Heritage: The Last Walk of the Year

Heritage Toronto's final walk of the year, through the Beaches (or Beach) neighbourhood, started at the Beaches Library on 4-October-2009

TORONTO, ONTARIO - All good things must come to an end, and the series of more than fifty walks this spring, summer, and autumn put on many weekends by Heritage Toronto ended this past weekend. The final walk of the year was through the Beach or Beaches neighbourhood on Sunday, 4-October-2009, led by librarian and local resident Barbara Myrvold.


The Beaches Exchange, now an apartment building, had once been the main telephone exchange for the Bell Telephone Company, viewed on 4-October-2009

Perhaps the most contentious issue in the neighbourhood is its name. Originally, it was the Beaches, as the three communities of Balmy Beach, Kew Beach, and Woodbine Beach (later, there was Scarboro Beach) were separated and distinct. Later, after the public beach area was unified with the Eastern Beaches Park in 1932, there was a concerted effort to codify the unity by calling the area the Beach, but both names remain in use to this day. Even an apartment building that was once a telephone exchange has changed names back and forth between the Beaches Exchange and the Beach Exchange. As it is an older name, I'll prefer the Beaches name for the remainder of this posting about a heritage walk.

Of course, "The Beach" matched the local practice of considering local locations by a singular "the" name as if there were no others in the world. "The Boardwalk," "The Club" (for the Balmy Beach Club), "The Cottage" (for the Kew Williams House), and "The Goof" (for a local restaurant) were just a few of the examples pointed out.


A style of multiplex essentially unique to the Beaches in Toronto was demonstrated by 52-54 Glen Manor Drive on 4-October-2009

Besides the presence of a beach not separated from the neighbourhood by a large thoroughfare or railroad tracks, the Beaches has a unique feel within Toronto because of some distinctive architecture. There are a preponderance of two-story row houses with columns in front and covered porches, a sight not often seen elsewhere in Toronto.


The Leuty lifesaving station was a symbol of the neighbourhood, constructed in 1920 and temporarily isolated by beach construction on 4-October-2009

Of course, the neighbourhood is called the Beaches for a reason, and much of the tour focused on the history along the Lake Ontario shore. Besides the establishment of the Eastern Beaches Park that really defined the shore line as one public space in 1932, the walk covered the Kew Beach Park Boat House, the Scarboro Beach Amusment Park, the Alfresco Lawn Houses, and the Boardwalk. The Boardwalk remains wood to this day (unlike a similar feature in the western beaches) largely because parents complained that a plastic test section woke up their children sleeping in strollers.


The Heritage Toronto walking season ended on 4-October-2009 as Barbara Myrvold wrapped up the Beaches walk at the W.D. Young Memorial Fountain, dedicated to a physician that did of influenza.

A well-planned event, the Beaches walk ended exactly on time in Kew Gardens. It's time to turn to other pursuits until the spring arrives with a new season of Heritage Toronto walks.