I've been negative on the subject of Manitoba heritage lately but Brandon, of all places, has come through with a couple of wins in recent days.
First off, they have increased their online heritage presence exponentially with the Heritage Brandon website. It's still a work in progress but already an impressive index of heritage resources in the city.
The second bit of good news is that Brandon's CPR station, ca. 1912, has a new lease on life after sitting empty for a number of years.Westman Immigrant Services will be leasing the space which will allow the owner John Hooker (also the owner the now collapsed block just up the road) to renovate it. (See Brandon Sun and eBrandon.ca).
I thought I would take a look back at the building. One of just a few examples of Brandon's grand architectural past that has survived ....
Brandon faced a period of explosive growth as the railway opened up the Canadian West.
Between 1900 and 1914 the city’s population grew from 5,620 to 13,839. The assessed value of buildings went from $9.4 m in 1909 to $11.6 m in 1912, a 23% increase.The Financial Post reported that 1911 would be Brandon's best year ever for new construction. Year on year between 1910 and 1911 the value of permits was up by 192%.
By 1910 Canada’s four major railways, Canadian Pacific; Canadian National, Grand Trunk Pacific and Canadian Northern already had a presence in and around the city. The 27 spur and branch lines running through the vicinity carried 348 passenger and 478 general trains every week.
Above: Prince Edward Hotel and CN Depot (source: Tribune)
Above: Manitoba Free Press, May 18 1912
Rail infrastructure built just a few years earlier was bursting at the seams and desperately needed expansion. CN was first out of the gate in 1910 with a $500k project, (about $10m in 2011 dollars), that included a new depot and the seven storey Prince Edward Hotel on 9th Street.
In July 1911 the CPR followed with a more modest $60,000 contract for its new passenger depot. It would be located beside the existing one at the foot of 10th Street.
Source: Brandon Daily Sun. (Above: Feb 17, 1911. Below: May 21 1906)
The firm that built the depot was the Brandon Construction Company. Under General Manager T. M. Harrington it was one of the premiere building firms in the city at the time. Their first large project was the Christie Block and from 1900 – 1911 were responsible for construction of the McKenzie Block, Brandon's Courthouse, the 'Victoria Avenue Methodist Church' and the Asylum Powerhouse. They also worked further west, credited with building the Presbyterian Church in Swift Current SK.
Top: CP Depot, 10th and Pacific (ca. unknown). Source: Peel
The Winnipeg Toilers basketball team was a powerhouse, winning the provincial basketball title 13 times and becoming the first Manitoba team to win the Dominion championship, which they did in 1926, 1927 and 1932.
The 1933 season promised to be a good one. On March 25 they again captured the provincial title and had their sights set on nationals in April. In the meantime, they had some international business to attend to.
Winnipeg Free Press, March 24, 1933
They were invited to play a best-of-five series against the American amateur champs, Tulsa Oklahoma's Diamond Oilmen, in a Canada vs. USA showdown. The Toilers had played U.S. teams before but only as friendlies or regional tournaments. This series was sanctioned by the national amateur basketball associations of each country.
Less than 48 hours after winning the provincial crown they were on a train to Minneapolis where a plane would take them on to Tulsa for the first two games of the series. The final games would take place in Winnipeg in April.
Winnipeg Free Press, March 29, 1933
The fact that they were taking a plane to the games was a sign of how big a deal the tournament it was. The cost of the trip was sponsored by Saskatchewan native R. H. Bonynge who went on to a pro basketball career in the U.S.. J. H. O'Brien of Minneapolis, head of the Mid Continent Petroleum Corporation, provided the company's plane. Both men accompanied the team. When they landed in Tulsa, the team received a telegram from prime Minister R. B. Bennett wishing them luck. Newspapers from across Canada and the U.S, including the New York Times, provided coverage. Dr. James Naismith, the man who invented the rules of basketball, visited the team before the first game.
Winnipeg Free Press, March 31, 1933
The Toilers lost the first game on March 29 by a score of 32 -13 and the second one the following night 41-19. Their recent grueling schedule, use of American rules and a capacity crowd of 2,000 Oilers fans were considered factors in their poor performance. The team was invited to stay late the next day and be guests of honour at a luncheon hosted by the Tulsa Chamber of Commerce. Tired and anxious to get back to their families and day jobs, they declined and made plans to leave early in the morning of Friday, March 31, 1933.
The weather was poor that morning with heavy rain and gusting winds. The ten members of the Toilers were joined by the two pilots plus Bonynge and O'Brein for the return trip to Winnipeg.
Shortly after takeoff, the engine over the left wing of the Ford 4-AT-B Tri-Motor began sputtering then cut out. The pilot warned passengers that he had to land and was presumably trying to make it to Neodesha Municipal Airport. Flying low over a farmer's field suddenly nose dived into the ground.
Eyewitnesses in Neodesha (Nee-o-desh-ay') Kansas, just 90 miles north of Tulsa, could hear the troubled plane overhead and see the plume of smoke when it crashed. The first rescuers described a grizzly scene of a mass twisted bodies crammed into the forward section of the plane. An excavator was required to remove the bodies of the pilots. (To read more coverage of the crash.)
Winnipeg Free Press, April 1, 1933
The dead included all four non-team members: pilot Alvie Hakes of Windom, Minnesota; co-pilot H. E. Eggens of Hendricks, Minnesota; trip sponsor Bonynge and the plane's owner J. H. O'Brien of Minneapolis.
As for the Toilers:
The dead:
Mike Shea Jr., 26, was a three-year veteran of the team. He was in his final year at the U of M to become a chartered accountant. He lived with his father, a former Free Press sports editor) on Wharton Road and is buried in St. Mary's Cemetery.
Joe Dodds, 21, was the high scorer in the 1932 national championship series. He worked for Monarch Life Insurance Company and was the older brother of Bruce, also a member of the team. He is buried in Carlyle, Saskatchewan.
Critically injured:
Ian Wooley, 28, played both guard and centre. He was a five-year veteran of the team and lived on Lyndale Drive.
Andy Brown, 25, was the alternate centre. He was single and lived on Langside Street.
Seriously injured:
Al Silverthorne, 28, played guard and was captain of the team. A Kelvin grad, he worked for the Western Grain Company and was married with 2 children.
George Wilson, 37, was a one-time star of the team who retired in 1930 to become a coach and manager. His day job was President and Managing Director of Wilson Furniture Ltd. on Main Street. He was married with three children.
Hugh Penwarden, 22, was the smallest and fastest member of the team. An all round athlete, he was also a celebrated track, rugby and lacrosse player.
Minor injuries:
A. C. "Colonel" Samson, 44, was the club president. He was manager of the press room at the Winnipeg Tribune.
Bruce Dodds, 18, was the youngest member of the team and brother of Joe.
Lauder Philips, 22, played forward.
Below: Winnipeg Free Press, April 1, 1933
On the morning of April 5, 1933 the bodies of Dodds and Shea lay in state in the Winnipeg Auditorium. Thousands of Winnipeggers filed past the flower draped coffins. Members of the Toilers' youth teams took turns standing as a guard of honour.
Within a week after the crash Phillips, Bruce Dodds, Penwarden and Samson were cleared to return to Winnipeg. On April 15 Wilson, Brown and Wooley were released and traveled home together. Silverthorne, the remaining victim, was set to leave in the last week of April but contracted pneumonia which delayed his return until May.
A benefit fund was created for the survivors and families of the deceased. Numerous sports events, from bridge tournaments to hockey games, donated proceeds from their gate to the fund. Charity games were played as far away as Vancouver.
In May 1933 UMSU voted to create the Mike Shea Jr. memorial Trophy to be awarded to the junior basketball champions of Manitoba. It appears to have been awarded into the 1950s.
- The Toilers were an established sports organization, its roots dating back to 1910. They carried on operations, fielding three teams for the 1933-34 season. The senior team was good but a shadow of its former self. None of the 1932 players appear to have returned.
- The official cause of the crash was a "crash upon landing" in bad weather. This goes against the eyewitness and survivors' accounts that an engine had cut out. A TIME article notes that one of the pilots had complained about a couple of engine cylinders cutting out on the flight to Tulsa.
- In 2004 a Topeka (Kansas) Capital-Journal columnist wrote: 'Seventy-one years later, the crash of the Canadian basketball team remains relatively unknown. Except to those who were there'.
- Coincidentally, the crash happened two years to the day - almost to the hour - that sports legend Knute Rockne died in a plane crash just 75 miles away.
- Toiler Andy Brown had never been on a plane before. He expressed to co-workers that he had a bad feeling about the trip. He doodled for them fake newspaper headlines such as "Toilers Plane Crashes, Players are Killed" and half-jokingly offered individuals his office ash tray and fountain pen should he not survive. - On June 16 1933 the Toilers' organization sent a large thank-you card to the people of Neodesha. It was signed by all members of the club, including surviving players and their families. It read:
"We, the relatives, friends and comrades in sports of the Winnipeg Toiler Basketball team members, do hereby extent to you, the citizens of Neodesha, our sincerest thanks, with added thanks to your mayor, the Rotary Club, and those individuals who did all that was possible to relieve the sorrow and pain of we Canadians on the loss and sufferings of our loved ones on and after the terrible catastrophe that occurred near your town at 8:30 a.m., March 31, 1933"
The Bell Hotel doesn't look different from the front but from the back work is ongoing. The latest thing are new windows all around.
On the other side of the subway at Euclid, the former California Fruit Market is being transformed into the new, larger home of Neechi Foods. (Imagine if all the brick buildings along that strip lost their awful paint jobs !)
While I haven't been a fan of every project, as a grouping it's certainly the most development seen on Main Street in a few decades. Importantly, they are bringing more services and retail opportunities to a long neglected area.
Might as well have a bit of fun with it and check out what your MP has been up to for the past couple of years. Who knows, you may find a kindred spirit !
There are a number of websites that you can use and these aren't your Daddy's text-only, micro print, basic search engine, 'cross-reference it yourself' models. They are quite easy and enjoyable (relatively speaking) to use.
The three sites that I have used at some point in the recent past are all variations of the same thing. They provide voting records, lists of bills, speeches and statements in the House etc. with built in links to drill deeper (right back to Hansard, if you want). Each has their own little nuances, though.
How'd they vote includes a handy MP ranking table for each session based on how many times they've been up in the House, how much they've said, Bills they've introduced and how many votes they missed.
It's a bit more text heavy and easier, I found, to get stats and vote counts.
Open Parl has a great search engine and a nice feature of colour coding items and including photo icons of each MP next to their name.
It probably doesn't sound like much but if you're reading through a long-winded debate with multiple speakers they are nice to have.
On an MP's main page they also include media mentions and twitter posts.
Citizen Factory(by Apathy is Boring) is aimed at youth. It includes not only MPs but Senators as well. They also split things in Committees which is great because that's where a lot of the real work gets done and where some MPs who don't get a lot of floor time can really shine.
A great feature they have is a sidebar glossary of parliamentary terms so, while reading a debate, you can check out what the procedural term mentioned actually means.
I enjoy doing my little history posts, especially ones dealing with families. Most of the time the families already know 'the ending' and I am just filling in the gaps. (In the case of William Harvey it included posting an obit for a man who never had one).
One of the people killed in the fire was Patrick Timmins. He came to Winnipeg, (I now know it was from South Dakota), enlisted with the 78th Battalion (Winnipeg Grenadiers) and went overseas. After being injured in the war he returned to Winnipeg and was a lodger at the Riverview Hotel. On the night of the fire he escaped but ran back in to try and save lives. He never came out again.
Excerpt from Manitoba Free Press Feb 6, 1918
The story of his actions touched the community so much that, despite his being discharged, the 78th gave him a full military funeral and a couple of Returned Veterans' charities picked up the tab. He lies in St. Mary's Roman Catholic Cemetery in Winnipeg.
Timmins' headstone at St. Mary's R.C. Cemetery (photo is (c) A. Riezebos - source)
It turns out that there a modern day twist to the Patrick Timmins' story.
Ruth Zaryski Jackson, a relative of Lena Huckan, tracked down a relative of Timmins on a genealogical site. That relative, after speaking to Timmins' 85 year-old grand niece, said that they never knew what happened to him until that email message !
The relative wrote that he wasn't spoken about much due to the sadness of losing him and not knowing what happened. "The family assumption was that he must have died in action. Mom doesn't even know his name. The story of his death is closure - 90 years in the making."
Since that time the search is on for better photos, his war papers and other articles that we can find. Timmons' grand niece wants to come to Winnipeg visit the grave site while she still can.
So, it seems, there's a part 5 to the Elmwood's Riverview Hotel series is in the making !
It was a frank discussion about the state of U.S. cities and the problems that they as administrators have faced in the past few years trying to keep the wheels on.
The topics ranged from taxation policy, retired workers, attracting immigrants and foreign students, crime and federal funding mechanisms.The panel was quite candid about what they got right and, in some cases, got wrong during the downturn. An interesting insight into not only the problems of these mega-metropolises but how they've had to do a lot of retooling in order to survive.
They also spoke about where they are going. What they and other American cities need to do not just to rebound but to ensure their success in the decades ahead. As one mayor put it: the reason people want to live in cities is innovation. If any of their cities stop being innovators, whether it be in economic opportunities, providing improved infrastructure or civic services, there are plenty of others who will step in and woo the best and brightest from them.
A side note: the (just) slightly lesser panel of Winnipeg Internet Pundits takes to the airwaves at 5 pm to chat about freeways, Shoppers Drug Mart's expansion, the Avenue Building and CentrePort.
I was sad to hear about the stabbing death of Abdul Rahim Mah Jemei last week.
I've known his mother for a couple of years. The family came to Canada five or six years ago. Originally from Eritrea, they came via Sudan as refugees. Fleeing a couple of war-torn countries to seek out a better life for their children.
Sadly one of their children, 22 year-old Jamei, was stabbed to death beside the Y on Vaughan Street last Wednesday. Police think it was an unprovoked attack and the teen suspect they have in custody is apparently known to them.
In a Free Press article about how the African community has come together to support the family Lambros Kyriakakos, president of the Eritrean Community in Winnipeg, said that 'homicide highlights the vulnerability of youth who are newcomers to Canada'.
Very true.
And this brings me to an aside ...
I don't know all the details of the stabbing so I don't direct this towards Jamai or his family's situation but something I have wondered about is how we have used immigrant and refugee housing as a way to get people living in areas that most Winnipeggers wouldn't.
Sometimes it's the bleak-ish, old semi industrial parts of the core like (like IRCOM House on Ellen). sometimes it's places like Central Park, home to a lot of Canadian born and bred gangs and criminal activity. The mainly African influx has began turning that neighbourhood around but for many years things were rough and as a result came African-based youth gangs. We live with the legacy of the assumption that an African youth in the Central Park area simply must have some sort of gang involvement which, of course, is not true.
The latest announcement of a refugee and immigrant housing complex is for 271 - 273 Princess, the 'Peace Tower', that will be built a couple of blocks from the core's triangle of homeless shelters.
It is a great way to get people settled. The land is cheap and you don't have to worry about a fuss from the neighbours. Still, perhaps it would be nice to mix things up a bit and put housing in different areas of the city rather than dropping refugees into the worst that the city has to offer and expect them to deal with what most of us can't.
Related: The Housing Circumstances of Recently Arrived Refugees: The Winnipeg Experience (PDF) This report describes a two year study of recently arrived refugees in the city of Winnipeg, and discusses their significant housing challenges. The research findings highlight the changes in circumstances that occurred over the two year study period. The report was written by researchers at the University of Winnipeg and released by Prairie Metropolis Centre at the University of Alberta.
Just four weeks later Heritage Voices, the final report from a year long study into the state of heritage conservation in the city of Toronto, was released. Strikingly similar issues to Winnipeg: demolition by neglect, bureaucratic malaise, a lack of any solid policies on how to deal with the issue. Hume sums them up well here.
The report makes a wide-ranging series of recommendations and policy changes. Something I will visit in a future post. (Also see Heritage report paints a bleak picture Toronto Star (Hume)
More online features.
The Globe and Mail had a neat story on how a now-abandoned mining town has been brought back to life thanks to a web page.
The Vancouver Archives now has a blog page that is out to preserve Vancouver's digital heritage. Some great image and video footage has been newly added. This is on top of their pretty nice regular webpage. For more on the story see this City Caucus post and if you have an interest in Van history also check out Past Tense)
The Alberta Advantage.
Yet another example of how Alberta is becoming the best place to go to check out Winnipeg local history.... I was interested in looking up something about the GWG building. Of course, the Royal Alberta Muesum was the place that had information on it !
And finally ....
Built Heritage News continues to be a great place to find urban heritage related articles.
Silver City is continuing on their classic movie series. This weekend is the original Wizard of Oz !
I've had great response to my Elmwood's Inferno series and particularly the Life and Death of Lena Huckan. Starting later this week I will start another, shorter, series on Blake Latta and the Canadian National Express. The Deanna Durbin series will come in early April.
For the third (?) time now the New York Times has announced that it is disappearing behind a subscription wall. I wonder how long it will take for others to follow ?
This morning I got the following notice that they're testing it out on Canadians before launching it worldwide !
Dear New York Times Reader,
Today marks a significant transition for The New York Times as we introduce digital subscriptions. It’s an important step that we hope you will see as an investment in The Times, one that will strengthen our ability to provide high-quality journalism to readers around the world and on any platform. The change will primarily affect those who are heavy consumers of the content on our Web site and on mobile applications....
Thanks to the success of 'apps', which have shown that people will pay for online content as long as it is called something other than a subscription, a new era of paid online content is coming very soon.
What's innovative about the Times' new approach is that there are three different packages you can choose from versus past attempts when, if I recall correctly, you had be a paid up subscriber at the dead-tree subscription rate to get online access (this was in pre-App days).
- All Access (NYTimes.com and both Apps): $35/ mo.
Oh, and if you want the the paper version ? It's $23.40/ mo delivered in New York and $29.60 delivered in other major U.S. centres (L.A. and Minneapolis, for instance). You get the All Access with that.
It won't be a complete subscription wall. As the notice sent today states:
Readers who come to Times articles through links from search, blogs and social media like Facebook and Twitter will be able to read those articles, even if they have reached their monthly reading limit. For some search engines, users will have a daily limit of free links to Times articles.
The home page at NYTimes.com and all section fronts will remain free to browse for all users at all times.
Closer to home, the Free Press already advertises different price points. The online version is $12.50/mo and paper-version (delivered) is $23.96/ mo ($26.95 outside of city). Of course with little content behind a subscription wall subscribing online is a bit moot but presumably the day will come ....
What seems a bit counter intuitive is that with many titles, The Walrus and Winnipeg-produced Canada's History (formerly The Beaver, snicker, snicker) for example, the subscription price of $29.95 per year is the same for either the paper or e-zine version.
Others do differentiate between the two. For instance (annual rates):
- Toronto Life: $24.95 in paper; $15.95 for the e-zine.
- The Hockey News $52.95 in paper; $39.95 for the e-zine.
- Reader's Digest Canada (which is Canada's top selling mag) is $24.95 and $20.00. For an international magazine like Esquire, paper subscriptions via Rogers are $13.75 and the e-zine through zinio is $8.
Muppet Theatre is slated for demolition. No, not by 'Crazy Harry' or the equally dangerous 'building owner who lets their property fall to pieces out of neglect'. Instead, it's oil speculators who want to purchase and demolish it in order to drill for a newly found oil deposit in downtown L.A.. (No word if Scooter's uncle is still the owner of the theatre).
The troupe must rally to fundraise the $10m necessary to save it from the wreckers ball.
A look at Muppet Theatre ...
The theatre in question is the circa 1911 Los Angeles Theatre. It was the most expensive theatre on a per-seat basis built in the city at the time. The almost palatial interior put it in the top tier of Hollywood venues for a number of decades.
As L.A.'s downtown began to decline in the 1960s so did the fortunes of the Los Angeles Theatre. It fell into disrepair and eventually closed (of course, that's when The Muppets began using it).
The house has been well maintained. It retains many of the original features such as loges (well, at least one) and orchestra pit. Decorative touches such as velvet curtains and the original plaster work give a sense of the luxury that it was famous for.
Despite the lavish productions put on by The Muppets over the years, the footprint of the stage is surprisingly small. This is likely due to the size of the performers and the stagehands - some of whom are rats - that must work it.The scale, though, gives the audience an intimate setting rare in a theatre.
Back stage the signs of age can be seen.
The original wood interior shows sign of wear and aging infrastructure such as electrical (see over Miss Piggy's shoulder) is in evidence.
The Muppets need to raise $10m for the purchase of the theatre.
