Tag: photography

Arts & Letters Club — New & Old

We visited the historic and elegant Arts & Letters Club, also known as “St. George’s Hall,” on Elm Street west of Yonge Street today. The lovely interior is filled with beautiful works of art by the Group of Seven, many of whom were its members, and by other notable members of the club. Indeed, a…

New book offers pieces by Kayfetz, Speisman on Toronto Jews

Toronto publisher Now and Then Books’s latest title — Only Yesterday: Collected Pieces on the Jews of Toronto, by Benjamin Kayfetz and Stephen A. Speisman — is a prolifically illustrated book featuring 18 evocative articles by two notable historians of Toronto’s Jewish community. Culled from a variety of sources, the pieces in Only Yesterday focus…

Toronto shul exhibits photos of Polish shtetl

From the Canadian Jewish News, October 3, 2012 TORONTO — A series of old historic photographs from the Polish shtetl of Staszow has been quietly wowing visitors since being installed in the Stashover-Slipia Synagogue on Sultana Avenue in Toronto. The photographs are to remain on permanent display in the shul’s lobby. “Everyone notices them when they…

Obit: Bill Carrick, wildlife photographer (1920-2002)

Bill Carrick, a Toronto-area naturalist and wildlife photographer who coaxed beavers, ducks, fish, geese, polar bears and other animals into acting naturally in front of the camera, has died after an accidental fall on the rural property he rented in northeastern Scarborough, Ont. along the Pickering town line. He was 81 years old. * William…

Historic photograph of 1812 veterans was taken in 1861

No, it isn’t an actual photograph — just a sketch of a photograph of ten surviving veterans of the War of 1812 to 1814, who assembled at Rosedale some 50 years after the war, on October 23, 1861. The photo-sketch appeared in the Toronto Evening Telegram in 1910, just more than a century ago and…

Jewish Toronto: miscellaneous photos from the olden days

MEDICAL ARTS BUILDING ON BLOOR STREET (illustration, above) : New structure to be erected on the old Sweny property at northeast corner of Bloor and St. George stret by a group of Toronto physicians. The site was acquired from the Toronto General Trusts Co., executors of the Sweny estate, and has 140 feet frontage on…

Aerial view of Toronto, 1910

This aerial photograph of Toronto was taken in 1910, when the science of flight was in its infancy. Note that the pilot is visible in the early biplane, which took off from the Aviation Park in Weston. The photo was obviously taken from a second plane, flying nearby. This poor reproduction doesn’t reveal much of…

Rare 1910 Toronto panorama from Library of Congress

A rare panoramic photograph of Toronto harbour, taken in 1910 from the top of one of the city’s first skyscrapers, has been transferred into video format and posted with some analysis and description onto YouTube. Toronto author and publisher Bill Gladstone, who maintains the website www.billgladstone.ca, came across the rare photograph in the US Library…

Photos capture ‘the Way We Were’

A photograph, the old saying goes, is worth a thousand words. Sometimes, however, a photograph’s worth cannot be measured in words. By capturing an ephemeral moment in exquisite detail, a photograph can be far more articulate than language. Irreplaceable images of our culture from days past can be infinitely instructive as to how we lived.…

Postcards from the past

A picture, according to proverb, is worth a thousand words, but sometimes the power of a photograph to illuminate a setting seems to go well beyond the descriptive abilities of language. Genealogists are often keen, therefore, to find good generic photographs, illustrations and other visual materials to enhance their family tree research. As defined by…