The Imperial Airship Scheme — A Blimp Above 1930s Toronto

In 1928, Germany launched the world's greatest airship, the Graf Zeppelin. For the next decade, it would make hundreds of flights all over the world: from Germany to the United States, Brazil, Japan, even the north pole. With the Second World War only nine years away, it was enough to make the British very nervous.

Their answer was the Imperial Airship Scheme. It was a contest between a private military contractor and the British government to build the best blimp. The first to be finished was the "Capitalist ship", the R100. It was the fastest airship in the world, with a top speed of 130 km/h. And its first big test was a trip to Canada. For three days in the summer of 1930, it cruised across the Atlantic before finally reaching Quebec. A couple of weeks later, it was flying around the skyscrapers of downtown Toronto.

The whole trip was a rousing success. So much so, in fact, that once it returned home, the team working on the government-built "Socialist ship", the R101, decided to push ahead with their voyage to India, which they'd thought they might postpone due to safety concerns. Their blimp made it all the way from England to France before plummeting to the ground and bursting into flame. The disaster killed 48 people, more than the Hindenberg. The Imperial Airship Scheme was abandoned, the R100 was grounded and then sold for scrap.

The R100 in Bedfordshire, England, just before leaving for Canada

A version of this post was originally published on August 29, 2010. It has been updated to add more photos.

A Tour of Toronto's Skyline in the Summer of 1930

The summer of 1930. It was the beginning of a difficult decade for Toronto, along with much of the rest of the world. The Great Depression had just begun. But before the stock market crashed, the boom of the 1920s had fueled construction projects all over the city. Toronto was full of elegant new landmarks — many of them still familiar to Torontonians today: Union Station, The Royal York Hotel, Maple Leaf Gardens, The Palais Royale, The Sunnyside Bathing Pavilion, The Princes' Gates... And on one July day, a photographer climbed to the top of a building on the north-east corner of University & Dundas, pointed a camera south, and took this photo of our city's new skyline. It's full of interesting details, so I thought I'd give a brief "tour" of some of the buildings you can see.

But first, you’ll want to open the full version of the image so you can see the whole thing, which you can do by clicking it here:

 

01 The Maclean Building

By 1930, the Maclean family's publishing empire was already more than four decades old. It had all started back in the 1880s with a trade journal called The Canadian Grocer. Before long, they'd added Maclean's, Chatelaine and The Financial Post among other titles. They were the biggest publishing empire in the British Empire. And that meant they could afford to buy an entire block of land in downtown Toronto. On the north-east corner of University & Dundas, they built a whole complex to house their offices and printing presses. In 1930, the latest addition had just opened: the new Maclean Building soared a whole nine storeys into the air, making it the tallest building in the neighbourhood. That's when a photographer climbed up onto the roof and snapped this photo of Toronto's skyline.

Today, the building is still there. It's on the north side of Dundas, just to the east of the intersection. On the corner itself, you'll find a TD on the ground floor of the newer Maclean-Hunter Building; it was built in the early 1960s.

02 Eaton's

Of course, the Macleans weren't the only Toronto family to build a wildly successful business. At about the same time the first edition of The Canadian Grocer was hot off the presses, Timothy Eaton was moving his famous department store to the corner of Yonge & Queen. Over the next few decades, as Eaton's became a Canadian institution, the company bought up whole blocks of the surrounding neighbourhood. By the time this photo of the skyline was taken, they owned pretty much everything between Yonge, Bay, Queen & Dundas. In 1930, their complex sprawled over more than 60 acres: there was the main store, an annex store, factories, warehouses and mail order facilities. Today, that same huge chunk of land is home to the Eaton Centre.

  

03 The Ward
Today, this is where you'll find Nathan Phillips Square. But in 1930, the same spot was home to Toronto's most notorious slum. What is now an open expanse of concrete was a warren of hovels back then, where slumlords crammed people into tiny, poorly-insulated shacks. The Ward had been home to one new wave of immigrants after another — stretching all the way back to the mid-1800s — and by the time this photo of the skyline was taken, it had become Toronto's first Chinatown. These were hard days for those new Canadians: anti-Asian racism was rampant; the federal government had recently banned all immigration from China. The Great Depression would make things even worse.

By the summer of 1930, the days of The Ward were already numbered. Developers had begun to buy up parts of the neighbourhood to build office towers and hotels. Finally, in the late-1950s, the City expropriated the land, forced all the residents out, and demolished the buildings to make way for our new City Hall. Chinatown was driven west along Dundas to Spadina, where it is today.

 

04 Old City Hall
Back in 1930, Old City Hall was still known as just plain old City Hall. And Toronto's mayor was a newspaper reporter by the name of Bert Wemp. Just a few months earlier, he won the election by running against a plan to improve the downtown core. Huge swathes would have been rebuilt. There would have been grand boulevards slicing through the city centre, a majestic new square where Nathan Phillips Square is now, and a huge traffic circle near Union Station along with new Art Deco skyscrapers and public buildings. But after the stock market crashed, the public mood changed. And people in the suburbs had always felt the plan — which hoped to improve traffic congestion — did too much for downtown and too little for them. Wemp was elected. And in a referendum, the proposal was rejected by fewer than two thousand votes.

The Old City Hall building itself had already been around for thirty years by this point. It was designed by E.J. Lennox (the same architect responsible for Casa Loma, the King Edward Hotel and the west wing of Queen's Park). Until the Royal York Hotel was built in the very late 1920s, nothing in Toronto reached higher than the tip of this clock tower.

 

05 The Bank of Commerce Building

The Royal York didn't spend long as the tallest building in Toronto, though. In the summer of 1930, the title belonged to this new skyscraper. In fact, it was the tallest building in the entire British Empire. Today, we call it Commerce Court North, but back then it was called the Bank of Commerce Building. It was brand new — it opened the very same year the photo of the skyline was taken — and it was designed by the architectural firm of Darling & Pearson (who also built many of Toronto's other landmarks: like the original ROM, the AGO, and 1 King West). On the 32nd floor, it had the most spectacular observation deck in the city, decorated with four enormous, bearded heads. It would remain the tallest building in Toronto for the next three decades, until Ludwig Mies van der Rohe built the sleek black modernist towers of the Toronto-Dominion Centre in 1967.

 

06 The Royal York Hotel

In 1930, the Royal York was brand new, too, just a year old. Back then, it was the biggest hotel in the British Empire. It had ten elevators, the biggest pipe organ in the country, a shower and a bath and a radio in every single one of its 1000+ rooms, and a telephone system so extensive they needed three dozen operators to run it. In fact, the Royal York is so fancy that nearly a hundred years later, the Queen still stays there when she comes to town.

07 The Armouries

Once upon a time, this was one of the most impressive buildings in all of Toronto — in all of Canada even. The Armouries were built in the late 1800s as a training ground for the militia. It was the biggest building of its kind on the continent. It looked like a huge, squat castle, complete with turrets and flags. Inside, you'd find a rifle range, drill halls and even a bowling alley. This is where Torontonians lined up to volunteer for the Boer War, the World Wars and the Korean War. They were trained here, too. But in the early 1960s — about the same time The Ward was being leveled to make way for our new City Hall — the Armouries were demolished to make room for the new provincial courts that still stand on this same spot today.

08 The Goel Tzedec Synagogue
In 1930, The Ward was best known as Toronto's Chinatown. But thirty years earlier, it was most notably Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe who called the neighbourhood home. It was back then — in the very early 1900s — that the local congregation opened this beautiful new synagogue on University Avenue (just a block to the north of the Armouries). Inspired by the design of England's Westminster Cathedral, this synagogue became the spiritual centre of Toronto's Jewish community. It stood on this spot for fifty years before it was demolished. By then, the community had moved west: the Goel Tzedec congregation merged with the worshipers of the Beth Hamidrash Hagadol Synagogue on McCaul and opened the brand new Beth Tzedec Synagogue on Bathurst Street between St. Clair & Eglinton.

09 The Canada Life Building
Today, the Canada Life Building — topped by its familiar weather beacon — is one of our best-loved landmarks. But in the summer of 1930, it was still being built. The Beaux-Arts skyscraper would serve as the headquarters for Canada's biggest and oldest insurance company: Canada Life. (They still own the building, though they were recently swallowed up by Great-West Life.) It was supposed to be just the first in a whole complex of buildings along University Avenue, but the Great Depression forced them to cancel those plans. 

The helpful weather beacon (lights run up or down according to the changing temperature, flash red or white for rain or snow, steady red for clouds and green for clear skies) was added in the 1950s.

10 The Chestnut Trees of University Avenue

Today, University Avenue is a canyon of concrete, pavement and glass. But less than a hundred years ago, it was a majestic tree-lined boulevard. In the early 1800s, five hundred horse chestnut trees were planted along either side of the road and a grassy promenade was built down what is now the centre of the street. It became one of Toronto's grandest avenues. Even Charles Dickens was impressed when he came to town in the 1840s.

11 St. George The Martyr

Over here, in the west, you can see the towering spire of one of Toronto's oldest churches. St. George The Martyr had been built at the edge of what's now the Grange Park all the way back in the 1840s. The population was booming; Toronto's very first church — the Anglicans' St. James — just wasn't big enough anymore. When St. George was built, it became one of the most easily recognizable landmarks in the city. The spire stretched a hundred and fifty feet into the air. It could be seen all the way from the lake. Ships used it to navigate. But sadly, the church suffered a terrible fire in 1955. Most of the building — including the slender spire — was destroyed. Today, only the brick tower that supported the spire is left standing. And a new church, with new gardens, has been built on the same spot. 

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I've got another tour of Toronto in the 1930s here.

The photo the skyline comes via Wikimedia Commons here.

You can see an aerial view looking north toward the Maclean Building thanks to Chuckman's postcard blog here. There's more about the history of the Maclean-Hunter company on Encyclopedia.com here. Kaitlin Wainwright shares a story about the man behind John Maclean's own impressive home here. And the City's own "Heritage Property Research and Evaluation Report" about the Maclean Building is in a PDF here. The photo of the building comes via Chris Bateman's blogTO article about a proposed condo development on the site.

Wikipedia has stuff on the Eaton's Annex here. And an image of the entire complex here. And a history of Eaton's here.

Chris Bateman has a brief history of The Ward over on blogTO here. And he lists "10 lost Toronto buildings we wish we could bring back" here.

Jamie Bradburn writes about Mayor Bert Wemp — who led quite a fascinating life — for Torontoist here. Wikipedia gives a much briefer rundown here. And a very quick overview of the 1930 municipal election here.

The Toronto Historical Associated has a bit more about the Armouries here. And so does Heritage Toronto here.

Kevin Plummer writes about one of the cantors of the Goel Tzedec Synagogue in an edition of Torontoist's Historicist column here. Wikipedia has a "History of the Jews in Toronto" here.

I wrote about the chestnut trees of University Avenue here.

You'll find a neat photo of John Street and St. George The Martyr in 1909 on Google Books here. And an even older painting of it — as part of a history of the nearby St. Patrick's Market on Queen Street — thanks to Doug Taylor here. The church's own website shares a history of itself here. The full photo of the church after the fire is on the Toronto Public Library website here. blogTO calls it one of the best make-out spots in Toronto.

A Bird's-Eye Tour of Toronto in the Early 1930s

The late 1920s and early 1930s were an important time in the building of Toronto. Many of the city's most beautiful landmarks opened in those few years: everything from Maple Leaf Gardens to Union Station to what was, at the time, the tallest skyscraper in the British Empire. Many of them were planned during the boom years of the 1920s, those carefree days of flappers and jazz, just before the Great Depression hit and priorities changed. As other major construction projects were cancelled or put on hold, the buildings built in this period would dominate Toronto's skyline for decades to come.

You can see many of them in this aerial photograph. It was taken sometime in the early 1930s by William James, one of the city's most important and prolific early photographers. There are thousands of his photos in the Toronto Archives — they call him "the first press photographer in Canada." And since this particular photograph gives such an interesting overview of our city at a formative moment in its history, I thought I'd give a brief "tour" of a few of the landmarks it contains.

First, you'll probably want to open a bigger version of the image so you can see it in better detail. Click here.

01 Maple Leaf Gardens

When this photo was taken, our city's most storied sports stadium was brand spanking new. Maple Leaf Gardens opened in 1931. The Leafs would win their very first Stanley Cup in their very first year in the new building. It was the beginning of their Golden Age. They were loaded with superstars. Seven players on that team would be inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame, including King Clancy, Charlie Conacher and Hap Day. Conn Smythe was the owner and manager. They'd win ten more Stanley Cups in that building by the end of 1967. And not a single one since, of course.  

02 Eaton's College Street

Just down the street from Maple Leaf Gardens — on the south-west corner of Yonge & College — is another beautiful Art Deco building designed by the very same architects: the Montreal firm of Ross & Macdonald (they also did Union Station and the Royal York Hotel). Today, we call it College Park, but when it first opened it was known as Eaton's College Street. The original plan was to move the Queen Street Eaton's a few blocks north, but in the end the retail giant decided to keep them both. It was also new when this photo was taken. It opened in 1930.

03 Queen's Park

The Ontario Legislative Building is just above the number 03, its dark brick blending in a bit with the surrounding trees. It was nearly 40 years old at the time this photo was taken. And in the early 1930s, the Conservatives were in power. George Howard Ferguson had been Premier since the early '20s. His government was most famous for ending prohibition and creating the LCBO. They were also anti-immigrant, anti-labour and anti-French. Once the Great Depression hit, Ferguson resigned, leaving George Stewart Henry to take over in 1930. Henry created work camps to help the unemployed — and to get them and their radical left-wing politics out of the city. The work programs vastly expanded Ontario's new highway system, including the building of the QEW. Still, when he finally called an election, Henry lost to the Liberals. He'd retire a few years after that.

04 The Canada Life Building & University Avenue
Just down the street from Queen's Park, the Canada Life Building was another brand new landmark at the time this photo was taken. It opened in 1931 and it's still there today — on the west side of University Avenue just north of Queen. It was built as the headquarters for Canada's biggest and oldest insurance company: Canada Life. (They still own the building, though they were recently swallowed up by Great-West Life.) It was supposed to be the first in a series of buildings along University, but the Depression forced them to cancel those plans. Its coolest feature — the weather beacon at the top (lights run up or down according to the changing temperature, flash red or white for rain or snow, steady red for clouds and green for clear skies) — didn't get added until the '50s.

Just to the south of the building, you can see a brand new stretch of University Avenue. The road originally ended at Queen. But just before this photo was taken, the provincial government gave the municipal government the power to expropriate the land; they wanted to extend University down to Union Station in order to ease traffic congestion. It became the main issue in the 1929 Toronto election — and the supporter of the scheme, Mayor Sam McBride, won. His government then unveiled an elaborate plan, including a magnificent roundabout called Vimy Circle and grand avenues named after battles from the First World War. But there was another election the very next year — and by then the stock market had crashed. With the Great Depression now just beginning, voters rejected the ambitious plan and kicked McBride out of office. In the end, University got a simple extension straight down to Front, which is what you can see in this photo.

05 Old City Hall & The Ward

The dark building just above the number 05 is Old City Hall — or as it was known back then: just plain old City Hall. It had already been around for 30 years before Mayor McBride won and lost his elections, designed by one of Toronto's most important early architects: E.J. Lennox, the same guy who did Casa Loma, the King Edward Hotel and the west wing of Queen's Park. Until the Royal York Hotel was built in the 1920s, nothing in Toronto reached higher than the tip of this clock tower.

Just to the left of Old City Hall, you can see the neighbourhood that was called The Ward back then. It was Toronto's most infamous slum. Since the mid-1800s, it had been home to one wave of new immigrants after another, a place where slumlords crammed people into tiny, rundown, poorly insulated shacks. By the time this photo was taken, The Ward was home to the city's first Chinatown. Those were days of severe anti-Chinese racism; the federal government had just banned Chinese immigration. And the Great Depression meant things would get even worse. In the 1920s, developers had already started to buy up parts of the neighbourhood to build office towers and hotels. Finally, in the late-'50s, the City expropriated the land, forced all the residents to move, and demolished the buildings to make way for Nathan Phillips Square and our new City Hall.

06 The Bank of Commerce Building

In the early 1930s, the tallest building in Toronto was also the tallest building in the British Empire: the Bank of Commerce Building. It was another new addition to the skyline, rising higher than the clock tower of Old City Hall and higher than the Royal York Hotel. On the 32nd floor, it had the best observation deck in the city, decorated with four enormous, bearded heads. It's still there today — we call it Commerce Court North now. It was designed by the firm of Darling & Pearson, who also did many of Toronto's other landmarks and early skyscrapers, including the white one you can see just to the top-right of the number 06 in this photo (that's One King West, which has a big fin-like hotel and condo on top of it now) and also the white one to the right of that (the Canadian Pacific Building, now home to the Shoppers Drug Mart on the south-east corner of Yonge & King).

The Bank of Commerce Building would remain the tallest building in Toronto for the next three decades, until Ludwig Mies van der Rohe built the sleek black modernist towers of the Toronto-Dominion Centre in 1967.

07 The Royal York Hotel

The spot on Front Street across from Union Station has been home to a hotel since before there was a Union Station — since before we even had a railroad. The first hotel was built there in the 1840s. But the most recent, of course, is the most grand: the Royal York. It opened in 1929 — yet another brand new landmark when this photo was taken — and was on the cutting edge of hospitality. It had ten elevators, the biggest pipe organ in the country, a shower and a bath and a radio in every single one of its 1000+ rooms, and a telephone system so extensive they needed about three dozen operators to run it. In fact, it's so fancy that the Queen stays there when she comes to town. When it first opened, not only was it the biggest hotel in the British Empire, it was also briefly the tallest building in Toronto — until the Bank of Commerce Building opened the very next year.

The hotel was designed by the firm of Ross & Macdonald with the help of Henry Sproatt, the same architect who designed the Canada Life Building and helped them with Eaton's College Street. In the late-1800s, he had also been partners with Darling & Pearson. Between them, those three firms were responsible for many of our city's most striking new landmarks in this period. 

08 Union Station

The biggest train station in Canada was also a brand new addition to the city when this photo was taken — and was also designed by Ross & Macdonald. The official opening ceremony in the summer of 1927 was a major event: the Prince of Wales showed up to the cut the ribbon with a pair of gold scissors. (In a few years, he would briefly become King Edward VIII and then abdicate in the name of love.) He was joined by his younger brother George, Prime Minister Mackenzie King, Premier Ferguson, the Lieutenant Governor, the British Prime Minister and lots of other government officials. Union Station became the grandest stop on the Trans-Canada railway, straddling those nation-building rails that snake out across the continent all the way west to Vancouver. Still, Union Station almost didn't make it to the 21st century. Just 50 years after it opened, developers announced plans to demolish it. It was, thankfully, saved. Today, it's undergoing renovations — which will include replacing the green copper roof so that it shines again like it did when this photo was taken. Nearly 100 years after it opened, Union Station is still the busiest transportation hub in the country.

To the right of Union Station, you can see the gleaming white Dominion Public Building. It was originally built by the government as a giant customs clearing house. It's still there today: the huge, imposing, columned building that curves along the south side of Front Street for an entire block between Bay and Yonge. In this photo, the construction was only half-finished: the whole western wing has yet to be built.  

09 The Roundhouse

The John Street Roundhouse might not be a towering skyline icon, but it too was an important new addition to the city in the early 1930s. It was built for the Canadian Pacific Railway, featuring the biggest turntable ever used by the CPR, allowing them to service 32 locomotives at a time. It opened in 1931 and was used until the '80s. Now, it's home to the Steam Whistle Brewery, a Leon's Furniture store and the Toronto Railway Museum (though the museum is currently under threat). The city has grown up around it: the CN Tower and the SkyDome are right across the street and those few blocks of empty railway lands you can see to the north of the Roundhouse have become home to the Convention Centre, the CBC Building, Metro Hall and Roy Thomson Hall. You can also see, along the northern edge of the railway lands, the warehouses that Frank Gehry and David Mirvish are hoping to demolish in order to make way for their three new towers.

10 The Toronto Harbour Commission Building

Up until about ten years before this photo was taken, this spot was in Lake Ontario. When the Toronto Harbour Commission Building first opened in 1917, it was right on the water, at the end of a small pier. But the Harbour Commission changed all that. One of the first projects they took on after moving into these new headquarters was to create more land. Beginning in the early 1920s, they filled in the lake, moving the shore a few blocks south. Today, the building is still there — but it's more than half a kilometer from the water. It's now home to the Toronto Port Authority, the agency that succeeded the Harbour Commission.

It was designed by Chapman & Oxley — the other big Toronto architectural firm building landmarks along the lake shore at this time. Most of their most famous buildings had recently opened to the west of this photo: Palais Royal, the Sunnyside Bathing Pavilion, the Prince's Gates at the CNE, the Maple Leaf baseball stadium at Bathurst & Front. They'd also just finished the old Toronto Star Building, which was at the foot of Yonge, just off to the south-east of the Harbour Commission Building. Four of the downtown skyscrapers you can see in this photo were also Chapman & Oxley designs.

11 St. James Cathedral

In the days before the Bank of Commerce Building and the Royal York Hotel and Old City Hall, the highest peak in Toronto belonged to the Cathedral Church of St. James. It has the tallest church spire in Canada, higher even than our city's early skyscrapers. It's a bit hard to see in this photo, but it rises up just to the left of the number 11. The original church was one of the very first buildings ever built in our city — it went up on this spot at the corner of Church & King in the late 1700s. (The cathedral was built in the 1850s.) It's with this neighbourhoood that Toronto began — growing at an astonishing rate over the next 140 years to become the urban metropolis we can see in this photo.

12 The Bloor Viaduct

It wasn't just buildings: many of Toronto's biggest and most beautiful bridges were built around this time. The most famous of them all, of course, is the one officially known as the Prince Edward Viaduct (named after the same Edward who cut the ribbon on Union Station). You can see the bridge just to the left of the number 12, spanning the Don Valley. It was finished about 12 years before this photo was taken, the most famous project by Toronto's visionary Commissioner of Public Works: R.C. Harris. It united the western and eastern halves of the city, opening up the Danforth for development, and included a level for a subway that wouldn't be built for another 50 years. A century after it opened, the Viaduct is about to get another new addition: council recently approved funding to illuminate the bridge with LEDs, turning the modern suicide barrier into a truly luminous veil.

13 The Leaside Bridge

The Bloor Viaduct wasn't the only big new addition to the Don Valley. It was followed by the Leaside Bridge, which takes Millwood Road across the gap. You can see it just below the number 13. It was built a couple of years before this photo was taken as a way of attracting people to the new town of Leaside. The neighbourhood was only a couple of decades old at this point, planned as a model town by the Canadian Northern Railway. The bridge — which connected Leaside (to the left) to east Toronto (to the right) — was constructed in a record-breaking 10 months and was originally called the Confederation Bridge since it opened in Canada's 60th year. It was also widened in the 1960s to allow six lanes of traffic and has a mosaic handrail, which has recently been restored.

14 The Don Valley Brickworks

You can see the white cliffs of the Don Valley Brickworks just below the number 14. At the time this photo was taken, the spot was still being quarried for clay to make the bricks that built much of our city: Old City Hall, Queen's Park, Casa Loma, Hart House, Massey Hall... The quarry had been founded a few decades earlier and still, at this point, had a few decades left to go. Just to the right of the cliffs, you can also see the "half-mile bridge" of the Canadian Pacific Railway. It was the first line to lead directly into downtown Toronto. Before that, trains coming from the east had to head all the way west to the Junction and then literally back their way into the city. The bridge was new: it had just been rebuilt in 1928 — and, amazingly, they rebuilt it without shutting down the tracks, quickly slipping in new sections during the gaps between passing trains.

Maybe most amazing of all, though, is what was found in those white cliffs: a geological and fossil record stretching back tens of thousands of years. During the 1920s, A.P. Coleman, Toronto's most important early geologist, was using them to trace the advance and retreat of the last Ice Age. They were a new addition to our understanding of this place. They were a reminder of a time long before this city was built — before skyscrapers and train stations and sports stadiums, before even the villages of the First Nations, before the first human beings had ever set foot on this land — when Toronto was home to bison and deer, giant prehistoric beavers and enormous stag-moose, the days when mammoths and mastodons roamed this land.

Photo: Waterfront Construction in 1964

 Harbourfront in 1964

I can't find much information about this photo, but I like it, so I'm posting it anyway. Apparently this is the beginning of construction on a building along the waterfront in 1964, though I'm not sure what building it is. (I'm thinking there's a chance it's the ugly apartments at the foot of Bay Street. In any case, it's definitely right near there.) The shot was taken by Harold Whyte, who has other neat images of Toronto in the '60s here (where you can also buy the rights to use them in magazines or whatever, which you should totally do). Oh, and that building dominating the skyline in the background? I'm thinking that's the Bank of Commerce Building, which I already wrote a post about, right over here.

The Tallest Building in the British Empire

Toronto, 1935ish

I just stumbled across this photo taken from the island sometime around 1935. The tall skyscraper on the right is the Bank of Commerce Building, which, from the time it was finished in 1931 right up until 1962, was the tallest building in the British Empire.

It was designed by the architects at Pearson and Darling, the same firm responsible for U of T's Convocation Hall, the original ROM, the original AGO, the Dominion Bank Building at One King West and a bunch of other shit. These days the building is still used by the CIBC under the uninspiring name "Commerce Court North"; it's hidden in among the newer bank towers on King, right across the street from the Scotiabank building. It also has a kickass observation deck on the 32nd floor, decorated with four giant, gargoylesque heads meant to represent bank-approved virtues like "Enterprise" and "Foresight". It was closed to the public, though, after the view got blocked by newer buildings.

The stockier building on the left-hand side of the photo is the Royal York Hotel, which had apparently broken Toronto's old height bylaw to become the tallest building in the Empire before the Bank of Commerce Building stole its crown. Near the middle of the picture, on the right-hand side of that cluster of buildings there, you can just make out the clock tower of Old City Hall.

Torontoist has a much more detailed post about the building's history here.