Thursday, February 9, 2012
You have to love Canadian Toponymy
In our most recent set of depository map library titles sent to us this month, some choice toponymic gems included: "Loaf Island, Nunavut", to go along with "Bakers Dozen Islands, Nunavut" - formerly called "Eskimo Harbour", and one can wash these down with the "Grey Goose Island, Nunavut". here is the Packing Slip
Marcel
Monday, January 9, 2012
Junction Dodge Plant that was...
A storage facility at Osler and Pelham in Toronto went up in flames on January 9th, 2012 and continued to burn for two days. http://ctestp.ctv.ca/servlet/an/local/CTVNews/20120109/120109_toronto_fire/20120109/?hub=CP24Home This was not the first time in recent history that the building's structure had been challenged. In 2006, the building was hit by a grain train http://www.tcrc295.com/Osler_derailment.htm when it derailed from the neighbouring railway tracks. Here are some photos from John (aka Krunkwerke) of the aftermath of that derailment: http://www.flickr.com/photos/krunkwerke/sets/72157625704504118/with/5305938452/
While the building is currently one of many storage facilities in the neighbourhood, the building and the site are historically significant to the Junction area. Here is a photo from 1948 of the building, from the Toronto Archives :
Here is the archival photo draped over the current google streetview of the building
To view this image online, click on http://www.whatwasthere.com/b/33522
According to the Old time Trains web site, the "Dodge Manufacturing Company of Toronto Limited; manufacturers of the Dodge Wood Split Pulley and other factory equipment including grain elevator machinery moved to Pelham Avenue in 1888 from Toronto. It expanded in 1901 spending $40,000 building additional factories and office buildings and going from 200 workers to 500." from: http://www.trainweb.org/oldtimetrains/Toronto/junction/history.htm
This is what the site looked like in 1889. The map is a Goad fire insurance plan of West Toronto Junction.
From a 1914 Fire insurance plan, here is the site again.
This is the site again in 1964 from an Insurance Underwriters plan map. The Dodge manufacturing plant site had now made way for a few different manufacturers including a camping trailer manufacturer, a wool factory, and the Aristocrat Manufacturing Co. Ltd. where commercial wash basins were produced.
This is what the area looked like the first morning. On the left is a shot from St. Rita's School Parking Lot on Edwin Avenue. On the right is a photo of the area from the laneway just East of Osler
Interestingly, Google maps displays quite an error for the site. They have labelled the site and the buildings immediately to the East of the building as being St. Josaphat's school. St. Josaphat's is further to the east. See this link.
Here are a few photos of the building on January 14th, 2012. Old bricks and other parts of the historical structure are now becoming visible through the bad stucco and 1970's/80's looking windows and cinder block "curtains".
Police and fire trucks remain on the scened even 5 days later.
Here is where you start to see the old bricks that have been covered by stucko and cement blocks
While the building is currently one of many storage facilities in the neighbourhood, the building and the site are historically significant to the Junction area. Here is a photo from 1948 of the building, from the Toronto Archives :
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Here is the archival photo draped over the current google streetview of the building
To view this image online, click on http://www.whatwasthere.com/b/33522
According to the Old time Trains web site, the "Dodge Manufacturing Company of Toronto Limited; manufacturers of the Dodge Wood Split Pulley and other factory equipment including grain elevator machinery moved to Pelham Avenue in 1888 from Toronto. It expanded in 1901 spending $40,000 building additional factories and office buildings and going from 200 workers to 500." from: http://www.trainweb.org/oldtimetrains/Toronto/junction/history.htm
This is what the site looked like in 1889. The map is a Goad fire insurance plan of West Toronto Junction.
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| click on image for closer view |
This is what the area looked like the first morning. On the left is a shot from St. Rita's School Parking Lot on Edwin Avenue. On the right is a photo of the area from the laneway just East of Osler
Interestingly, Google maps displays quite an error for the site. They have labelled the site and the buildings immediately to the East of the building as being St. Josaphat's school. St. Josaphat's is further to the east. See this link.
Here are a few photos of the building on January 14th, 2012. Old bricks and other parts of the historical structure are now becoming visible through the bad stucco and 1970's/80's looking windows and cinder block "curtains".
Here is where you start to see the old bricks that have been covered by stucko and cement blocks
Marcel Fortin
University of Toronto Map and Data Library
University of Toronto Map and Data Library
Friday, December 2, 2011
Codes & Maps
Recently I've been sifting through all of the wonderful maps that are donated to the library. It's a interesting process, as they range from pieces like this 1898
Plan and profile of the line of route of the Montreal Ottawa and Georgian Bay Navigation to more mundane 1980's US road maps.
The majority of the road maps are
Rand McNally and don't display a date or edition, which makes cataloguing quite frustrating. Comparing the streets to known dated maps would be too time consuming due to the sheer volume that need to be processed. Tucked in the bottom right corner of one map, I noticed a 10 digit number, discontented from any of the map content.
Turns out this serial code contains the publication date. Road Maps.org has a simple breakdown of the code system used on both Rand McNally and Gousha maps. The serial number for the above map is 79604909-15, so 1979.
Within the mounds of donations, there were other undated maps. One of which was a Hagstrom NYC bus map that stood out because of it's design and colours. WorldCat.org suggested this was either from 1959 or 1969.
Hagstrom was considerably more cryptic about the dates of their maps then Rand McNally or Gousha. According to Gregory J. Christiano, this secrecy relates to copyright and marketing tactics, and was dropped in 1978.
The 3 to 4 digit codes used letters to tell the month and year of publication [mm]-[yy] based on the code below:
Our Hagstorm's map of New York (Manhattan) Bus Lines is coded A-RR, therefore published in February 1966. Below, in the larger section of the map, you can see the code at the bottom right corner. So, even the maps that seem mundane at face value have fascinating stories hidden in their lines and colours.
Plan and profile of the line of route of the Montreal Ottawa and Georgian Bay Navigation to more mundane 1980's US road maps.
The majority of the road maps are
Rand McNally and don't display a date or edition, which makes cataloguing quite frustrating. Comparing the streets to known dated maps would be too time consuming due to the sheer volume that need to be processed. Tucked in the bottom right corner of one map, I noticed a 10 digit number, discontented from any of the map content.
Turns out this serial code contains the publication date. Road Maps.org has a simple breakdown of the code system used on both Rand McNally and Gousha maps. The serial number for the above map is 79604909-15, so 1979.Within the mounds of donations, there were other undated maps. One of which was a Hagstrom NYC bus map that stood out because of it's design and colours. WorldCat.org suggested this was either from 1959 or 1969.
Hagstrom was considerably more cryptic about the dates of their maps then Rand McNally or Gousha. According to Gregory J. Christiano, this secrecy relates to copyright and marketing tactics, and was dropped in 1978.
The 3 to 4 digit codes used letters to tell the month and year of publication [mm]-[yy] based on the code below:
Our Hagstorm's map of New York (Manhattan) Bus Lines is coded A-RR, therefore published in February 1966. Below, in the larger section of the map, you can see the code at the bottom right corner. So, even the maps that seem mundane at face value have fascinating stories hidden in their lines and colours.
Friday, November 11, 2011
Heart shaped (Stabius-Werner) projection
This enchanting page is from the petite Pocket Atlas of the world by John Bartholomew. The uncommon Stabius-Werner projection creates a fascinating and whimsical first page to the atlas.
Wednesday, October 12, 2011
Resource of the Week: Seamless Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM) 3 Arc Second (90m)
This week's Map and Data Library geospatial data resource of the week is
NASA/NGA's Seamless Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM) 3 Arc Second
(90m) Digital Elevation Model. The data have been available to us for a
few years on an external hard drive but this is the first time we have
had enough server disk space to load the data for access on the web.
All files are downloadable and can be identified through an interactive
map index we built on GIS Cloud. The data record is here:
NASA/NGA's Seamless Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM) 3 Arc Second
(90m) Digital Elevation Model. The data have been available to us for a
few years on an external hard drive but this is the first time we have
had enough server disk space to load the data for access on the web.
All files are downloadable and can be identified through an interactive
map index we built on GIS Cloud. The data record is here:
http://maps.library.utoronto.ca/cgi-bin/datainventory.pl?idnum=807&display=full
Please note that these data are also available here:
http://srtm.csi.cgiar.org/ but that this site is extremely slow and
difficult to use. Our site allows for quite an easy location of
datasets and download.
For more information on this resource, please see this PDF document:
http://maps.library.utoronto.ca/dataut/world/SRTM3arc/SRTMreadme.pdf
Thursday, October 6, 2011
Resource of the Week - Toronto Clutter Data
Once in a while i find datasets in our data catalogue that I have not
used or thought about for an extended period of time. I was thinking
that it might be a good idea to do resource of the week posting on the
blog and through an email message when I or anyone else in the MDL finds
such a resource.
This week's resource of the week is Toronto Clutter Data purchased
through RMSI.com last year.
In this TIF / GRID / Shapefile resource, land is divided into 16 land
cover classes:
Clutter Classification :
0 Unclassified1 Inland Water
2 Open
3 Low Tree Density
4 High Tree Density
5 Rural areas/low residential
6 Suburban
7 Suburban With Tree
8 Urban Low Density
9 Urban Medium Dense
10 Urban High Dense
11 Skyscrapers/ High-rise
12 Industrial Area/ Commercial areas
13 Airstrip
14 River
15 Coast
Consider mentioning this resource to a number of our Landscape architecture
library patrons. The data can be found here:
http://maps.library.utoronto.ca/cgi-bin/datainventory.pl?idnum=1067&display=full&title=Toronto+Clutter+Data
Marcel
used or thought about for an extended period of time. I was thinking
that it might be a good idea to do resource of the week posting on the
blog and through an email message when I or anyone else in the MDL finds
such a resource.
This week's resource of the week is Toronto Clutter Data purchased
through RMSI.com last year.
cover classes:
Clutter Classification :
0 Unclassified1 Inland Water
2 Open
3 Low Tree Density
4 High Tree Density
5 Rural areas/low residential
6 Suburban
7 Suburban With Tree
8 Urban Low Density
9 Urban Medium Dense
10 Urban High Dense
11 Skyscrapers/ High-rise
12 Industrial Area/ Commercial areas
13 Airstrip
14 River
15 Coast
Consider mentioning this resource to a number of our Landscape architecture
library patrons. The data can be found here:
http://maps.library.utoronto.ca/cgi-bin/datainventory.pl?idnum=1067&display=full&title=Toronto+Clutter+Data
Marcel
Friday, August 5, 2011
The Map as a Historically Specific Object
Maps are historically specific in all their aspects. An excellent example of this is a roadmap of West Germany that I came across this morning whilst cataloguing. The Michelin Allemagne Ouest map, printed in 1944, depicts highways and roads. Like other Michelin maps, it was intended for commercial use. Interestingly, the map not only depicts highways that existed at the time, but also roads that were under construction.
This 67-year-old Michelin map, whose paper is not only darkened from the passage of time, but also from a few coffee or tea stains, is fascinating in its own right. However, the biggest surprise happened when I turned it over.
On the other side of the Michelin map I found a German topographic map of the Scottish islands Yell and Unst from 1941. It was printed for use by the German army (on it you can read the words “Nur fur den Dienstgebrauch,” which can be translated as “only for official use”). Most distinctly visible, however, is a red cross that spans over the entire map.
We can only speculate as to why two completely different maps are printed on one single sheet of paper; why one of them is in French, the other in German, and why one of them has a big red cross over it. What most likely occurred, however, is that the German map from 1941 was seized by the French and reused to print the commercial Michelin map a few years later. Paper during the War was a scarce commodity. And getting a hold of paper that could be used for map printing was even more difficult. It is for these reasons that every now and again we come across one of these unique historical gems of cartography.
Janina Mueller
Janina Mueller
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