Ontario

Local author Dennis Rizzo tells the fascinating and diverse history of Orillia, Ontario. First populated by the Huron, Iroquois and Chippewa Nations, Orillia is now a well-loved, year-round recreation destination. Its history is deeply tied to its water. Situated in the narrows where Lake Simcoe flows into Lake Couchiching, Orillia was a gathering place for centuries before Europeans used it to bring furs to market. Sir John Simcoe, first governor of Upper Canada, fostered permanent settlement of the area. A gateway to the Muskoka region, it has been home to lumber, manufacturing, and artistic endeavours. Today, summer cottagers and winter athletes alike enjoy the Sunshine City and its more than twenty annual festivals. Local author Dennis Rizzo tells the fascinating and diverse history of Orillia, Ontario.

On May 16, 1853, the first passenger train steamed out of Toronto from a wooden depot that was located near the site of today's Union Station. Over the next century, the railways had a profound impact on the geography and economic fortunes of Toronto and helped transform it from a provincial town into the commercial centre of Canada. To the dismay of many, the railways also swallowed up prime real estate on Toronto's waterfront and isolated its citizens from Lake Ontario, the city's most scenic asset. The struggle between the promoters of unfettered railway development and crusaders for public access to the waterfront culminated during the 1920s with the building of the waterfront railway viaduct and Union Station. This magnificent Beaux-Arts railway terminal is the busiest transportation hub in Canada and is undergoing a $1.5 billion revitalization. Inside this book are over 200 rare images illustrating 80 years of Toronto's railway history.

In 1901, Florence McCrea married into one of the most prosperous families in the Dominion of Canada, becoming Lady Eaton fourteen years later when her husband, John Craig Eaton, was knighted. Not long after the death of her husband, Lady Eaton retired from her home in Toronto to the seventy-two-room, Norman-style chateau she had built on their King City property. She named it Eaton Hall. The estate fueled the local economy and community, supported the Canadian World War II effort and established a firm place in the hearts and minds of the residents of King Township. Rediscover an enchanting and bygone age with the life and history of Lady Eaton and her grand Eaton Hall.

The history, heritage, and architectural significance of Toronto's most notable theatres and movie houses. Movie houses first started popping up around Toronto in the 1910s and '20s, in an era without television and before radio had permeated every household. Dozens of these grand structures were built and soon became an important part of the cultural and architectural fabric of the city. A century later the surviving, defunct, and reinvented movie houses of Toronto's past are filled with captivating stories. Explore fifty historic Toronto movie houses and theaters, and discover their roles as repositories of memories for a city that continues to grow its cinema legacy. Features stunning historic photography.

In 1783, Peter Clinch arrived at the mouth of the Magaguadavic River and, finding he could not navigate the forty-foot falls, climbed up the cliffs of the Fundy shoreline. On the intervale above, he founded the town of St. George. The falls were to play a significant role in the development of the area, driving mills first for the granite works and later for the pulp mill that became the economic mainstay of the town. The stunning photographs in St. George and Its Neighbours tell the story of how the town of St. George was built, how it developed, and how it survived various calamities like fires, industry closure, and highway realignment. This
spectacular collection of images, which date from as early as 1890, focuses on the people of St. George and the surrounding communities and includes where
they worshipped, worked, relaxed, fished, and farmed. Major storms, spring freshets, ball games, and crowds listening to the local brass band make up a sampling of the events covered in this lively book. Glimpses of picture-perfect fishing villages, smart resorts with turreted hotels, Fundy's lonely clam flats, winding hiking trails, and sandy beaches make clear why the surrounding areas were considered for the province's first national park in the 1940s.