Gasoline stations back in the day

From Pictorial Brighton 1859-1984.  (Brighton Anniversary Book Committee, 1984).  Note the British spelling of "gasolene" in the top photo.  Now in Canada we used the American spelling (just like we do for "vise"!)

Esico Luger

Doesn't look much like a Luger to me!

From an old pasteboard box for an Esico soldering iron .  Below, more stuff from the box:

The Electric Soldering Iron Company had its beginnings in 1928. It's still around, now as Esico-Triton International, and still headquartered in Deep River, Connecticut.  There are not many American tool firms left that can boast such longevity and loyalty to one location.

Railway Bridge collapse at Batavia Ohio, 1884

Robert Reed; Train Wrecks; Bonanza Books. 1968

Oct 17 1884 or July 1889?

Princes' Gate At the Canadian Exhibition

Fredrick H. Armstrong, Toronto: The Place of Meeting; Windsor Pub. 1983

The Princes' gates was opened in 1927 as a celebration of the Golden Jubilee of Canadian Confederation. Picture taken in 1931. The Electrical Building in the background was built in 1928 and demolished in 1972, replaced by the Direct Energy Building in 1997.

The arch is looking just as impressive more than eighty years later, still serving as the eastern entrance to the CNE.
 Pictures taken in 2010 during restoration work.

One of my vices is vises: The Littlestown Hardware & Foundry Company, Littlestown, Pennsylvania

Above, a handy little vice on my woodworking bench.  Below, a large C-clamp made by the same firm:

The Littlestown Hardware and Foundry Company was founded in 1916 by Luther D. and Emory H. Snyder in, well, Littlestown, Pennsylvania.  Happily, they're still around and according to their website, they used to make bench vises, hammers, bookends, fire place tools, doorstops and other castings.  During World War II, they contributed to the war effort through the production of hand and rifle grenades, bomb plugs and anti-personnel mines. They moved into the casting of aluminum in 1939.  They're now known as Littlestown Foundry, Inc., and also as Littco, and they produce commercial aluminum castings.  Sadly, vises are no longer included in their product line.  Their website has a history section with some videos that include the vise production story

Open Air Kindergarten, 1929

The Canadian Educator for Home and School Use, Volume 3.  Toronto:  The Iroquois Press, 1929.

Somehow, it looks like the kids should all have brandy snifters and cigars.  "Young war leaders plan for the future opening of the second front."

Nigel Birkett Suzuki

A far cry from the Suzuki RL250, Suzuki's consumer trials offering.

Horse-drawn bread wagon

Pictorial Brighton 1859-1984.  Brighton Anniversary Book Committee, 1984.

My father tells me that bread used to be delivered by horse and wagon in Toronto when he was growing up.  He and his siblings used to fight over the end crusts.  One day, tired of their bickering, my grandmother snapped, "Why would anyone want the end crusts?  That's what the delivery man touches after handling the horse!"  She didn't think this one out.  After that, none of her kids would go near the end crusts.

Minsk Auto Works Tip-Up Lorry

Nikolai Mikhailov.  Discovering the Soviet Union.  Moscow:  Progress Publishers, 1965.

Yes, thought Uri, it was a pig on gas, but the seller had convinced him that there was plenty of room for his camping gear and it certainly commanded respect from other drivers on the road.

We used to make things in this country. #172: The Compact Ladder Company, Toronto, Ontario

I was recently forced to scrap an old wooden extension ladder due to age and deterioration. Despite the fact that I had stepped through a rotten rung or two, there was nothing wrong with the shapely cast steel mechanisms. I couldn't throw them out so now need to find a new use for them.   Cast into them was "Compact Ladder Co."

According to his obituary, Thomas Alfred Dalton founded the company back in the late 1950's, and operated it until his retirement.  Born in Middlesex, England, he had quite a varied career before starting this company.

As the ads below show, making wooden ladders was once quite an enterprise.  You had to know about the qualities of various woods, and which ones would shrink less so rungs wouldn't pull out of the sides.  Still, old wooden ladders are best used as decoration today--their safety does not improve with age.

Sell's National Directory of Large Commercial Houses and Buyers' Guide.  London:  Business Dictionaries Ltd., 1920.

J.H. Ashdown Hardware Company Limited.  Winnipeg, Manitoba.  1953 Catalogue.