Photo: Rowing Around The Islands in 1908

Derek Flack has a tendency to nail it over at blogTO when he posts galleries of old Toronto photos. His most recent collection is a visual history of the Islands, stretching all the way back to the 1830s. In those early days, the Islands weren't islands at all, but a sandy peninsula still connected to the mainland. Giantass storms in the 1850s finally severed them from the rest of the city. I've re-posted what might be my favourite photo from his gallery — of these folks rowing sometime around 1908 — but, really, you're going to want to scroll through the whole collection to get a sense of how one of our city's awesomest features has evolved over the years. And you can do that by clicking right here.