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Old Photographs, Recognition, Handwriting Deciphering => Handwriting Deciphering & Recognition => Topic started by: Isabel H on Saturday 12 November 11 17:05 GMT (UK)
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This is one of two photos of a house at 1148 Dufferin St, Toronto. I think it may have been taken around 1910. The message on the back, addressed to my grandfather, reads "This is a view of our house & 2 Scotch friends on the verandah."
I am wondering if the people may be cousins of his, who lived in Canada, but I do not know their names (only that their surname may have been White).
Can anyone suggest how I might identify them?
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Hi
Have you considered contacting the Toronto archives and asking if they can help with providing the details relating to this address? - if their surname was indeed White then this will make things a little easier.
http://www.toronto.ca/archives/reference.htm
I did have a quick look on the Canadian 1911 census but I was unable to search by address alone and even with the surname 'White' it retuned many thousands of options :o Dufferin Street appears to be found in Ward 6 however, if this helps.
If you can trace your Grandfathers cousins (ie their exact names - I am assuming that they were born in the UK and that your Grandfather was UK born??) you may be able to find them on passenger lists and this will help to confirm if they were indeed named White. That will also give you a date of birth to search more specifically on. The lists may also give an onwards address, which may well match the one on the back of your postcard. There appears to be quite a mix of origins living in the area (e.g. Irish, English and Scottish, or 'Scotch' , as they put it) so worth doing a little more investigative work here if you can. The Scottish friends could well be neighbours but until you identify the cousins it could be an even trickier business identifying them!!
The dress certainly leans towards an Edwardian-ish time frame. Looking at the chap on the left, he almost looks as though he is wearing a'20's style cardigan and I think I can see the moustached chap on the right with some spats on his shoes, which were certainly in vogue between 1910-1930's. Overall, I sense late 1910's, but could be wrong as I am not an expert on this!!
PM me if you need any help with this and I will try to help where I can.
Best wishes
Flosse
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Hi Flosse,
Thank you for giving me some ideas to be going on with. I'm probably on a wild goose chase here, but it's worth a try.
Isabel
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Hi,
There are a few Toronto City directories online.
http://www.rootschat.com/links/0h3h/
The first part of each directory is organized by street address. I had a look and that address didn't exist (house wasn't built) until the 1913 directory. In that year, the two halves of the duplex - 1148 and 1150 Dufferin - were vacant. Unfortunately, the 1914 directory isn't online. The next directory that is available online is from 1921 and the occupant of the house at 1148 Dufferin is Francis C. Rainey. Does this name ring a bell?
If this is your family, then mystery solved. If not, you can contact the Toronto Public Library. They have the complete set of Toronto City Directories. They have an "Ask a Librarian" feature, so you can request a look up and they can tell you who was at that address. They won't check 20 years worth of directories, but if you ask them to look in a couple of years between 1914 and 1920, they will.
http://www.torontopubliclibrary.ca/ask-a-librarian/
If for some reason, they can't help - I can check for you the next time I am near the downtown Reference branch of the library (where all the directories are kept). It won't be for a couple of weeks though. Just let me know ....
The 1911 Canadian census can't help you - because that address didn't exist in 1911. When the 1921 census comes out, it will likely show the Raineys at that address. Directories are the way to go... :)
RK
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Thank you, RunKitty, it's kind of you to offer to check. :) I had found the directories online, but for some reason couldn't download/open them. However I e-mailed Toronto Archives and got a very helpful reply.
The house was occupied by a James Davidson in 1913-14, and from 1915-17 by an Alexandra Murray, then Thomas Sutton in 1918. None of them seem to have stayed there long! I haven't found any of those surnames connected to my family, nor Rainey - so the people in the photo may just have been acquaintances. I think I'll put this line of enquiry aside for the time being.
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The houses still stand! Use Google Maps and type in 1148 Dufferin Street Toronto, and hey presto, the houses are next door to a coin operated laundry. I like to have then & now images where it is possible to get them, for the family photo archive.
Philip
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The houses still stand! Use Google Maps and type in 1148 Dufferin Street Toronto, and hey presto, the houses are next door to a coin operated laundry. I like to have then & now images where it is possible to get them, for the family photo archive.
Here http://tinyurl.com/crhdrjd
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Thank you, Phodgetts and Geoff-E.
It's fascinating to compare how places used to look with how they are now.
Isabel
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Hello!
This is quite amazing! Have been looking for 1148 Dufferin St, but my relatives lived there in the 40s/50s, maybe even earlier (James Foster WILLIAMSON, died 1954) He was from Sunderland, England, maybe there was a connection to the Whites? Maybe his wife's family GOOD rings a bell (from Norfolk, England)?
Regards,
Chris
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Hi Chris
You're right, it is amazing the way one person's odd bit of information turns out to be what someone else was looking for!
I learned from Toronto City Archives that the house was built in 1912, which puts the pictures later than my guess of 1910.
The Archives supplied a list of occupants up to 1918, and I've since looked at online street directories up to 1921 without encountering any familiar names. It's quite possible that the people in the photo are just friends of my grandfather and not related at all.
If it turned out to have been taken late enough to be your relatives, then the fact James was from Sunderland would make me pretty sure that they were people my grandfather, Robert Gray, an engineering foreman, knew when he worked in Stockton on Tees and/or Darlington. He moved back to Scotland about 1910.
The two photos are very similar. I've put them in Dropbox if you would like to download copies.
https://dl.dropbox.com/u/5168710/Toronto-House-1.jpg
https://dl.dropbox.com/u/5168710/Toronto-house-2.jpg
Isabel
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Thanks Isabel,
James Williamson was a shipyard driller in Sunderland before he left for Ingersoll/Canada 1923, just not sure yet when he actually lived in Toronto 1148 Dufferin St
BTW: Rainey still lived at 1148 Duff in 1922
Chris
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I am surprised by the assertion that the house is new.
You would not normally build a house that close to a tree, without cutting the tree down.
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We wouldn't, but I've been told by Canadians that they value trees around their houses, for shade in the heat of summer. To them, our preference for full sun seems strange. You can see in the photo that some of the branches have been cut off the tree.