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 :

https://gencat4.eloquent-systems.com/webcat/systems/toronto.arch/resource/ser372/ss0058/s0372_ss0058_it1760.jpg

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.

click on image for closer view

From a 1914 Fire insurance plan, here is the site again.


click on image for closer view

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.



click on image for closer view

click on image for closer view

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".

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

Marcel Fortin
University of Toronto Map and Data Library

Library and Archives Canada Fire Insurance Plans/Atlases online

Access to and restrictions on the use of Fire Insurance Plans and Atlases limits our ability to conduct much historical research. These restrictions have been a constant concern and impediment for both librarians and researchers for years. A healthy knowledge of the issue is important when undertaking a Spatial History (read HGIS) project in Canada (the issue is very different in the United States). Fear of copyright infringement has led many libraries and archives to restrict and in some cases eliminate the duplication of all fire insurance plans by researchers. There is a great deal of confusion and misunderstanding on the issue, which accentuates the difficulties of accessing many fire insurance plans and atlases in collections across Canada.

CGI Environmental Services currently claims copyright on all fire insurance maps published by Charles E. Goad and all successor companies such as the Underwriters’ Survey Bureau and the Canadian Underwriters Association, regardless of date of publication. Under Canadian Copyright law, any map that is fifty years old and a day is considered to be outside of copyright protection. That is, only if no cartographer is named for the map in question. Charles E. Goad and successor companies are not considered the cartographers of fire insurance plans, but instead corporate authors. CGI and previous successor companies do not interpret the law in the same manner, and thus a stalemate existed for many years over what could and could not be done with these invaluable sources of historical information. In 1993, the Ontario Archives, Library and Archives Canada and CGI reached a compromise agreement according to which the two government institutions would enforce restrictions on reproducing maps less than ninety years old. As a result of this agreement, which was widely discussed and documented in the library and archives community at the time, many other institutions, including university libraries, implemented the same restrictions. Every so often the issue resurfaces in the community and new discussions revert back to this agreement and its particular compromise. Many institutions have openly questioned the agreement. In 2010, a municipal government in Québec, following an investigation by their lawyers, concluded that they were within the bounds of the law in allowing the duplication of any fire insurance plans older than fifty years.

Researchers interested in high resolution fire insurance plan and atlas images can now consult hundreds of reproductions on Library and Archives Canada web pages:
Description found in Archives - Search - Library and Archives Canada

Marcel Fortin

see also http://maplib.blogspot.com/2011/04/one-of-current-projects-at-map-and-data.html