's a lot of exhibits shut down and they just don't want to give the money to it. Now you mentioned you grew up in Scarborough. So I often on this podcast we talk about the east of Young set versus the west of Young

sect. And of course I do belong into the west of Young sect. My whole life is I've lived west of Young even when I lived on Young, it was on, which I rode by yesterday, 30 Charles Street West I lived at for a little bit. And it was on the west side of Young Street. So I've never lived east of there in my entire life. But the Science Center was a destination, a place that we would go that was east of Young.

Yeah. Like I always felt like the east of young people had go that was east of young. Yeah. Like I always felt like the east of young people had to always come west of young to go for the, not all, but for the vast majority of concerts and sporting events and, and a lot of the activities, uh, you know, science center and the CNE, and we could go on and on of all the stuff going on west of young, but it did, it just seemed like, Hey, here's something we're going to come to you now. Yeah. And it just seems wrong that we're just going to rip it away and it's going to

end up if it ends up at Ontario Place or wherever the hell heck the Ontario Science Center ends up. Well, I think with the traffic problems that they do have during any event downtown now already, you're going to add another down there. And it's just it's ridiculous. Why not have it spread out a bit like are you

going to bring the zoo down? Share the love.? Yeah the zoo. I mentioned the zoo and you said Scarborough because it's literally the only Scarborough destination I remember as a kid was the zoo. Yeah yeah it's one of the claims to fame for Scarborough being the Toronto Zoo but before that it was at Riverdale. We have our high park. Right was it? Okay. It was Riverdale Park. That was the zoo back in the day. Okay, cuz we have a high park zoo that I Would bring the little ones to who didn't at the time. Oh, there's a yak like it's like Oh, this is just like the big zoo. We have yaks here

I guess the high park zoo was around happy bear about the same length of time as the Riverdale one was but they anytime They'd mentioned the Toronto Zoo that would be about the Riverdale one. Okay, interesting one more place Again, it's all about my bike rides here. You're going to learn here, but this is my segment here, but the Oculus Pavilion that is, well, some people think of it as like the, the spaceship looking thing you pass by on the Humber trail. It recently got some love. They did some, uh, much needed repairs on it and fixed it up. So it's, it's looking pretty good now.

So they're not they're again There's sometimes they put these a Designations on buildings where you're not allowed to mess with it So is that in the good as I guess is there a historical designation for the oculus pavilion that would prevent them from destroying it? well, I'm a lot of people get comfortable when they hear something has a designation and I Wouldn't be surprised if anything happened to anything right now. The way that laws are being stripped away by our current provincial government, a lot of environmental protections and historical protections are currently being torn away.

Oh, it looks like that Simpsons episode when Timber, remember, because he opens up the suitcase full of money. You know, there's always ways around these environmental laws. Follow the money. All right. Oh, that was a great episode, actually. That was based on Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, I think. But that's a great episode.

OK. Seth's pool on the Potamac. I think that was the speech. OK. One more. I mentioned I got married at Old City Hall. I like Old City Hall being there. I just want to ensure Old City Hall gets to live, to fight for another century.

It was another one that came very close to being torn down. And the original plans for Eaton Center, they wanted to get rid of it completely, and that would be another section of the Eaton Center. And eventually people fought, and basically came one step from chaining themselves to the building and and they won and it's amazingly surviving today and now they're trying to find viability for it

now that the courts aren't in there and I really do hope that it is turned into a Toronto Museum because it would be great to have a showcase like that right besides you know New City Hall and feature a lot of the things that are mothballed right now in warehouses that I've seen personally that it's just amazing. It's like that scene in Raiders of the Lost Ark with Indiana Jones where at the end they pushed the the Ark down this massive storehouse of just everything that's ever been classified. And it's it's kind of like that with Toronto. Like we don't get to really show a lot of what we have and it would be a cool show place to have that there. We just had the eclipse, as you know, was that Monday?

It was Monday, right? That's all blur now. So we have our solar eclipse here and you know, we got the kids all excited about it. And I played the scene from Raiders of the Lost Ark when Bellic's face melts. And then you said good night. If I say this is what happens if you don't wear the glasses and you're, when you're staring at the eclipse, the goggles do nothing. That's right.

Thank you for jumping. The Simpsons have to go. Cause did you know that was more liquid though? Oh, there was, that's right. But there is a Simpsons episode that I did also watch with the kids were Marge. They have three of these. What are they called when you build the contraption that pinhole cameras? Is that what they are? What they call the case? So the Simpsons did this. They built three of these things to watch their eclipse, but then no, they built four of them. Sorry. And then

Homer broke his. So Marge lent him hers. And then they were talking about how amazing it was. And Marge couldn't resist. She's like, I have to see this. And she looked at a bare eyed and then her eyes just, they just, uh, they hardened and turned bright red. And she basically loses her eyesight instantly from staring at the, the eclipse here. Okay. Oh man. She trumped it. Well, unfortunately, apparently he can, he can still see, but you know, that's another story for the day. Okay, very important. So I just saw a comment on the live stream that I have Medusa hair. I actually don't know what my hair's doing right now. I am probably gonna go visit Andy the FOTM barber and get this thing tamed.

But is this Medusa hair? No, I've seen some of your older photos and was like, wow, he shaved it all off? That looks cool, I don't know. I like it. was like, wow, he shaved it all off. Like that looks cool. I don't know. I like it. Okay. Shame on you.

In person, it's not Medusa. No, I'm not turning into stone. I'm good. Thank you very much here. Okay. Let's look at the, this is the penultimate. That means it's the second last. Yes.

And then I'll know what was missed and then I can talk about some FOTM submissions. This one was a little influenced by the Toronto firefighters, historical society. They said to me, I hope there's a fire station there. And I was like, oh, there isn't, but I could put one. This is old fire hall number- Did they threaten you? We're going to arson?

No, they didn't threaten me. No, no, they're just great guys. I've met them before. They have the old fire trucks out and at events and stuff And I've posed with their stuff and talked with them. They're they're great people. So I was like, oh I'll throw one in there I don't want people threatening you this might not be the ultimate one that they want to put in there But we're not doing the ultimate today So but this is what the Toronto Fire Department when they were established

they took this older fire hall and they called this Toronto Fire Station number one and it was right across the street from the oh right at Bay and Temperance right across the street from the temple building on the kiddie corner from it like on the other the other corner and it wasn't a very you know remarkable building or anything it started off very small but it was built in the 1850s so this was all horse-drawn wagons and you know just very small fire departments that sort of thing they weren't really regulated like they are now it was towns would make their own fire halls or they have their own volunteer bucket brigades and that sort of thing but when Toronto came in and made their own fire department they redesignated a lot of

these older halls and this became number one at Bayon Temperance so it actually was torn down very early though because this is only really meant for horses and carts and that sort of thing so as bigger equipment evolves yeah some of the stations they can adapt and a lot of the old stations are still there but this one I guess they couldn't adapt by 1924 they were just like oh that's it we'll tear it down and they put another building there and it ended up being a skyscraper. But another reason I wanted to do this one is because of the great Toronto fire having its 120th anniversary on April 19th, which is coming up very soon actually.

And this building with all of its bays across the front here, if you look at it, I think it's claim to fame is it's the very first film of Toronto ever being filmed was in 1904 for that fire and A person by the name of George Scott and well as a George Scott company came to film George C Scott, of course And they they actually filmed a fire wagon coming down Bay Street Right by this building and you can see it off to the right, all the bays there, and some of the firefighters standing around because I think they tried to shoot a few scenes the next day to sort of fill in the fire scenes that they didn't really have too much of.

Wow. Where, where did you get all these photos? A lot of these are from the city of Toronto archives, from the Toronto public library, which thankfully just got their archival site back up again because of the cyber attack they really really were down but they have some good quality photos and yeah you can print them off you can also order reproductions from them and yeah. Amazing, it's just I think you put in great effort here so then we have only one to go. Yes one more so I think that's

all I had to say about that one. Amazing. Yeah, it was expanded. Oh yeah, originally it started with only one side of this and then expanded over the years. That's the only other thing I wanted to say. I want to say something though. I want to ask you, Jeremy Hopkins. Yes. And I think I've alluded to this in the past, but this is the official request, the official ask. But I think you'd be perfect if you were the official Toronto historian of the Toronto Mike podcast. That would be so cool. I would love to. So I, you know, we talked about you coming on ever since I met you at TMLX 14 at Palma's Kitchen

last December. We talked about you coming on for a proper episode. And I said to you, how do you feel about talking about the 10 buildings we demolished that we shouldn't have demolished? And I picked that topic because of how personally interested I am in this. Like I am so interested in the built when I learn and see the buildings that I can't see anymore, but we're here. It's like, oh, that was there and now it's gone. Like I'm just so interested. So if you are into the topic, which I think is amazing, but we could have different themes. Uh, I won't, I won't put any timeline on it, but maybe like even like if every quarter you drop by to get your Great Lakes beer, to get your lasagna, to get, to get your Ridley funeral home measuring tape,

to get your Manera speaker and another gift you'll be getting in a moment. You drop by and just kind of educate us and we talk about whatever the theme is, Toronto's history. What do you say? I would love to and the opportunity to spread more of Toronto history. I enjoy the chance. It's just so fun to talk about this stuff and talk about it to receptive people that like to learn and hear about it. And yeah, it's just it would be wonderful. And I think I said, OK, we're going to talk about 10 Toronto buildings that should not have been demolished. And I said, I put in like a wink wink.

I would love one to be this building, which we're going to talk about in a moment here. So but Garnet Barnsdale, he's a good, good FOTM, huge horse racing fan. You know, he listens to down the stretch, the definitive Ontario horse racing podcast, which comes from the great FOTM hall of famer Peter Gross. Garnet Barnsdale said if Greenwood racetrack isn't on there, it should be number 11. Oh, shadow to Greenwood racetrack.

I have memories of Greenwood racetrack and of the restaurants that used to serve it there. There used to be the tulip and a few other old restaurants that were there that we'd go and hang out at. And it had such a long history of people hanging out there and experiencing that. But unfortunately, that's not in the list. I was thinking about doing a surprise 11 just to make it, you know, the 11 on the amp. But no, I didn't today. Well, they're making a new spinal tap, right? Did I read that?

I've read that too, and I thought it was maybe AI. Speaking of great sentence episodes. AI giving me music. Oh, please, don't get me started on AI. So that was Garnet Barnsdale, and there was in the live chat, I didn't take down who was saying all this stuff, it might've been a conversation between Tyler and Andrew, I'm not sure anymore, but Honest Ed's Warehouse, that's gone now, right?

Yes, it's. Because my grandmother used to take me there. It's like basically this would be like if we needed a fancy dinner, like there was no fancier place my grandmother could envision in the city than Honest Ed's Warehouse. Oh, that's, yeah, it had its glam charm. It had a lot of cool old antiques and a lot of things.

Well, there's a few restaurants there at one point. And yeah, it was pretty cool. And I remember going there with my family way back. And I think in one of the restaurants there, they always forced you to wear a suit, or wear a suit jacket at least. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And if you didn't have one, they'd put one on you.

Right, no, I have memories of this as well. And that's part of old Toronto that's now now gone. But speaking of gone, we talked about saving the signs, the Honest Ed sign. Where is that hanging right now? Is that it's currently being restored. One of the signs was saved actually by David Marvish, and he's going to have it reinstalled or the plan was to reinstall it on Victoria Street right on the back of Marvish Theatre. Okay so you know, shout out to Honest Eds because we talked about Honest Eds Warehouse,

the Big Bop, Crocodile Rock, the original Second City, not demolished says Tyler but literally moved and then they moved out anyway so I guess they... Well, another Firehall story right there. They were in the Firehall on Lombard Street. It was a second city when they came here and that was a good repurposing of the venue and at the current second city they've actually got a stage I think it's called stage 76 or something like that. I forget what what year it was but they made it look like the old fire hall so when you go there to sit for a comedy act it looks like the base for the old Lombard Street fire hall. Amazing. And now we have arrived.

The moment of truth. This is it. We are going to talk about again, no particular order, but we're going to close with a building, a structure that has been demolished that we wish was not demolished. Let's hear from you, Jeremy. Okay. Here we go. This is the Maple Leaf Stadium and it's not for hockey.

This is a lot of people when they hear Maple Leafs, they think hockey, but it has, I think an even longer story as being a baseball team. And yeah, definitely. And for years, this team was on the island at a couple of stadiums that were built out of wood. And it was run by Lahl Salman and a few other people. But he also owned the ferry company

that could get you there. So if you wanted to go see a game, you were going to pay him money to as well to go on his ferry. And some guy hit his first professional home run there. Yeah, some guy named Babe Ruth kind of knocked a ball under the water there and they have few people have searched for it and they've never found it. But his first professional home run was hit there

on the island into the water and there is a memorial there for it. I think he was the Providence Grays, I want to say. I think that's the name. That's in my head anyway. But that alone, like if you step back and just drink that in, okay. So Babe Ruth, who hit, I think it was 714 career home runs, but we're going back to an era when they were playing

154 games a season and he was hitting home runs at a pace where the other teams weren't matching his home run output. Like unbelievable slugger, Babe George Herman Ruth, his first professional home run hit on the island. That's unbelievable. Yeah, it was incredible. I was invited to go to that event for the plaque and I didn't make it out to it.

I forget what happened that day, but I wanted to go see them put it there, but it's still there. So you can go see the plaque on the island. But this stadium though, when you look at it, you think that's a classic baseball stadium. That's just what they should all look like. And unfortunately, we're in Canada, so we're right on the lake, things get cold.

You'd have problems with it, like you would with the Blue Jays Stadium. Exhibition stadium. Exhibition, yeah. Where you'd get fog rolling in off the lake, or snow the very first game at the exhibition stadium, it snowed in April. Yeah, April 7, 1977.

So yeah, that's eventually what led to them wanting to make the dome, because then they could control the elements a bit and Dom okay, so the Jays arrive in 1977. When do they demolish Maple Leaf Stadium? So this lasted from 1926 to 1967 and by that point the team had been sold off a couple times and There was really just no use for it. It became a bit of a hazard. Kids were getting into it. So that led to its demolition. But it too was a solid building that really could have lasted many more years. And geographically, there's literally there's a place, a street called Stadium Road, right? That's to signify where this one stood, right? I understand it when I try to understand where

it was. I think it's where the tip top tailors was, which is gone, by the way. But the sign, see it's all about the freaking signs in the city, but the sign remains. There's the condo tower there. That has tip top, tip top, luffs. Yeah. Right. The tip. Thank you. Okay. But that's about where we're talking, right? On the waterfront. Yeah. It was right, right beside that at the foot of Bathurst street, by you know where the the flagship Loblaw store is it was sort of kitty corner to that and even that Loblaw store I thought that was going to be torn down but they completely rebuilt it took it down bit brick by brick and then reassembled it. But every time I see these old photos of the Maple Leaf Stadium I think what a cool photo

like it's like straight out of like the natural or something like that. Very cool. Now you mentioned that that stadium was it till 67? 1967. So yeah, not long after that. Right. So that that's exactly right. So you've touched the book that is the Toronto Maple Leafs history book. That is the history of the Toronto Maple Leafs baseball team. You're taking that home with you Jeremy and if I may they've been at Christie Pitts I believe since 1969 I want to say that team has been at Christie Pitts. Two years after the other one closed down. Right so everything's kind of connected here and the home game the whole of the you know the seat the debut of the the 2024 season the

season starts May 12th at Christie Pitts and this is a call to you Jeremy and everybody listening come to Christie Pitts on May 12th it's a Sunday at 2 p.m. the first Maple Leafs baseball game of the season Rob Butler is the manager of this team I'm bringing out a whole bunch of cool FOTMs to hang and I'm going to see if I can get Biff naked to sing the national anthem. I'm working on that. We got Rick Emmett coming out, Steve Pagan, Peter Gross, Mark Hemsher, Blair Packham, a whole bunch of others. Rod Black, of course, will be there. He's growing a mustache for the event. I understand the great Rick Vibe is going to be there and some other surprises that I think people will dig. And I would love to see everybody out there. I'm going to have my recording equipment set up so people

can come by and say hi on the microphone. Stephen Brunt is making the trip from Hamilton. So if you want to meet Stephen Brunt, this is your chance. May 12th, Christie Pitts, Toronto Maple Leafs baseball. Get into it. And because I feel I haven't been mentioning this, because I assume people know you don't have to buy a ticket. I just want to bring this home. Okay. You just have to show up at Christie Pitts, Christie and Bloor and take in some of the best baseball outside the dome, uh, best baseball in the country outside the dome. That's where you got to be. Jeremy, will you be able to make it? I'm going to try. There's a few things happening that day, including Mother's Day,

but my mom likes baseball. So bring up, they're going to have pink flowers. It's going to be flowers for the moms. There's going to be swag. It's going to be, it's going to be a good time. So if you can fit in a trip to Christie Pitts on May 12th, that's amazing. And I think you, as a Toronto historian, you're going to love that book, the history of the, there's such a wild and amazing, wonderful history of this team, the Toronto Maple Leafs. You know, everybody thinks Leafs, they think, oh, Austin Matthews got a 65th goal yesterday. Will he get to 70? That's a whole separate conversation. But the, this team predates that team and it's the best baseball outside the dome. And it's been very exciting to work with them

The last couple of months nice. Oh one thing I haven't I I know they're not affiliated with the old team at all Really are they it's just by name and sort of by look right an IBL team now, which is so it's a different Yeah, so it's a different league. It's different league So it's kind of tough to compare the apples and oranges but But the branding, the actual name of the team is the one consistency for sure. And carry on that look and that feel. And it's more like the old school baseball, I guess, or? Yeah, yeah, you'll dig it, you know, and everybody who likes a good baseball game should come out and check them out.

And I'm glad we got to close with the Maple Leaf Stadium. I've written about it on my blog a few times. Whenever I encounter these photos from the, you know, you mentioned that TPL has the great historical photos and everything. It's kind of hard to believe that this place existed before we were born, but that this was there. And you can talk to people.

I've had guests on like Larry Milson and stuff who talk about going to these games as a kid. And they tell you the story of how just, it just sounds amazing. You know, Sparky Anderson's there and it's like this is happening and at some point it stopped happening and then in 1977 we got our team and they played at Exhibition Stadium and then since 1989 they've been at the dome there's been a lot of discussion about uh you know work done inside the dome uh have you caught any uh Blue Jays actions since they came home a couple

a couple of days ago? No, I haven't. I'm just curious what you think. I've been watching they have this it looks different. Like when you when you watch on TV, it doesn't look like the dome. I did see some pictures of it and people are talking commenting about the backgrounds and all that sort of thing. And the advertising is a little odd and it looks different. They the first thirst. It's, it just doesn't look like the dome, which I was watching. I was at a sports bar thing. My kid turned 10 years old yesterday and we went to this place called Game Time. So happy birthday to Jarvis. And the game, there was funny. They had these three big screens. I was there. Three of my four kids were there. And

my mom was there. And of course, my wife was was there and then they had these three big screens and one had the Raptor game on okay whatever and then the Leafs game which is kind of exciting because we'll Austin hit 70 that's kind of exciting and then the Jays game which I was kind of focused on and it did not look like the dome and there's no that's fine but they have this when you watch it on TV now they have this section the TD is obviously the sponsor there's TD logos all over the place and the seats are very wide and high and there's very spacious so it just seems like to me it's a bit uh you know it's a bit of a monument to like wealth and commerce oh yeah the the extreme rich people will be seen throughout the game in these seats and one of them happens to be Geddy Lee from Rush and then you have the home plate lady and the guy who runs Canada Goose. And you kind of like, it just seems a little off putting when you're trying to take in your baseball games. So none of that ambiance on May 12th at Christie Pits.

You wonder how much of that a pitcher could complain about. Like if it became distracting at one point where it's like, there's too much advertising there and it's throwing me off Maybe no, they're used to it. But then they remember. Oh, yeah, that's what pays my monster salary So and I will thank you just before I play it with some lowest of the low great Toronto band But you did a hell of a job promoting your appearance on social media like thank you so much in various channels too because you tag me in it so I would be inundated it was I And various channels too, because you tagged me in it, so I would be inundated. I think I got it.

Do you want to shout out all the social media channels where you promoted this appearance? Can you name them all? Okay, so Facebook, Instagram, let's see, threads, Blue Sky. Blue Sky, yeah. And what's the last one there that I have? I've kind of spread myself thin lately. Twitter. Oh yeah, Twitter. No, X.

I actually tried to kick X, but it drew me back in because people still talk to me nice there and I haven't had any of the negative stuff that a lot of people have had. Yeah, I mean, I'm trying to move on too, but I'm still there primarily because that's where a lot of the people I engage with are. So it's like sort of the one thing missing.

And I like blue sky fine, but there's far of the people I engage with are. So it's like sort of the one thing missing. And I like Blue Sky Fine, but there's far fewer people there to engage with. Exactly. A lot of business is still stuck with X and it's just how things are. And a lot of people don't want to fuel Elon Musk, but it's still happening. No, I won't buy a Tesla.

How's that? Now let me play the song that you've been using in your social media promotion Oh cool. Play it because I want to talk to you about this on our way out here They passed an ordinance in the town they said we'd have to tear it down That little old shag got back so dear to me Though the health department said its day was over and dead,

it will stand forever in my memory. Don't let them tear that little brown building down. Don't let them tear that precious building down. Don't let them tear that dear old building down, don't let them tear. Don't let them tear. That dear old building down, there's not another like it in the country or the town. It was not so long ago that I went tripping through the sun. And what is this song? I only learned about it when I heard it

in one of your video promotions for your appearance, and I thought it was perfect for this topic. It's a tribute to the little brown shack and I was familiar with it from some other artists that's been covered by a lot of people but a lot of people think it's about tearing an actual historic building down or something like that but this is just a sentimental building because it's the outhouse. And talking about how all his family were there before him and did all this stuff and it just it just kicked and it's it appealed to my dry dad joke humor

I went wow that's that's a bit of a not irony I don't know what it would be it's just quirky and I liked it. I dig it we're gonna have a cold open for this episode where I use a little bit of it Andy on the live stream Just as we say goodbye. She says she loved your Twitter account and she is so glad That you created a blue sky account so she can follow you there So Andy and others are following you on the blue sky amazing and remind us again. So it's under your name Jeremy Hopkins Yeah it's either Jeremy Hopkins or

Hopkins design where I wasn't able to get Jeremy Hopkins because there are name, Jeremy Hopkins? Yeah, it's either Jeremy Hopkins or Hopkins Design, where I wasn't able to get Jeremy Hopkins because there's some other Jeremy Hopkins around the world, a lot in Wales, I guess, and other places where they have that name. What an absolute pleasure for me. I can't wait for you to put on the hat for the photo we're gonna take by the Toronto tree.

Oh, I can't wait till the Toronto tree. Shout out to Dave Thomas. It's a beautiful day out there. I don't know what will hit because we have the lake effect down here, but if I go a little north, I'm sure it'll be like 17 degrees today. So yesterday was a funny day. I was up at where was I? Dundas and Bathurst on a bike ride and I was so hot. And I realized it's because the way I dressed for the bike ride was how I needed to dress to leave New Toronto.

I can't tell you at this time of year what the difference is. Even last night, I could feel it coming once I kind of cleared Queensway and then you're just like, oh my goodness. I think we're talking about a good seven, eight degree swing from like a Bathurst in Dundas to where you are right now. That lake effect really does play a big part in it. It can calm things and make things a lot more pleasant down by the lake than it is on a hot day. On a day like this, you like to, you don't want it. I'll be honest, but I will shout out lake effect. That was a great, great lakes beer that you can, you can buy.

So this is the part where I drop a mindblower or something, right? So that we have to turn the music off. No, I have a bit of one. That does happen quite a bit. So you're, you do hear quite a bit ofower or something, right? So that we have to turn the music off. No, I have a bit of one. That does happen quite a bit. So you do hear quite a bit of Toronto Miked episodes, right? But that is a thing. I love it when that happens. It's like a mic drop and then everything goes down.

You're like, oh wait, this episode's going longer. Which is fine. I'll bring down the song for a... Moose Grumpy has arrived. I feel like the party can start now. Moose Grumpy's late to the party, but she's had a morning. She just says, sorry that she missed this live stream. But of course, I recorded it for Toronto Mic'd and it'll be in the feed in mere minutes.

But thank you, Jeremy. Hell of a debut. It will get you back. And you can, of course, suggest the theme. You're the historian. I'll try to rack my brain and come up with something for some ongoing themes. And thank you so much for this chance. It's been a lot of fun. And if any listener has a suggestion, they want Jeremy Hoffkin to tackle a different like Toronto history theme, yeah, just let me know. You know, many ways to reach us and you can write me an email, mike at torontomic.com and we'll get Jeremy back in a few months to do it again.

It's good too, because it helps break me out of my shell. If I'm sort of stuck on the East End a lot, it drags me out to the West and makes me think about more things than I've been thinking about. So I love suggestions. And that brings us to the end of our 1,468th show. You can follow me on Twitter and Blue Sky.

I'm at Toronto Mike, and you can find Jeremy Hopkinskin all over the place. If he's not under Jeremy Hopkin, he's going to be under Hopkin Design. Much love to all who made this possible. That's Great Lakes Brewery. Jeremy's got his fresh craft beer here. Palma Pasta. Don't leave without your lasagna. RecycleMyElectronics.ca. Raymond James Canada. subscribed to the Advantage Investor, the Toronto Maple Leafs baseball team come out on May 12th and Jeremy's got his history book, Monaris Season Six of Yes, We Are Open is dropping now, and Ridley Funeral Home, Pillars of the Community. See you all tomorrow when my special guest is, it's not tomorrow, but my next guest, this is interesting,

doing something different. It's called FOTMcast. It's a little meta, but I think you're going to dig it. If you're a fan of this podcast, you're going to love it. Tyler Campbell and Cam Gordon are dropping by for the inaugural FOTMcast, which will also be a quarterly Toronto mic happening. And I want you guys to listen and tell me what you think, because it's gonna be really meta, but really inside baseball. And I think

you're gonna dig it've kissed you in Spain And I've kissed you in places I better not name And I've seen the sun go down on Chacla Cours But I like it much better going down on you