Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Colin Cripps: Toronto Mike'd Podcast Episode 1741

Episode Date: August 7, 2025

In this 1742nd episode of Toronto Mike'd, Mike chats with guitarist Colin Cripps about his years playing with the Spoons, Crash Vegas, Junkhouse, Kathleen Edwards, Bryan Adams and Blue Rodeo. Toronto Mike'd is proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, Palma Pasta, Ridley Funeral Home, Toronto Maple Leafs Baseball, the Waterfront BIA, Blue Sky Agency and RecycleMyElectronics.ca. If you would like to support the show, we do have partner opportunities available. Please email Toronto Mike at [e-mail].

Welcome to Toronto Welcome to episode to episode 1,741 of Toronto of Toronto, of Toronto Maked, Proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, a fiercely, independent, craft brewery who believes in supporting communities, good times, and brewing amazing beer. Like this Sunnyside Session IPA, I'm about to crack with Jayho. 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. Toronto's Waterfront, BIA, check out what's happening on Toronto's Waterfront this summer. Blue Sky Agency, the official distributor of Cylent's quiet, comfortable, and customizable office pods, create sanctuary within your workspace. Toronto Maple Leafs Baseball, get your butts to Christy Pits, Saturday night, 7.30, under the lights, the best baseball in the city outside the dome. Recycle My Electronics.C.A.

Committing to our planet's future means properly recycling our electronics of the past. And Ridley Funeral Home, pillars of the community since 1921. Today, returning to Toronto Miked to discuss the 100 plus years. The history of Sunnyside. Yes, it's the official Toronto historian of the Toronto Miked podcast, Jeremy Hopkin. Hey, good day, Mike. Welcome, Jeremy. You're looking dapper as usual.

I always dress up for the occasion with you guys. How many pinstripe suits do you own? Is it always the same one, or do you have multiple? I do have a couple. This one's the more special of the ones, and I tend to wear this the most, and I guess it's sort of become a brand identity as well. So it's getting a little rough around the edges. I've patched it multiple times, but I love it.

Yeah, you need a seamstress to keep that in order. You don't buy that off the rack, right? Like you can't walk into, I don't know, moors and pick up a suit like that, can you? No, not fitting this nice. Like, this was actually custom made for me. So it fits in all the right places and, yeah. All the right. That sounds like the tagline fits in all the right places.

This is Jeremy Hopkins, official Toronto historian of the Toronto Mike podcast. I'm playing a song. I'd say name that tune, but I don't think you're that good. Like, that would blow my mind. Seems right up my alley, though. Well, this song was a big hit in 1925. So 100 years ago, you know, groovy, you weren't groovy in the 20s. What were you swinging?

What were you doing in the 20s? Roaring. Oh, yeah, you were doing the Charleston. You were, yeah, roaring in the 20s, of course. And, yeah. This is called the Riverboat Shuffle. The artist is, I hope I say this name, right, is Sham Jones. Oh, yeah.

In a hundred years ago. So 1925, this would be a song you might hear at SunnySy. Definitely. So before we start talking about Sunnyside, and again, I have to just preface this by saying, Jeremy, that us, you know, average Joe's and Janes, when we think Sunnyside, at least when I think Sunnyside, I think of the swimming pool. Oh, yeah. I bike by it almost every day. It's a big pool. It's right there at Sunnyside.

I think, oh, Sunnyside, you're going to the pool. But as we'll learn in our discussion about the history of Sunnyside here in Toronto, It was much more than just a pool. Like, the pool arrived 100 years ago, but there was already a happening at Sunnyside. Definitely. Basically, Parkdale was a happening place for the well-to-do. Even earlier than that in the 1800s.

And by the 1890s, they were annexed by Toronto. Bathing along that beach was always very popular. But that time period, the waterfront started to get kind of gross and people started noticing a lot of the industrial pollution and also the residential pollution and there was a big call for them to clean it up and they hatched this plan where basically the Toronto Harbor Commission was invented and by 1917 in this area they started dredging up the ground in the harbor or in that area and bringing the sand up from the bottom of the lake and basically infilling it so that they could have more of an area to play and have a proper beach

and clean it up a lot. Okay, so well, that's over 100 years ago. Yeah, it started around 1917 in the filling, and then by 1922 is when you have the actual beach opening up, and there's a big festival. You have the bathing pavilion opening up, which is on this can of Sunnyside here. And 1922, it opens up.

The tank opens up a little bit later, because they realize, wow, this water's really cold. And so they created the heated pool. And that turned 100, not even a little more than a week. week ago. So July 2025, the swimming pool, the Sunnyside pool, that turned 100 years young. Yes. It had a big revitalization in the 1980s, and then that's when it got its new name of Gus Ryder. You know, that's news to me that that pool is called Gus Ryder Pool because there's a Gus Ryder pool here in New Toronto. Oh, yeah. Yeah, he was very famous, notable person, and I guess they felt his name could be spread around a little more than just the one pool.

Yeah. That's cool. I believe Gus Ryder co-ed. Merlin Bell. Yes, he did. He coached her and was a prominent figure in the area. And then she went on to also have things named in that area after her too. Yeah, Marilyn Bell Park. Well, yeah, so this is all a good teaser here. I feel like I'm going to just set you up and you're going to take us on the journey.

Sure, hope so. Of course, we have to crack. I guess this was a long-winded intro to say, we need to crack open our fresh cans of Sunnyside Session IPA from Great Lakes Brewery. That's right. like Sunnyside is the name of a popular summer beer brewed by Great Lakes Brewery. Yeah.

So, Jayho, go ahead. It's a tasty one. Ready? Three, two. Okay, cheers to you, Jayho. I'm ready to learn. Cheers. And I know I have a lot to learn because, you know,

I know the pavilions there. It's beautiful. I've even seen, we'll talk about it as we talk, but I even kayak on the other side and see it. And, you know, the beach is there. And of course, the pool. is there. It's still very, very popular, especially at this time of year. A lot of people in that pool. It's a great pool. Yeah. But I have so much to learn when it comes to, like, you know,

Sunnyside Amusement Park, for example, and, you know, the roller coaster and everything. So I don't want to, like, pollute your process here. You're the historian. I will, though, annoyingly have anecdotes or questions because I can't shut up, and it is Toronto Mike, right? Jeremy no is it Toronto Jeremy or whatever then I'll try to bite my my tongue more but right on you know I don't know where you want to start

I don't know how far back you want to go but I need to learn everything there is to learn about the history of Sunnyside in Toronto Ontario Canada well we can go well first I want to just mention this weird character that's on this can his name he actually has a name it's Roland Baggatz I didn't know until I started looking into it but one of the first times I saw this I just

had to buy it because it had the pavilion on it. And then I found out about this guy. They have him on quite a few other products of when it involves the lake because he's a fisherman, but here he's on vacation, sort of hanging out at Sunnyside. So I produce the podcast from Great Lakes, which is called Between Two Fermenters. And we drop an ad in there during the summer, which is the character, Roland, what's his name, Roland Baggins? Roland Baggots.

It's him basically talking about, you know, about himself and what he's up to. and it's a little ad for Sunnyside Session IPA, which, as you said earlier, is very tasty. Oh, yes. And it kind of reminds me of my dad when he used to do an impression of, you know, an old sailor talking to Billy at the sea, and he sounds like that.

Or like the Simpsons sea captain. Yeah, yes, definitely. Ar, I hate the sea and everything in it. So with the history of Sunnyside, we can go way, way back and talk about geology and all that kind of stuff, I guess, but I don't want to go too far back. You're going back to the Big Bang theory?

Is that where we're going to? Not that far back. But, you know, glaciers recede, that's basically the first part of the history that you hear about anything in Toronto. You have Lake Iroquois, which basically, you know, where Castelloma sits on top of it, that used to be the shore of a massive lake. So basically everything downtown was underwater, including Sunnyside. Waters recede, and there's a large indigenous history in this area where part of the traditional territories of the First Nations, including the Wendat and the Mississauga, all in that area. eventually it becomes a vital part of the carrying place trail. So that's sort of like the beginning part,

the beginning place where you would portage and also bring your canoes up and hunt, fish, trade. And so it has a large history, even before it becomes Sunnyside and before the, I guess, Eastern, the European people come here and do their thing. So I always, I recently had, very recently, like last Friday, I got a tour of the Toronto Islands.

Oh, cool. From Professor Pricklethorn. Yes, I was on the live stream for that one. He's an interesting guy. So he's got another name, apparently. It's not just Professor Prickle Thorne. His name's Warren Hossleton. And Warren has these island tours.

They're walking tours, but at the Captain John's Pier, you get on a water taxi, and you go to Ward's Island, and it was an absolutely fantastic tour. And, of course, it always starts by telling you, back in the day, like not even that far back, but the waterfront was Front Street. Yes. So in downtown Toronto, like, it was called Front Street because it was literally the front street, right? That's the street where the water went up to.

And then we filled it in. And so in the area that, like the Parkdale, Ronsie, Swansea, neighborhoods just south of there, what, do you know what the, where the lake would go up to? Well, the natural shoreline, you can still kind of see it and actually prominently at Parkdale. right where Queen and King and Roncesvale's come together. There's a bit of a bluff right there, and that's the original shoreline right there. Isn't that amazing?

So everything, I found it amazing too. Like, it's just everything we're on south of there is, it was in the lake before. And yeah, so there was a huge project. They put in so much infill to get that to happen. A lot of it was first motivated by the railways coming through, even like the Great Western Railway very early on. But eventually, they found more and more need to have that at that lake level.

But who made this, I'm just thinking of how difficult it is to get, like, new transit opened up and anything down in the city. Like, who made the call? Yeah, we're going to, like, move the waterfront, you know, how many hundred meters south. Like, like the fact that not only you make the plan, you agree, okay, now we're going to have a new waterfront, and then you do it. Well, it was motivated a lot by the people to form that commission, the Toronto Harbor Commission. And then from there, the Toronto Harbor Commission did things that. today we wouldn't accept, like, filling in marshlands. Oh, yeah, now I remember.

That's why you can build a building in some parts of the world. You can build them so quickly because you don't have to adhere to the same codes and safety standards. For sure, yeah. And we didn't have those back then. So they've happened quickly, and a lot of times, yeah, environments were devastated, but it also brought about some change that was needed, I guess. So, yeah, I guess you could say it was kind of its, Well, the people at that time, they saw swamplands as being disease-causing and disease-written.

Mosquitoes were spreading disease, and they just wanted it gone. So a lot of that, they didn't understand quite the intricacies of a lot of the environment. So, yeah, it just happened very quickly. Okay, so we basically build a new waterfront. Yeah, it's very close to, I find a lot of parallels with Ontario Place. They wanted this place for amusement and also to improve the waterfront. and ended up filling a bunch in and it has a lot of similarities

also with the government later coming along and destroying the whole thing to a point so yeah it's a bittersweet history with Sunnyside okay so so basically they have a plan for this area and I guess this was this was all through the Toronto Harbor Commission

that the government had created okay okay very interesting so like so the Harbor Commission, they, like, where do they go? By the way, I was trying to figure, like, what's left today, because we're going to talk about what it was. Oh, yes. And we're going to get a sense of what, I don't know,

what our grandparents were up to in this area. But as far as I can tell, there's three things left. Tell me if I'm wrong. And this will get to this at the end as well. But if you were to do a bike ride on the Martin Goodman Trail or just get your way to the waterfront in this western part of the city that we're talking about, kind of, I would say, you know, it's kind of near like, from Humber to,

Jamison Avenue or whatever. Right, right. You can still see there, active today, of course, there's the Sunnyside Pavilion is still there. Yes.

You know, and there's a restaurant there and a beach, of course. There is the swimming pool, which we'll talk about, and you can go swim in it today, if you like,

and still from this era is the Palais Royal. Yes, it started off as Dean's pavilion, or Dean's boating, Sunnyside Pleasure Boats. So you could rent boats

and go out on the water in the bottom part of it and you can still see there today if you go down to the into the basement of the Palais there's bays where they would have had all the boats and then later on they added a restaurant up top which quickly became a dance hall and then that became famous as a dance hall from there on

I once had a CD that was called Four Nights at the Palais Royal. It was Sloan. Was Sloan performing back then 100 years ago at the Palais Royal? No but I do remember them coming there in the 90s along with a bunch of other bands. It went through a few hands over the years and miraculously survived.

There was a plan in the 60s to actually rip it down. But then it got designated by the city all of a sudden in the 1970s and it saved it. Well, that should have been on our list of buildings we almost destroyed but didn't. Yes, that's one of them definitely. One of my favorite Jeremy Hopkins episodes of Toronto Mike Tara. Okay, by the way, the name that was called Dean's Boathouse.

Yeah, Dean used to have a boathouse closer to the hump. like right on the mouth of the humber at the bottom and was very popular and then eventually moved into that and after a while it went out of business and it just became the Palo Arreal completely all over okay so that in the beginning when the harbor commission I guess they lease this land or whatever we're calling it Sunnyside a good name for a beach front area sunny side does it begin tell me does it begin with the amusement park here's I think it'll be fascinating if we learn about the Sunnyside amusement park. Okay. Well, you know,

and if you have a different order, please don't let me pollute your process here. Well, you were talking about the name Sunnyside? That comes from one of the first city surveyors, John Howard. He had a Sunnyside villa. Oh, the high park guy. Yeah, yeah. He had another villa that doesn't exist anymore that was

right on top of the hill where St. Joe's is today. And they actually had that building for a while, but eventually tore it down when they did additions. So they got the name because that was his, that Villa estate. They got it from there and it just sprung from that, I guess. You were saying about some of the buildings that are left over. Yeah, please.

There is also the Parkdale Canoe Club, which is now the Boulevard Club. Yes. And when that was built, it was out on stilts in the middle of the water. And then eventually they built the land out to it. And so those stilts are probably still under that building today. But the Boulevard Club must have been rebuilt, I suppose. It looks too modern, no? Well, it's the older part is right in the middle.

of it. So there's a lot of newer stuff around it. Also, that's for very rich people, Jeremy. They don't let me in the boulevard club. They probably wouldn't let me either. But if I was dressed like this, maybe I could sneak in one day and they'll find me out pretty quick. Well, they'd assume you were hired as a performer of some sort. Maybe. You know, I bet you could get into anything dressed like that. It helps if you got the confidence and you go in like this. And people, I guess it just kind of bewilders people for a while, like,

what the heck is this guy doing a three-piece suit on a hot day like this? If he's wearing that on a day like this, wearing that hat and that outfit, clearly he belongs here. I'd hope so, yeah. And usually I can talk about the place and make them think I do. So is this, and again,

we don't ever chat, like we don't have, like, let's go this way, let's go that way. I do a little homework, but mainly I come here to learn. Oh, for sure. Is that an appropriate place to dive into some of the details,

Sunnyside Amusement Park, or is there a better way to get there? Well, to get there, Let's see. Well, we got it filling in and everything. And John Howard, we mentioned. But as far as the amusement park goes, it was a Toronto Harbor Commission plan as well.

They planned out everything. They wanted to have basically the bathing pavilion there with change rooms and showers. And that's the pavilion we see today. Yes, the Sunnyside Pavilion. There was another place called the Pavilion Restaurant that was closer up on the shore that later became club top hat.

And one thing that they were trying to do in this place in Sunnyside was, It wasn't just a place to go and, you know, ride rides. There was restaurants, there was dance halls, there was games of chance, there was a merry-go-round that was very famous, and people loved. Later on, they added another merry-go-round, and it kind of evolved over the years, and they added more attractions as the years went by. They added a roller coaster called the Sunnyside Flyer, just like sort of the flyer at the C&E,

and it was very similar in construction. So you could kind of go there, and for not a lot of money, you could ride all, these rides and have a good time listen to music and a lot of the newest refreshments were out there too like some of the earliest instances of like orange crush or hires being in you know available and refreshment stands were all out there so this this basically if you're you're a young person in the 20s yes the place in Toronto to go is Sunnyside yes beside the the C&E but that's only a narrow part of the year this was a little bit longer you could go swimming there they had uh The Toronto Railway Company, before the TTC came along,

actually offered free bathing cars to a lot of the kids in the city. So if you didn't have any money and you wanted to go bathe, you got a free ride downtown and you could go swim on the beach for free and come back. Okay, so they had a place to change, like get into your bathing attire. That's the pavilion there. You had the beach. It sounds like an amusement park is growing here. Like there's rides.

there's like nightclubs and ban shells oh for sure just it was a rocking place and uh just everyone wanted to go to this place and because cars were becoming more and more popular a lot of people come from far away bring their cars there and experience this place okay so remind me when does the gardener open up gardener is uh 1955 i believe that section and um yeah sadly i had to drive over the graveside of Sunnyside on the way here. I went on the gardener on the way here, and I was just thinking about it and going, oh, man, it'd be so cool to check this place out. Have you been to the Lucky Lion?

Yes, I've been to the Lucky Lion, taking photos all around it, and it was relocated from the mouth of the Queenie. Yeah, that's, I guess, Elizabeth I first. Yes, yes. I guess. But it's sort of a bit of a hidden treasure, the Lucky Lion, because you can, although you can see the top of it, like from the Humber Bay Bridge, for example, you can see the top of this thing.

I don't think many people know, because you have to go off the actual Martin Goodman Trail and you go like a titch north, like near the dog walking park, and there's this part that nobody goes to to kind of discover the lucky lion is just kind of hanging out there. Yeah, the tree growth has really increased in there, so it does hide a lot of it from the highway. I noticed that today I couldn't even really see the bathing pavilion because of all the trees. Okay, so we'll get back to this gardener. It doesn't come until the 50s here. Okay, so we're still in the 1920s.

We're foreshadowing dark times. Dark times ahead here. Dark times ahead. It's all the car's fault. If everybody just biked everywhere, we wouldn't have these problems. So are there any other buildings we should discuss? I know it's 100 years ago that we built the actual swimming pool so we can get to that too. Parkdale was the important place at the beginning, but when a lot of people started flocking to this place,

they opened up a sunny side railway station at the top of the hill right where Ronsesvale's Queen and King Street meet. And I remember for years there was remnants of that station that had been long torn down before I could recall that it was even there, where if you looked along the hill, you could actually see this little archway door that there was just nothing there behind it. And that was the old freight elevator for that railway station. And from Ronsesville... There's a McDonald's there now. know. Yeah, the McDonald's is just on the other corner. Because, you know, you keep naming the three streets and meet,

but four streets meet there, Jeremy Hopkins. Oh, right. It's Queensway, I guess. Yeah. That's where Queensway basically starts if you're heading west. So, only because this is, I take that Ronsey's Bridge over on my bike. I did it yesterday when I went to the Paradise Theater to see a real Static's Great Lakes album. They have a new album coming out with these improvised pieces of music with guest Alex Lifeson. the Rio Static's created this music with Kevin Hearn,

and it's all kind of about inspired by the Great Lakes, and I just felt it's all kind of tying together here. Oh, very cool. My favorite Great Lake, though, is Lake Ontario. Me too. I can kayak on it any time I want here. Okay, so, yeah, the four streets that meet, though, but I always thought that, I don't know any other part of the city

where four streets meet in the same spot, but you got Ronsies is kind of going kind of north there, and you got Queensway going kind of west, there and then you got that two options if you will to go east which is you could take king street which is the south or queen street which is to the north but there's a lot happening at that intersection well at one time there was um the queen's way well there was a bridge right at the foot of that that you could go across and then that would sort of turn and then go into sunny side that was another entrance way to get into there and the um you have the uh well the street car yards right there too

streetcars would come into Sunnyside from there. They had a sunny side loop at one point and some of the connections, Parkdale was very connected to that area and I'm just trying to think. The McDonald's actually was a gray coach for years where you could,

that was a bus terminal, you get the bus out of there. Unless we forget, you're very close, of course, to St. Joseph's, birthplace of Toronto, Mike. Let's not bury the lead, Jeremy. I found your birth notice in the paper

when your 50th came up. Oh, my goodness gracious. So it did happen, everybody. That was neat. All right. So, um, but did you, um, I don't know, wherever you would like to go with this, but I can go as well. You lead the way, you need the way because you, you got the brain full of all the, uh, the info.

And I'm just excited because like today at this, you know, the foot of Ellis, if you will here, now you, now you have that joy oil gas station. Yeah. That has like a fence around it. So, uh, we've talked about this in the past. but it has been preserved. They moved it because it was at, I feel like it was at Windermere and Lakeshore

or something like that. It was right there on the corner, the northwest corner. Yeah, and now it's at kind of the foot of Ellis here by the waterfront. And by the way, later in the program,

I'll shout out some events happening a little bit east of where we're talking about. The Waterfront BIA are sponsoring this program and I'm going to shout out an upcoming event at Harborfront, but we're still a little west of there

in the Sunnyside, region. I guess one other thing I did want to mention about the amusement park, besides the amusement park features, they also did some odd things there too in strange contests. They had dancing contests. You're probably familiar with like in the 1920s or no, in the 1930s. They had those dance contests where people would almost pass out because they're trying to win money and it's the heat of the depression.

But at this time it's the 20s, everything's going pretty good before the crash happens. So they had contests like that. But then they'd have weird ones and weird ones. that they thought would appeal to the college crowd, like the greasy pole contest, which I'm not exactly sure how that worked. I think you're... It's probably like a big rope that they grease, right,

so you can't get a grip. Try to hold on as long as you can, I guess, yeah. And they also had some weird features too where I guess pyromaniacs would be fascinated at this, so it would be very attractive to them to watch boats burn. So anytime a boat was decommissioned from the Toronto, you know, the ferry service, they got this great idea,

hey, let's buy it up, and we'll burn it. And so a fairy called the John Hanlon, Jasmine, Clark Brothers, Julia B. Merrill, which was a lake schooner, and another schooner called Lyman Davis. They burned all of those between 1929 and 1934 down on the lake shore there. And people would just marvel at it. Some of them, they actually torpedoed. Some of them, they put fireworks on.

But this one that came up, the Lyman M. Davis, people were actually protesting at getting burned because they thought it was a very important, it was one of the last schooners on the lake from the old days. It was built in 1873. So a lot of people were against it. They eventually identified that it was just a freighter, had real no importance to, you know, old wars or anything like that. So it eventually burned and it got set adrift and sort of came crashing down in the bottom of the lake

right near the mouth of the humber. So when you're in your kayak coming out of the mouth of the Humber, you're probably floating right over the remnants of that old ship. Yeah. I heard there's like 10,000 ships at the bottom of the Great Lakes. Oh, yes. There's so many. And they're in such good preservation because there's barely any oxygen down where they are with a lot of them, you know.

Some of them aren't so far down and they rot away. But yeah, there's a lot of great shipwrecks and people diving on them because of that. I would love to get down there and take a peek at some of this. because all I can see is this is like rusty old shopping cart. That's all I see. Well, this one's pretty far down. You probably wouldn't be able to see it, but unless you went down.

By the way, as you talk about this burning ship thing, like I mean, of course, this is an era where before television, of course, it's like, you know,

like this would be entertaining. I would be entertaining today, to be quite honest. I think I'd make my way to Sunnyside to check it out. But we should have done that with Captain Johns. Oh, that would have been a nicer send-off

than just sending it to the scrapper like it went. It got like a to-bo- or towing it away or whatever and it gets broken up or whatever. But imagine we all got to collect at the foot of one young street. Watch Captain John's restaurant at Blaze.

It was amazing. And that's kind of one way they talked about it in the newspapers of the day. They were like just basically giving it a Viking funeral. Like, yeah, it's going out in a blaze of glory. You know, as I learned from my tour of the Toronto Islands,

most things just burned down on that island. I guess everything's wood or whatever. And it's like, you'll hear about, oh, this is where this was. And, oh, it burned down a few years ago. And it was like, this way, oh, it burned down 20 years. Like, everything burns. Okay.

Can I ask you about some specific, because you talked, you mentioned earlier, what do you know about the Sunnyside Flyer? Because there's a quote, I don't have, there's an advertisement where they're talking about the Sunnyside Flyer. Yeah. Which, of course, was at Sunnyside Abusement Park back in the, the 20s. I guess this opened in 1923. And the quote is, dipiest dips on the continent. Okay. So this sounds like for the time, of course, 1923, this was maybe the biggest roller coaster on the continent.

It definitely could have been because I don't think there was anything larger than that anywhere else. Take that America. And we, yeah, we did have some of the largest before anybody else did, including the pool. That was apparently the largest in North America at the time that it was built in 1925. and I haven't found exact proof of that, but it seems to hold up. I heard it could possibly have been the largest swimming pool in the world. Oh, very cool.

That would be amazing. Print the legend, okay? We'll get back to the pool. But just, again, it's hard to imagine today. Here we are talking in 2025. And I've been very familiar with this area for at least four plus decades now. But at Sunnyside, okay, so we're not talking. We're not talking about Ontario Place, and we're not talking about the C&E Canadian National Exhibition.

But I was checking out, okay, what kind of rides they have there. I mean, they had a ride called The Looper. They had bumper cars. They called Gatabout. Oh, yeah. They had a fun house called Funland. They had this ride called Flying Scooters. We talked about the flyer, which might have been the biggest roller coaster on the continent.

They had an indoor horse racing carousel. They called Derby Racer. Yeah, the Derby Racer was a pretty cool one. Okay, well, what more do you know about that? Eventually they took that after Sunnyside was dissolved. They took that to the C&E and it remained there for a few years but got vandalized so it eventually was destroyed. But it had this mechanism inside of it where you could ride these horses inside of a merry-go-round

except they actually competed with each other. So you could technically place a bet on these horses and, I'm sure Peter Gross was making bets back in the 20s on these horses, don't you worry. So, yeah, you could technically do that, and I think eventually that led to it being changed. But I think even then in the 50s, like I have spoke to people that even remember that being at the C&E later on. And it was a pretty cool invention that they did this. With a, you know, regular merry-go-round, you didn't think there was really anything like that. No, and there was something called The Whip?

Yeah, the Whip is just, it's hard to. explain it you just kind of whip around and uh a lot like those uh you know um the guys that shout you want to go faster polar express something like the polar express but a lot more um rudimentary just playing i i worked a game booth right across the the midway from the polar express uh all day long for 20 days every summer that is burned in your head then well and i share this on the blog back in the day before the podcast but every night when they were closing up they played louis armstrong so What a Wonderful World. And it did add this like serene kind of moment where you're done.

The park is closed. You're now doing your, you're packing up of your big booth or whatever. And then you just hear Louis Armstrong, What a Wonderful World blaring. It just had this peaceful moment. It just was really nice on a summer night in August and early September to have that moment. And we had that 20 nights every summer. Very nice. There were, I won't go through the mall, but I mean, there was something called the Moon Rocket.

Yeah. If you know more, I mean, I literally just have a list here. A lot of these, the ones that you're mentioning, I did put a list together. Oh, yeah, take over, buddy. If I can find that here. You're the official Toronto historian. I just know enough to be dangerous. But yeah, they had the, you've actually mentioned them all.

There you go. But the merry-go round, I guess we haven't really got on to the demolition side, but we've already talked about that happening. But the first merry-go-round that was there, when Sunnyside was being, dissolved, I guess they started selling off things to people, and the Disney company became interested in this Mary Go Around, the Sunnyside, Mary Go Around, and they ended up buying it and taking it to Disneyland. And you can still ride it today as King Arthur's Carousel. That's a fun fact. So that some parts of Sunnyside still exist like that. Okay, now here's, by way, that's a, I'd say that's more than a fun fact. I think that's a mind blow. And I was, well, great. I'm

I do you find that a mind-blown. I expect at least two to three from you every quarter. I'm trying, I'm trying. So I actually just recently at one of the car shows that I've gone to talk to somebody that worked for Disney back in the day. And she used to do cell painting and that kind of thing for animation. And she said to me, when I said to her, oh, do you know anything about the Sunnyside Carousel? Like, did you have anything to do with it when you were here? And she goes, oh, no, but I don't think Disney would have done it.

I thought, I think her brother Roy would have been the guy to do that because he was more of the business guy. One guy was the business guy. One guy was a creative guy. So I think it may have been Roy that came up here and bought it and brought it over there. And I think the name, if I'm correct, the name when it was at Sunnyside Amusement Park in the 20s, it was the menagerie merry-go-round. Am I right? Yeah, it had a couple names. Some people just called it the Sunnyside Marry Go-Round.

But yeah, the Menagerie Mar-Go-Round, I've seen that before as well. A lot of the rides, I think the enclosures were designed as well. by, oh, the company that made, I didn't mention that earlier, the company that made the bathing pavilion and sort of that neoclassical looking style. Wait, the one on my can of Sunnyside Session IPA. On this can right here. Exactly.

That was designed by Chapman, Oxley, and Bishop. And they ended up designing a lot of the refreshment booze and all that, all the other stuff that was there. But everything else that was on the midway and the carnival was built out of wood. but the bathing pavilion and parts of the Palais Royal which they also designed

were a little more permanent built so they endured a lot more than the other structures did clearly because we can go see them today yeah they've had to fix them up and they're stucco building so you do they do knee maintenance over the few years but they've held up pretty well

there was something and you're going to tell me what it was hopefully but I'm dying to know because it was called Lovers Express like what exactly was like where my grandparents Grandparents making out at something called Lovers Express in the 20s. No, you caught me on that one. I don't know about the Lovers Express.

So we're going to find out more about Sunnyside. From what I'm thinking, maybe it would be like one of those trains where you go into the dark areas and then you come back out and you can, you know, maybe kiss on your way in. I bet you there was a lot of kissing going on. How many of us are here today because of a good time at Sunnyside back in the 20s? And, you know, it was a good time, but with Prohibition on, they weren't allowed to sell booze. but I have seen some signs mentioning ale in a couple of the photos that I've seen. So I'm wondering if maybe they had something that was de-alcoholized or just had that name.

But even with the Toronto Sunday laws, the strict Sunday laws, it was closed every Sunday. And you think that would be a prime day for them to get business, but it was closed. But a lot of people still would go there just to do a walk after church or just a nice Sunday walk with family. and they'd get all dressed up in their Sunday best. So you see a lot of these photos where people are all dressed up in very nice suits walking down there. They'd also have an Easter promenade where they would just specifically just go out

and all their best clothing and just rock it. So a lot of reporters would go along there and take their photos. You see tons of photos from the globe of those events happening. Back then, essentially if you were going anywhere in public, you dressed up, am I right? Because whenever you see pictures from Maple Leaf Gardens in the 30s or 40s, like everybody's dressed up kind of like you are now. But was that just the common practice?

I mean, I think I know the answer. But if you're going in public, you're dressing to the teas. You're going to dress up. Yeah, especially on days like that, on the Sundays, you would. But everybody, even workwear, just kind of looked more dressy. Everybody had collared shirts and vests and you name it. Even their leisure costumes earlier on in the 20s, people were a lot more conservative. So you see even some of the bathing suits.

They're like a full head-to-toe bathing suit, but as the years progress and the flappers came into style, that diminished. And yeah, and... And heart attacks rose. Yes, some places. Shout out to, yeah, St. Joe's. Yep.

Okay, so I'm going to do a little, like, just a recap here. So you've got this Harbor Commission. They construct Sunnyside Amusement Park. I believe it opens in 1922, so it's just a bit over 100. years ago. This is a very popular destination for, particularly for young people in the city of Toronto, because there's rides. We're talking about a lot of this already, but there's nightclubs, there's outdoor ban shells. You talked about Dean's Boathouse being, becoming the Palais Royale. I'm all choked up here. The Palais Royal nightclub. You've got a pool that comes

into play. Maybe let's focus a little bit on the pool and then talk about some of the events and things that would draw people to this area. But what is it that they just thought the ocean? I almost called it the ocean. And I feel like I'm Gord Downey now. You're not the ocean. You're just the lake, Lake Ontario. That's why they made the killer whale tank.

Yeah. That's what they called the pool, the tank. Yeah. It had a few nicknames over the years. The tank was one of the big ones. And that really worked in with this tank 10 beer. Yeah. Bring back the name the tank.

I like that name. Let's see you at the tank. We'll say, okay. But is it the lake was too cold or too dirty? Like when you have this lake and this beach, very popular beach and waterfront there, why do you need a pool? Yeah, I think the main issue was the cold.

A lot of people did complain about how cold. A bunch of wussies, Jeremy, honestly. But there was some pollution back then, quite a bit in the water that you wouldn't even find today that I'm sure wouldn't be pleasant to swim in. No, but you would have found it in the 80s. Oh, yeah, yeah, oh, definitely. But yeah, I believe the main issue was the cold.

Okay. So they basically decide, let's build, let's not just build a pool here. Yeah, they, let's make it the biggest pool in the world. They made it the biggest, and it's actually heated, which was a huge thing to do back in the 20s, a huge expenditure to have that happen. And, yeah, and I think even from the beginning, they had swimming classes there. Eventually, people like Gus Ryder came along, and it just became a place for every, are a lot of the people to meet and go swim. And if you're looking for a good ship burning,

you know where to go? You talked about all those ship burnings. Yes. And one thing I hear people say a lot about this pool right off the bat of seeing is like, that would have been a nightmare to be a lifeguard there. But I actually also spoke to lifeguards that had been there and they loved it. They thought it was a great place to go. Unfortunately, there were a couple drownings over the years that happened in there

because of overcrowding. but overall it's had a very good record. Well, I was hearing a piece when they opened it up. They had like, I don't know, 20,000 people or, I don't know what the number was, something enormous like that where, you know, they just had to keep them outside. You can't fit 20,000 in that pool, and how big it is. Yeah, it's like a new ride at Canada's Wonderland. You got an hour and a half wait to get in to even enjoy it.

Right, but this is a free event. Yeah. Okay, so I keep talking about the 20s because it opened in the 20s. But of course, Sunnyside wasn't just a popular destination for young people in this city in the 20s, right? Yeah. Like, it's very popular in the 30s and 40s into the 50s. Yeah, with the end of, let's see, well, all throughout the 30s, it was popular. World War I happens, and a lot of people flocked to there during the war and after the war.

And I know even my grandparents, they had a lot of stories about going to this place and having dates there and listening to big bands that went through. There was a lot of notable big bands that went through all of the venues there, including the Top Hat, the Palais Royal, Palace Pier, a little further west down the Humber. And it was just very popular, right up until, I guess, the cars started to travel a little further, and they became a little more reliable. So this was a, it was a cool place to go and hang out, but a lot of people were going a lot further away. So it got a little bit neglected towards the 50s, where the boardwalk was starting

to get tattered and the buildings. They ended up having fires every once in a while to the point where people just thought of this place as being yesterday's news and, you know, maybe we need something different. And kind of like how Ontario Place went, where a little bit of demolition by neglect. And yeah, yeah, but yeah, all throughout the 30s and the 40s, immensely popular. popular place. So I guess in the mid-50s, the Toronto Harbor Commission just says time to do something else? Well, they didn't necessarily say it. I think that all forms of government kind of came together. But they did cancel all land leases in the area. Oh, yes, they did that. That is one thing. That is something they did. So yeah, yeah, they eventually did do that. And there was plans,

big plans for because of the influence of the car to have a new a new fast highway come through and that kind of spelled the end of the end of the days of Sunnyside and that's where some guy named Fred Gardner yes they named it after him were cursing his name to this very day

Big Daddy Gardner yes you were cursing his name earlier today I know you were come on even in that nice hat you're cursing out Gardner in the traffic jam there So when they do decide that they're going to like connect the QEW to downtown Toronto, which is what we now know is the Gardner Expressway, does that mean they have to basically demolish the amusement park in order to put the highway through? Yes, and it went pretty fast because it was all wood.

It didn't take very much time for a lot of them to come down. Some guys just walk by and threw a match. Well, some guys did throw a match. Quite a few of the concessions did burn even before they got a chance to bulldoze. So, yeah, a lot of that did happen. And they were like, good, that saves us on some time and money. Yeah, you kind of think sometimes, yeah, there's that, there's that heritage lightning that comes through and burns down old buildings. Okay, well, yeah, there's some terms for that.

Okay. So, basically, this era we're talking about is a good 30-year run, basically, from like the early to mid-20s. And it kind of is all done by the mid-50s. But I guess because of where they're located and the way they were built, they were able to say, okay, don't demolish the Palais Royale because Sloan's going to go there in the 90s Yeah, they sent one of the members of Sloan back in time to tell them To not do that. Which member was it? I have my theories. It was that Andrew Scott

I feel like he's the one going back. You've interviewed them all now, right? They've all been over. You probably know the time traveling one, right? I think it was Andrew Scott. Okay. That's my sense anyways. Cool. Yeah, control your dogs, America. And even speaking of fire, the Palais Royal did have a couple substantial fires. I even remember in the 90s one of the first places that I ever tried, even attempted this old school dancing was the Palo Royal back in the 90s. And I brought a girlfriend there

and we tried our best to dance like the people were dancing there, but they were all pros. And so we quickly got pushed to the side. And, yeah, but I remember not too long after that. But yeah, daydreaming even back then of like what it used to be. You know, describe so you guys weren't pros and you got pushed to the side.

That is what happened, though, electric circus, okay? When they launched electric circus, regular people at clubs, like regular people, because I knew one, shout out to War and Peace, they would be their dancing,

okay? And then there was a moment, or I don't know if it was a specific moment or over a stretch of time, where they weeded out these schlub, schlob-y-looking regular folk, like you and I. And suddenly it was like,

essentially pro, but like the beautiful great dancers were like tapped on the shoulder and said, No, you're on TV for electric circus. So same thing happened to you, happened to Cowboy. Yeah. Oh, yeah, yeah.

It's just, it was more of a voluntary pushout for us. And we just kind of went, oh, my God, and we got scared we were going to get run over. So we kind of just purposely went off to the side. But yeah, that would happen at Electric Circus quite a bit. May I revisit a name we dropped earlier? For sure. She was only 16 years old. Okay, I need to give it this context.

It's amazing to think. And she's still alive today. Oh, wow. And that happens when you're so young in the 50s. Okay, you can still be alive today. But Marilyn Bell, who is a lakeshore legend, they have a mural honoring her. And I've already talked enough about Gus Ryder, who eventually that the tank would be named after Gus Ryder. And there's also a pool nearby here in New Toronto named Gus Ryder pool.

Gus Ryder was training Marilyn Bell. and a guy named Cliff Lumsden. Did you know Cliff Lumsden was buried at Ridley Funeral Home? No, you did mention, though, something about it before. It came up because I learned that from Brad Jones on an episode of Life's Undertaking, which is a great podcast you should listen to by Ridley Funeral Home. And these are Lakeshore legends. So they live near Ridley Funeral Home, which is 14th in Lakeshore.

And absolutely Cliff Lumsden when he passed away was buried at Redley Funeral Home. home. Oh, wow. Well, you don't bury there. Your funerals there. They don't actually bury you at the funeral home. But you know what I mean? I think that's a little fun tie in there. That is. It is. I'm very happy to say I did get to meet Marilyn Bell back in 2004, I think, was the anniversary of her swim. Yes, it was. 2004. So she came to the C&E, and I was working there making a heritage exhibit basically for the C&E. And I was a curator that year, just talking all about the history of the C&E. We did some nice, big blow-up pictures of her and Gus

and all of her, everything that happened. And so she was invited there. And then one day I was there at the exhibit, I was there every day for the exhibit at C&E. And this lady shows up, and she goes, oh, hi, I'm Marilyn Bell. I went, oh, my God, I never thought I'd... And you went, yeah, and I'm Mickey Mouse.

Pretty much, yeah. I had no idea she was there. A lot of people are surprised to find out she's still with us. Yes, she is. She's in New York still. I do see from time to time updates from her daughter who goes swimming with her every once in a while. And she's in a retirement home. And now her name is Marilyn Bell Delasco.

But yeah, her daughter is very nice. I've talked to her on social media from time to time. And I know I even said to you, it might be possible to get her to chat with you one day. But I don't know if that's going to work out or not. We'll see. You never know, right? You never know what the future holds. It'll probably have to be a remote, though.

Well, I would do that for the daughter of Marilyn Bell. Okay. 1954, because you were talking about the anniversary being 2004, so 50 years prior, 1954, when the Sunnyside amusement, I guess just before it was demolished. So it's like the end of its era, if you will. Very close, yeah. Marilyn Bell, at 16 years young, she's a marathon swimmer, she's coached by Gus Ryder. She becomes the first swimmer to swim. across Lake Ontario.

She was the first. And the conclusion of the swim was at the foot of Ronses. And at least 300,000 of us, no, I wasn't there. Okay, I was there in spirit. But at least 300,000 people greeted her when she completed this swim across

Lake Ontario. That's how big a deal this was. Yeah, and she originally wasn't seen as being the person who was going to even win it. It was another, another person who entered that didn't, I guess, make it. No, there were two others, I think. I think this swim challenge, which was like a C&E promotion,

I think, I think there were three that made this attempt. Only one finished, and that is Marilyn Bell, and they named the park after her. Amazing. Yeah, I know, I know that there was a bit of controversy, even if she had won it at the beginning, but because the people at the C&E were a little not sure, because she landed a bit further this way than close to the C&E.

So, but yeah, eventually it came around and she is the official winner. She's the winner here. Yes. Okay, so we lose our amusement park. What was there, do you know what the reaction was like at the time? Like, I know what it's like now when they decided to build a private spa in Lake Ontario. I mean, think it's an Ontario place. I think there was, you know, there's going to be people with a lot of memories there that

basically we'll miss the place and there's still even people talking about it today missing it and having great memories but I miss it I wasn't even there same here it's it's a bittersweet history and um I think I first figure I first found out about Sunnyside and sort of fell in love with it and also sadness with it because um I'd see these articles by Mike Filey who was very much into the history of this and uh I'm glad you mentioned him as a kid I'd see this and he sort of would always call it the poor man's Riviera and And it just was fascinating to me because And then I talked to my grandparents

And it was another point where I could talk to them about Because they wouldn't mention it, I'd bring it up And they'd go, oh, yeah, I remember that. So yeah, it just, knowing, having that knowledge Even gave me a little bit more to talk about with my grandparents. Checking in on the live stream. Yeah. Wardo, he was wondering, I think you actually touched on this earlier,

but he was wondering if the popularity of Sunnyside Amusement Park led to the plan to build the palace pier a few years later i i think i definitely do think yeah that that really that whole waterfront area they were kind of trying to they had this idea that it almost like they were going to build a new sort of boardwalk empire like a coney island type of a place here sure and then they quickly realized like no this is canada um it might not be quite the same but um it just this vision of it and how it looked was was great and the palace pier they had originally projected to go a lot further out into the lake like the piers in the in the in britain did for a long time but eventually that plan even got cut back as well and it became a uh it became more of a big hall i guess and it was partially on the the waterfront but not too much there's still remnants of it today i'm sure you biked by that before there's a little bit of a memorial there with some photos of it and one of the pillars is still there of that palace pier interesting and you did of course in great detail we discussed the ship burnings i'm gonna go back in time

and see these ship burnings but i also read a little bit about tightrope walkers do you know anything about this is this just another like come and see this person who's gonna walk a tight rope yeah they they had everything there really anything that they could attract people to come down they would do so there would be tight rope walkers they probably had people falling from planes they i think one of the things uh one of the boats that they burned, they actually had partially torpedoed by a plane flying by. So anything they could do to really get some, yeah, get some buzz, they would do it. And I know we talked a lot about the live music you could see, but it's not just like at the

Palais Royale because there was some big outdoor concerts. Oh, yeah, there was, there was quite a few, like there were a lot of the restaurants there would have house bands and then once those got bigger, a lot of them would, yeah, have live outdoor concerts and those were immensely popular as well a few things i haven't mentioned as well now that it's reminding me there was a baseball field there as well a lot of early girls softball games were played there um what else not to be confused with the uh island uh baseball diamond where babe ruth hit his first professional home run for the providence grays against the Ronald Maple Leafs.

Yeah. So the Hanlon's Point had an amusement park as well, where that baseball diamond was. And it was sort of a predecessor, basically, to Sunnyside. The people who went to Sunnyside, their parents would have gone to that one on the island, and that was their main dig. If you, speaking of digging, if you want to join me, I want to find that ball. You think it's still, it's got to have a disintegrated by now, right? The Babe Ruth ball.

You know, you never know. If it was treated with some kind of a leather, it depends on how the ball was made. You never know. Because they found stuff on the bottom of the ocean floor with the Titanic that you never thought would survive. That's true. TTI or Toronto Railway Company tickets survived on the floor of the ocean

inside of a leather wallet that Henry, is it Henry Poochin? He was one of the men that was basically put on one of the lifeboats to make sure it would be safe. And as he was going from the Titanic into this life, boat, his wallet fell out of his pocket, floated down to the ocean floor, and then later the Titanic came down to it, and then they found it in the 80s.

See, I get chills when I hear stories about finding, you know, the Titanic and finding the wreckage there. Oh, same. And speaking of chills, this is not a fun fact at all. This is a devastating, tragic fact, but because I just did this Toronto Island tour on Friday, and I'm full of mind blows and fun facts,

Ward's Island is named, and Wardo's on the live stream. I don't know if there's any relation. Maybe Dwayne Ward as well. Shout out to all the wards, I know. But Turner Ward, there was another Blue Jain named Ward. But the ward that Ward's Island is named for, the story there is he was sailing with,

I can't remember if it was his four sisters or his five sisters. But either way, terrible tragic. They got caught up in a storm on Lake Ontario, and all of his sisters passed away in that. And he basically committed his life to, like, rescuing people from, Browning. Oh, wow. And apparently he did save many, many, many, many lives.

But this became his obsession and life's mission after, because he was manning this boat and through no fault of his own mother nature could be awfully cruel at times. He lost all of his sisters in this terrible boating accident. Yeah, that's just horrifying. I've heard about that tale before. Just not a fun fact, okay. Heartbreaking. That's a tragic fact that I'm sharing with you.

there here. But I did mention Babe Ruth and the Providence Grays and his home run against the Toronto Maple Leaves and on Saturday night, this past Saturday night, I went to Christy Pitts to see the Leaps play and Babe Ruth wasn't there. But Rob Butler was there, okay? I'll take

hello to Rob Butler. We actually had a good chat. There's some controversy in the Leafs land because the general manager of the Leafs quit because he says Ayami Sato is merely like a PR stunt and that if Ayami Sato were a man, she would have been cut a long time ago. And essentially, yeah, in protest of sorts that he, you know, this general manager couldn't

put the best team on the field because the owner of Keith Stein says that Ayami Sato is here for the entire season, regardless of record, that this general manager quit. And this is the big buzz at the ballpark. I had a long chat with Rob Butler about it. I was texting Keith Stein about it. It's not a manufactured controversy. Like this happened. It was in the Toronto Star.

And it is interesting discussion point because as we're talking about ships burning and tightrope walkers and swimming the lake Ontario, these are all kind of, I won't call them stunts, but they're all done to capture your attention and to get your interest. And I'm going to Sunnyside. They're burning a boat. What are you doing tonight? They're going to burn a boat at Sunny's. inside, I'm there. He's like, I'll meet you there, okay? Like, the fact is the first woman to pitch professional ball in Canada

is Ayami Sato. I said hello to her on Saturday night. She's lovely. Her ERA right now is nothing to write, you wouldn't write home to Japan about this ERA. I can't remember if it's like 11 or 12, but it's not an ERA that you'd be particularly proud of. But I have, on opening day, which we had a TMLX event, I watched her pitch to the first six batters six up six down she looked great the story is inspiring a f jeremy so it's an inspiring

story it's a groundbreaking first the next shoe to drop i speculate may have to do with ayami playing in the new woman's baseball league that is starting up next summer like i feel like there's a bigger picture at play i trust the owner who has done a number of things even upgrading that sound system at christie pitts he's poured a lot of money into this team he's sponsors this program, so there's some bias at play. For sure. But he's done a lot of things to make it interesting and a great experience, and I live and breathe it. I was there Saturday night. I'm going to be there next Saturday night.

Nice. And this whole idea that if Iami Sato were a man, she would have been cut, tells me that general manager who I don't know, he seemed kind of surly when I passed him. I don't pass judgments, but we never had a conversation. I know he pitched for the Red Sox. That's your fun fact. And he would often enter games as a reliever, like a plain general manager, which you don't hear about in the majors.

Okay, that would be something else here. But I don't think he gets it. I don't think he gets what it's like to own a pro team, even a semi-pro team in Toronto with these Rogers-owned giants consuming all the oxygen. Oh, yeah. It's hard to eat. And it's tough enough when the Js suck. Try getting attention and getting a crowd out to enjoy a Leafs Lager and a hot dog.

Try to gain interest. And again, I'm going to be there Saturday because it's no ticket required. I'm going to have. some pizza, I'm going to have some beer, I'm going to have a great time because it's always entertaining. But imagine cutting through that noise and getting attention in the city when the Jays are in first place. Yeah, yeah. I'm going to go on a rant here, Jayho. We're getting back, but we mentioned the home run on the island and it all came together. But you've got a copy, but if you have

anyone you know and love who would love a copy, you can have another copy because it's a great book on the history of Toronto Maple Leaf Baseball. I agree. The stats in there alone is a great reference to have. There's a guy on the team now named Jordan. You know, what's the name of that character from, what's that show of Claire Danes? It lasted one season. My so-called life?

Yes. What was, the character's name? Was it Jordan Catalano? Oh, my God. You know who I'm talking about? I don't. I don't remember, no. Well, then you didn't pay attention.

He was the dream boat. Okay, I remember him covering like a song, uh, 20, 20, 24, a Ramon song. Oh, was to go. Maybe I had a crush on. Jordan. I'm coming out as crushing on Jordan

Catalano. There's a, I'm getting the last name wrong, but there's a ball player on the leaves named Jordan Castellano or something like that.

And he recently hit his 100th IBL homer and they put a big picture of him up in center field. A hundred homers in the IBL is a significant milestone.

Incredible. And even Rob Butler, I think, who didn't play as long as Jordan did in the IBM did in the IBL, but he, I think he capped out

at like 38 homers or something like that. Cool. All right, speaking of cool. me do this now, because then I want to wrap up the sunny side, and then I want to have a solemn moment. I want to empty your brain if you have, I'm not wrapping you up or anything. There's a couple other little things that come to mind when I think about it. Some of the

first beauty contests happened there as well. You'd have like a, you know, full line of women and they were all trying to show poise and their new suits and all that kind of stuff. And they would have that kind of a beauty contest happening there as well. Not to be confused with what would happen on the Toronto Island of the Chin bikini. Oh, yes, yes. Good old Johnny Lombardi out there with Chin, yeah. Olympic Park, I believe that was. Please continue.

And we also have to mention, like, there was a lot of good things about the park back then, but there's, you know, with anything historical, there's always a tinge of not so great. I do love the history, but I, you know, I also like to know that people, I like to have the vintage style, but not all the vintage values. It's not really the greatest when you think about it. Like some of these clubs, like the Palais Royale at one point in time, and it was with a lot of clubs in Toronto. There was kind of an unwritten rule.

There wouldn't be signs about it, but you could have black performers performing on the stage, but to have a black person dancing on the floor, it's big controversy. In Toronto. In Toronto. This is disappointing, Jeho. And this actually created a,

fairly strong civil rights movement in Toronto based on protests about the Palo Rael having these problems in the 1950s where the guests that were a black man dancing with a white woman were asked to leave and from that a lot of the civil rights that we have laws that we have today sort of stemmed from that you think a place like Toronto that was very progressive even you know as far as slavery goes and the history of of even Simco being basically, you know, in favor of abolition, being an abolitionist. It's just strange to hear that even in the 1950s, there's this attitude going around at certain places. So that's a bit of a tinge on the sunny, of the sunny side. I'm glad you brought it up,

right? Because it's, you know, as you might have heard in the 90-minute Hulk Hogan retrospective with Stu Stone, like we're doing good, bad and ugly on this show. And that is some ugly history that we should be acknowledging. And I do think in Canada, we have a tendency to think we're all about the underground railroad and abolishing slavery. And I think it's important to note

that there was, there still is, but there was some absolutely some blatant racism going on at this time that we're glorifying right now. Yeah, definitely. And it's a shameful part of the history that I really hope people learn from and don't do again,

but we're seeing time and time again. things creeping back. And I just keep hoping that, you know, hooler heads prevail and, and people stop doing this sort of thing. So when you've drained from that big brain of yours, everything, and that doesn't mean, no, that doesn't mean, like you're going to have a moment here where you can give me

everything that you wanted to talk about. Oh, for sure. Because I love learning from you. We are going to have a moment where we talk about an event happening August 9th and 10th that you're a part of. And then I really hope we'll, spend some time remembering somebody,

I don't think there'll be a lot of name recognition with this person. But I do want to talk about somebody we lost tragically who was going to be

involved at your Viva La Lyside event that we'll talk about soon. And I think we're going to pay him proper tribute here because when I learned

about this individual, I was, two things struck me. One is, I had no idea what he's been doing for the past 50 years. This is incredible.

and how terrible this loss is for all of us. And I know you knew him personally. So we're going to spend some time with that. I do want to welcome a new sponsor. Blue Sky Agency. This gentleman's name is Doug Mills. Doug Mills is a listener of Toronto Mike. He's a supporter.

He's stepped up to help fuel the real talk. Blue Sky Agency has forged partnerships with these established office furniture brands like silent and, green furniture concept and Roolyard. And I know, because my wife keeps me abreast that what's going on with the back to work, sorry, back to office rules. A lot of companies are implementing.

And I know her office is like, we want you here four days a week starting like September. So a lot of this work from home COVID activity is slowly but surely being pulled back. And this is the time to talk to Doug. So if any listeners are looking for dynamic and creative work environments, Doug at bluesky agency.ca, write them now, let them know you're an FOTM and start the conversation. Doug's a good guy, and they're doing great work at Blue Sky Agency. Do you have an office to work at, or do you work your home office? I work from home off of an old typewriter desk.

But not an old typewriter. No, I have one of those in there, too. It actually has, it's spring-loaded. You lift up this part of the tabletop, and there's a typewriter that pops out of it, but I don't use it. It's more for show. Who do we know who collects type? Whom I think, is it, Tom Hanks?

Yeah, Tom Hanks is a big typewriter collector, and he gives. Don't forget Andy Rooney, but shout out to Ridley Funeral Home. He's not with us anymore. He's right on. Yeah, Tom Hanks actually goes around and gifts typewriters to people out of the blue and just, hey, you're a nice guy. Here's a typewriter. And, yeah, it's really different.

Fascinating. Okay, so a couple of events I want to tell you about, and then we're going to talk about your event. So we're going to do a few events here, and then we're going to remember a Toronto institution who passed away, and you may not know the name, and you want to stay tuned to learn more about this individual. But Great Lakes has this. It's an annual event now because this is the second year. They're going to do it every year.

So I'm now calling this an annual event. It's called Brood for You Fest. And it's happening on August 30th. And I think it's like $30 for a ticket. It's very reasonable. But you can actually save five bucks if you use the code beer me. So Google Brewed for You Fest

Great Lakes Brewery and use that code Beer Me, all one word. And it's live music. There's a great glass you get. There's, of course, complimentary pourers of fresh craft beer. And it's not just Great Lakes there.

Like, there's other craft breweries that are going to be at Great Lakes in South Atobico for this event. And there's like, it's four hours and there's two sessions. Like, the first session is family-friendly. Like, bring your kids. I think if you're under 12, it's free.

I could bring Jarvis and Morgan, and they're free. So that's the first session. And then there's the second session, four hours long, which is 19 plus. In each session, I think the first session has like an 80s cover band. And here are all the great 80s tunes. The second session has the 90s. But it's a really cool festival. I was listening to the guys talk about it the other day.

So it's called Brewed for You Fest, and it's happening August 30th, that Great Lakes Brewery. I wanted to shout them out. And I want to shout out the Habari Africa Festival. This is happening at Harborfront. It is a free event. It's all ages. It's a fantastic weekend of rich art, tastes, and sounds from the African continent.

The Hibari Africa Festival. Now, that's happening August 8th to the 10th. And there's another event you're going to tell us about that's happening August 9th and 10th. And then we're going to remember somebody we lost this past week. But I must remind everybody, if you have old cables, old devices, old electronics, you don't throw it in the garbage, because those chemicals end up in our landfill. You go to Recyclemyelectronics.ca, you put in your postal code and find out where to drop it off.

Also, because the name flashed on my phone, it's on silent, but I could see I'm getting a call from the Petrucci family, and they own Palma Pasta, and Palma Pasta makes delicious, authentic Italian food. They're in Mississauga and Oakville, but you can go to palmaPasta.com, and the next TMLX event is happening at the GLB brew pub at Jarvis and Queensky. But the one after that, which will be TMLX21, we're going to do that at Palma's Kitchen.

So I don't have the date for you to stick in your calendar yet. But stay tuned. It'll be like late November or early December, and we will do that. So after you've done the Habari Africa Festival at Harborfront celebrating African culture in Toronto, get your butts to Leaside, For Viva La Lyside, it's a street festival, a community celebration.

Tell me more about what's happening, August 9th, and 10th at 25 Commercial Road in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Right on. Thanks, Mike. It's, well, it's a- That wasn't a free ad, Jayho. Pay up, buddy. Thank you so much. It's, well, it's a car show. It's a festival. We're having live street performers, people doing live art.

just sort of a thing to bring out community and like you were saying before have an attraction there to get people out of their houses and just celebrate the neighborhood we also celebrate the neighborhood's history I've talked to you before about it used to be the basically the aerodrome for all of Toronto

you had to land there to go down that was your airport that was your airport before the island airport before Malton and all that stuff so we celebrate a little bit of that across the street from where we have the festival used to be the Durant car company. They used to crank out Durant cars. So we're trying to talk about the car culture as well and get old cars out there.

We've got some leads actually on some old Durants that we're trying to get into the festival. But one company that we've got involved is I was very, very surprised and happy that the people at Casaloma said, yeah, we'd love to bring our old cars to your festival. So some of the Casoloma collections coming there. Amazing. That includes some 1910 cars, like the 19. 1910 Maxwell, some old Ford cars. And so it should be an interesting day. This is our second year.

Last year was our first year, and we've learned a few things since then, and we're trying to bring some more attractions, including what you were alluding to earlier. Well, okay, before you get there, because it'll be a somber moment when we'll discuss this. I see here on the ad piece here, which, by way, I planned a bike to Leaside for this event. That was amazing when you came to that event the last time.

I'm going to amaze you again, buddy. I'm here to amaze you again, okay? You can't all be about Jordan Catalano on this program. I could not believe you were there. Like you just showed up on your bike and I went, oh my God, you did that. Watch me do that again.

And we got a good shot beside a black car. That was my favorite thing. In the shade, right? Was it in the shade? No, it was in the shade. Because it looks better in the shade. I know. Everybody knows this.

Okay. I see on this ad, the Distinguished Gentleman's Drive, it says. Yeah, oh yeah, we've done some fundraising through them before. We've actually done drives with old cars and we have gone out to the east part

like around Kingston area driving these old cars and raising money along the way. But I recognize this photo from TMLX events. I know this person I'm looking at here. Oh, yeah.

That's Joe Louis. That does look like Joe. I've seen Joe Louis, yep. You got Joe Louis promoting your goods over there. Oh, man. By way, I want to thank the, again, we're going to remember somebody here at a moment. And we're going to tip our Sunnyside Session IPA

in his business. memory and we're going to hear you talk about them and I learned some wonderful things about them as well but I do want to shout out some of the people who joined us on the live stream oh cool CJ I don't even know this name CJ so if you have another name let me know you know I've been promoting this and giving people the live stream address so hopefully you get some new live streamers yeah because it's the best kept secret because I don't promote it oh have you I only there's a little FOTM group on WhatsApp and I usually tell them we're going live I actually forget to tell the world so well I did ask you before I did it

I was afraid that maybe it was... The more the merrier. Look, watch us bake the cake, okay? Not make the sausage. Nobody wants to see that. Okay. WBN-1,000, C.J. Moose, grumpy.

Oh, hi, Moose. Leslieville. I was at this... I mentioned this, yeah, Leslie's been on the show a couple of Father's Days ago. Yeah. I mentioned to you, I went to this Rio Static's airing of their new album at the Paradise Theater.

And I'm there with Tyler Campbell, the VP of Sales. FOTM co-host And he tells me, we're chatting up, he goes, oh, I've been booked as a guest on another podcast. And I say, really, VP. I'm like, what is this

podcast you're going to be on? To cut out high as to Tyler? No, I want him to get more exposure to promote FOTM cast, of course. And he goes, oh, I'm on Leslie's podcast. Leslie has a podcast because, you know, she bakes, she bakes the cookies for TMLX events.

Oh, delicious cookies. I've heard they're great I only heard though I couldn't tell myself I got a birthday cake I missed that on the last one too did you okay feel better now

but Leslie who did offer to bake me cookies for camping and I said no Leslie I just like to complain about it on the podcast it's fun but she's going to talk to Tyler

and I don't know if it's recorded yet because I talked to Tyler yesterday and he says it's coming soon maybe it's happening maybe right now they're recording but although Leslie's on the live stream okay so yes so I've been witness to this

in Mimico I was invited to the VP's backyard. He's got a pizza oven back there, and he made me and my family pizza. Oh, very nice. Delicious. I mean, next to Palma Pasta, this is the best pizza I've ever had. And he's going to talk pizza with

Leslie, and I'm going to tune in and on the next FOTM cast. I'm going to talk about it. It's recording Friday afternoon. Oh, cool. Confirmed on the live stream. I'll do my best to listen. You've got to listen. So, Canada Kev is on the live stream. Always a pleasure. I've got to talk about Canada Kev a little bit.

Okay, well, let me name two more names, and then you tell me about Canada Cap. Hi, Kev. Canada Kev's buddy, the aforementioned Wardo, was on the live stream, Andrew Ward, of course. Andrew Ward. And Andy Pandy, who's coincidentally, her name, I know her is Andy Pandy, but Canada Kev has told me, Andrew Ward used to go by the name Andy Pandy. So there were actually multiple Andy Panties on the live stream at live.totronomike.com. What did you want to say about the TMU legend?

That is Canada Kev? I got to spend a few hours with Canada Cove the other day. Lucky bastard. Because he just out of the blue wrote me one day. Like, hey, I got this old phonograph. Do you want it? It's free. And I said, sure, I'll try to give it a good home.

I don't have room right now at all, but I'll definitely find it a good room. And then he told me he saved it from a house, and he was saying it was on King Street West. And I went, oh, that's right above sunny side where I'm going to be talking about with Mike. And he goes, oh, yeah. And, like, he told me the house, and it's patented, has patented parts from, like, 1917. So this thing had been sitting in the house right through the whole era of Sunnyside, just overlooking this house overlooking Sunnyside. So I said, wow, that's kind of timely.

And it doesn't work, but I do know a lot of people from the Canadian Antique Phonograph Society. I'm going to see if they can help me and find some parts for this motor and get it running again and play some tunes that they play. at Sunnyside back in the day. So that was really cool. Thank you, Kev. And, yeah, had a great day chatting with them. See, this is what I like about the TMU.

So I only know Canada Kev because he listened to Toronto mic, and then he came out to a TMLX event. Same, same. Yeah. And this is, like, I know one day I said, and he's so thoughtful because one day on the podcast, I said, oh, I think I'd like to start recording some of my rides, like like a GoPro type thing.

And he gave me, and I have, in fact, note to self. I have to get in on this and get it working because I actually want to do this for certain rides. But he gave me an old like GoPro like camera system that he wasn't using anymore. He just gave it to me. My youngest, my nine-year-old who's obsessed with the Simpsons has, she's got this, not a bunk bed, but it's a loft bed, so she's up higher. Oh yeah. And there's like a chest, it's pretty cool. And she has a giant duff beer, a stuffed duff beer that was gifted to her by Canada Kev. That's so cool.

Like, this is the kind of, anyways, and then I'm thinking about, like, Leslie, baking the cake for my birthday at TML. Like, I didn't compensate, I didn't buy the cookies

for visitors of TMLX19. Leslie donated her time. I don't know how, it's expensive to make cake in cookies now. I'm sure everything's, I can barely afford to drink coffee every morning. You've just attracted a really great group

of really cool people. But enough about movies. Moose Grumpy. No, but Moose Grumpy as well. I know, of course. Sorry. No, we love Moose Grumpy. There's a Toast stuffy right here.

Oh, yeah. The official mascot of Toast, gifted by Moose Grumpy. Oh, that's cool. Like, sits in the studio, and I just, I look at it, and I'm like, oh, what a sweetheart that Moose Grumpy is here. All right, let's get serious for a moment. You ready? Or is there any?

Next time I come by, I'll have to gift you something, too. I've been working on something for you. It's a little bit different than this kind of stuff, but it's a research project. Yeah, my attention. Okay, so before we pay tribute to Ernie, is to put a bow on the Sunnyside experience, okay? Yeah, just that I see the ghosts of the Sunnyside as I go by there every time. And I long for it, even though I never experienced it. And a lot of people have thought, you know, I've been weird for that.

But no, it's just a place. If I could time travel, I would really just love to go there and experience a day at the place. And I just hope that the memories are kept. people think about it from time to time because yeah it's just a park now and there's not really a lot there to remember that that sort of glorious time and that it's heyday which really wasn't a heyday for everyone but um it in Toronto's history when I see those photos I'm all I'm a lot about the visuals when I see those photos of the old way things were there it just makes me want to yeah just fuels that desire to check it out and uh and dress up like I do and

and go and go to places like that in the past. advice would be to the Martin Goodman Trail runners and rollerblading. Are people still rollerblading this day? That dates me a bit, I guess. The scooters and of course the cyclists like myself. But you see the, of course, you go by the pool and many people use that pool every day. But the pavilion, right? Like you see this pavilion. You're like, oh, that's cool. That's over 100 years old. I remember taking a photo of it on its 100th birthday. But I think we need to remember to go to the south side, like get south of the pavilion. because this is something I only appreciated

when I kayaked by it on Lake Ontario. But the beach is still there and they test that beach every day for E. coli and everything and they put up the appropriate flag or whatever to tell you if it's clean or not. But the beach, there's a place to eat, there's a place to drink. Like there still is waterfront activities happening

on the south side of the pavilion. And I think if you just see it from the Martin Goodman Trail, you would think it's just like a nice looking pavilion and then the swimming pool and then you'd bike along to Ronsies where you'd see the Palais Royal. Yeah, it's a beautiful place to go, even though the amusement park's not there. It's definitely a beautiful place to go and see. It's been in quite a few movies as well, music videos on those buildings.

Wait, you're only getting to this at the end here? Oh, I'm sorry, but this should have been the lead. That would be more for the other episodes we do about videos. Okay, but can you name check? Let me see. There was I know bomb girls That TV show that was out filmed at the Palo Rale

A lot The pavilion though I've seen it in so many movies and TV shows But there was You know that Superman movie with Ben Affleck Where he plays George Reeves Oh I figured the name of that one

But he was in that Or that it was in that Yeah that's the original Superman George Reeves Yes yes Before they Because it was George Reeve and then, you know, George Reeves with an S and then Christopher Reeve, singular.

Yes, yes. Which is a weird coincidence unto itself. But, okay. So, yeah, so you'll see these. There's also some 80s bands that, oh, there's one that actually is on the cover. Did the Spoons ever do a video at the Pavilion? I don't think the Spoon's dead, but there's another band that did that I can't think of their name right now. Was it Martha and the Muffins?

Did they do any Echo Beach content there? I don't think so. I will say Mark Gain told me in this basement. So if you want to hear the definitive conversation with Mark Gain and Martha Johnson from Martha in the Muffins, they were in the basement several years ago now. Martha sadly unable to, she's got some mobility issues. But this happened when she was able to get down here. We had an amazing chat.

I'm wearing their T-shirt now in their honor, and I urge people to listen. But if you talk to Mark Gain about when he was inspired to write Echo Beach, which is far away in time, right? The name of this park is Kashmir Zowski Park. Oh, yeah. And that's right there where we're talking about today.

Yes. Kashmir Zowski. I don't think he's got any relation to Peter Zowski. You never know. But you never know. That's true. I think they actually might be related.

Well, there's a question about Cliff Lumsden. Is he related to Jesse Lumsden? And there's, in his father, Mr. Lumsden, whose name will come to me. in a minute who was like in politics or whatever but uh you know if burlington rob was on the live stream he'd know right away okay so i won't put you on the you're on the hot seat and now i want to if it's like i i just want to say uh firstly sorry for your loss and sorry to all who knew and loved ernie lee please tell us more about ernie lee uh he was a powerhouse in the ballooning

community in ontario and ballooning yeah like hot air balloons he was a master at it That was his main gig, I guess, over the years. And he flew for everybody from Labats to pizza pizza, remax, the remax balloons that you'd probably, I know you know from the 80s. Can I chime in because I remember in the 80s, above the clouds was like the tagline. And I remember distinctly this remax balloon. And you're telling me Ernie Lee would be piloting that hot air balloon. Yeah, for the most part, him or his partner would be up in that balloon piloting it around.

Ontario and Toronto. And what else? Oh, even in the recent years, well, not too recent, but like 10 years ago, the Mr. Peanut balloon that was flying around here that caused a craze. He was the guy. I took a picture of it from my balcony

and I showed him it when I met him and asked him, oh, is this you? Yeah, that was me that day. Is it fair to say that pretty much any hot air balloon you spotted in Toronto over the past 50 years was likely piloted by Ernie Lee? Yeah, Ernie Lee or someone from his company not just hot air or no uh something somebody from his company yeah somebody would but usually

it was him it would turn out it was actually him 50 years of piloting hot air balloons that you would know and is it right that you were going to do something with hot air balloons and ernie lee at this beva la lee side which is happening in august 9th and 10th one of the attractions we were really happy to get this year was to have a balloon um that people could go and take rides on it and ernie was going to be the pilot for it um unfortunately he um he um he passed passed away this past weekend. I'm not exactly sure which day, but the family's given us approval to talk about it.

But I had only really known Ernie for a day. I dressed up in my old suit to kind of promote the event going on because we do a lot of stuff about history. And he just loved it. And he said, you know, I know you guys don't have a lot of money. And he cut us a deal and was just really supportive and really nice. And I'd only really known him a day, but just felt like I knew him for a very long time. I mean, he was a really cool guy.

Well, I'm, like, again, sorry for your loss. Sorry, my condolences to Ernie Lee's family, his friends, his loved ones. I learned about Ernie when you broke this news to me. And then very quickly realized that this is an example of somebody in this city, like part of the city's character, its makeup, you know, that Remax balloon or the Mr. Peanut Balloon and these various balloons, was there a beer balloon or my, is there? He had Labats. Labats, and I found a photo recently of it actually at the legislature.

They blew it up on the front lawn of the legislature and had it flying around there, which I don't think they would allow today, but... Well, who knows? Because Doug Ford's a big fan of beer. Yeah, a bucket beer. He doesn't actually drink it, though. Oh, yeah. He just likes to, you know, do things with it.

He likes to numb other people's senses, so... Well, you can get your beer in the Raba's now, right? So there's a lot changing in this city. But that's a terrible loss of, very... terrible loss for the city. I don't know if there's an air apparent, but it's just tragic. And it's just,

we won't name the cause of death, but it's worth noting it was not a hot air balloon accident. I think some people think a hot air balloon for 50 years passes away. I think people's first thoughts are a hot air balloon accident. But Ernie Lee did not die, if anything related to hot air balloons. No, not whatsoever.

He was a very incredible pilot, very safe, and trained a lot of other people, how to do the craft and do it properly. He even flew a couple of balloons that other people that fly balloons would find too dangerous, where he had this massive dinosaur balloon that had legs hanging down, and

every once in a while they'd blow towards where you're sitting, so he had to make sure everything was safe and didn't set the balloon on fire and never had a problem, never had any errors, and it's just, it's so sad that just a week away from getting him to be there with us that we couldn't have Ernie there. But this year's festival

is dedicated in the memory of Ernie Lee and all he brought to Toronto and all of our memories as kids just seeing these balloons and thinking about the wonder of flight. Rest well, Ernie Lee. I'm glad that you're able to tell us about Ernie. I don't think, I think Ernie Lee is the type of guy where in 2025 you might learn about his passing on Toronto Mike or if you follow the right, you know, Toronto historians like Jeremy Hopkins and you're going to tell us in a minute how to follow you. But his passing could happen.

And you'd be unaware. We need to remember these characters and these key figures in our city's history. I'm just so glad I did get to meet him before he did pass away. I'm glad I got to know who he was. And I hope everybody here looks into a little bit of his history or remembers him in some kind of way of seeing what he did over the city over the years. Well, I'm glad I got to know who you are, Jeremy Hopkins, and that you get to visit me. I get to be visited by you every quarter. another great episode

I learned a lot about this part of the city that today we know there's a swimming pool and there's some a little bit of activity at the pavilion and of course

I still see people dressed up and attending some kind of live music at the Palais Royal like they're still active I bike by it at nights and there's a lot of activities still happening there

but otherwise we missed out on the amusement park and all these happenings what a cool time in the city and thanks for reminding us of it it was a cool colorful time and thank you so much for letting me talk about it a little bit and also

just pay a little tribute to Ernie as well. Absolutely. And on the live stream, Moose Grumpy thinks maybe one of the videos that showed this part of Toronto was by the first band I ever saw live. An FOTM band. Shout out to Chris Tate. Chalk Circle. That's it. Chalk Circle. They actually have the, on the cover of that album,

they have the photos taken all around that. produced by Chris Wardman, by the way, also in FOTM. It was in Blue Peter. Oh, very cool. It's all coming full circle. Okay, Jayho, you hit another home run, just like Babe Ruth back in 1914 with the Providence Grays. I'm glad I only had the one major mental block there, but I should have. Only one?

Rookie. I had a couple. Do you know how many mental blocks I'm good for each episode? My goodness, here. We got to talk about a topic for the next quarter. Do you have one in mind or do you want to talk offline about it? I don't have one in mind, but the FOTM's, some of them have made suggestions, so I'm going to try to pick one from them.

One suggestion I had was to talk about the mansions of Toronto that have been historically here and ones that are still kicking around and how we can burn them down. Well, we'll discuss. Have we done a Castelloma episode yet? No, we haven't done a castellan episode. That might be a cool idea. That one's for Midtown Gord. He worked there.

Oh, yes, yes. Well, he could probably do an episode on that all by himself. To be discussed. Okay, but yeah, Castle Loma would be great. And that brings us to the end of our 1,741st show. Go to TorontoMike.com for all your Toronto Mike needs. Speaking of castles, that's the friendly giant theme. He had a castle.

Oh, look up. That's the other castle. Much love to all who made this possible. Great Lakes Brewery. I enjoyed my sunny side. I did too. It was great. Palm of Pasta, refreshing, what goes good of that, good palm of pasta.

Oh, for sure. Toronto's Waterfront, BIA, Toronto Maple Leafs Baseball will be there Saturday night. Recycle MyElectronics.ca. Blue Sky Agency, welcome to the family, Blue Sky. And Redley Funeral Home, shed out to Cliff Lumsden. See you all tomorrow when Colin Cripps from Blue Rodeo makes history. Toronto mic debut. Colin Crips in the basement. See you all then.