“Picturing Immigrants in the Ward,” a recently installed exhibit at the City of Toronto Archives, offers many tantalizing glimpses of Jewish, Italian and other recently arrived immigrants in the congested “Ward” neighbourhood of downtown Toronto as it existed from about 1905 to 1930, focusing mostly on the era before the First World War. The Ward…
My uncles, aunts and cousins on the Glicenstein [Gladstone] side always perk up when I mention the huge unclaimed fortune that is supposedly hidden somewhere in our extended family tree. Their eyes grow big when they hear that an alleged distant cousin of ours, a wealthy brewery owner, supposedly died intestate (without an heir) in…
Prelude: Bessie (Besha) Starkman, a Jewish immigrant from Poland, married baker and driver Harry Tobins in Toronto in 1907 and gave birth to daughters Gertrude in 1909 and Lilly (Leah) in 1911. They lived at 92-1/2 Agnes (Dundas) Street in 1909 and 63 Chestnut Street in 1911. In 1912 an Italian immigrant named Rocco Perri…
From The Toronto Star Weekly, November 18, 1926 ◊ Profile of the remarkable Toronto-born entrepreneur Lawrence “Lol” Solman (1866-1931), who was managing director of the Royal Alexandra Theatre, Sunnyside Amusement Park, Hanlan’s Hotel, Hanlan’s Point Amusement Park and the Mutual Street Arena in Toronto; owner of the Toronto Ferry Company and the Toronto Maple Leafs baseball…
From the Toronto Star Weekly, December 31, 1926 by Frederick Griffin You can’t imagine the gigantic United States with all its doughboys and buddies being scared of a woman. It is like a man being scared of a mouse. And yet we have the fact that they were so frightened over there by the presence…
Problem: you know your Jewish ancestors or relatives lived in Toronto in 1911 — you even know their street address — yet you can’t find them in the 1911 census. No matter how many times you search, they do not show up in Ancestry.com’s database of the 1911 census. Frequently the problem occurs because a family…
From the Toronto Star, September 24, 1902 A fashionable audience of guests gathered this afternoon in Holy Blossom Synagogue to witness the marriage of Mr. Joseph Oppenheimer of New Orleans to Miss Lottie Marks, daughter of Mrs. D. Marks of 526 Euclid Avenue. The bride entered leaning on the arm of her grandfather, Mr. N.…
From the Toronto Star, May 13, 1958 Funeral service for Mrs. Mary Wilensky, eight-six, a Russian immigrant who raised four daughters who became professional women in Toronto and the United States, will be held at 12:30 p.m. Wednesday in Park Memorial chapel, Spadina Avenue. Interment will be in Roselawn cemetery. Mrs. Wilensky died of a…
From a Canadian newspaper, August 20, 1976 By Mordecai Hershenson Harry Sniderman was a colourful figure in the Toronto scene for three decades — an able athlete, gracious sportsman and promoter and a Babe Ruth of the Bellwoods Park softball teams. During the late 1920s and 1930s, “Iron Man,” “What-A-Man Sniderman” was the king of…
Based on article from the Canadian Jewish News, Sept. 20, 1984 Sam Shopsowitz, the pastrami and hot dog king whose Shopsy’s deli on Spadina at Dundas was a city landmark for more than half a century, died last week of a heart attack at age sixty-three. His wife Lillian, also sixty-three, predeceased him by only…
