The Real Toronto

Glorious 12th, Toronto, 1860s.

Growing up in Montreal and in one of the Irish pockets of Eastern Ontario, I always knew there was something off about Toronto. And there still is. On the one hand, it had no culture; it was hopelessly nouveau riche. As Gertrude Stein said of Oakland, “There is no there, there.” On the other, it had a puritanical and an anti-Catholic streak: “Toronto the Good,” “the Belfast of North America.” A city that still boasted a “Temperance Street.”

Both raps remain perfectly correct. “Multiculturalism,” now all the rage there, requires a tacit admission that there is no local mainstream culture. The original Presbyterian intolerance has been replaced by a new brand of self-righteousness, the intolerance of political correctness. Which is still anti-Catholic.

But as a vacation destination, Toronto can still be a fun place to be. A few trips ago, our family arrived in Hogtown straight from Paris, and after a few days, I at least held the opinion that the provincial capital was a better vacation than the world capital of culture. While there is, objectively, more to see in Paris, you must spend half your time in lines waiting to see it, and then only get to see it over other people's shoulders. Not to mention dealing with the Parisian tradition of contempt for outsiders and petty theft. Toronto has a down-home openness to it that makes it almost like a small town.

St. Lawrence Market

And that, perhaps, is the secret of Toronto. It is just a big, awkward, gangly small town. As a small town at heart, it goes terribly wrong when it tries to be grandiose. The CN Tower? Anyone can pile one stone on top of another. That's a child's idea of impressive. Casa Loma? The very definition of nouveau riche. Pellat, unremarkable for anything else, bankrupted himself building it. With the best accommodations reserved for the horses. Main Street? You want a Main Street? Toronto has the longest Main Street in the world. Jiminey, can even Paris top that?

On the other hand, if you approach Cochonville with the proper attitude of Canadian unpretentiousness, it works. Consider St. Lawrence Market. A simple farmer's market. But the oldest continuous farmer's market anywhere in North America, and, according to National Geographic, the “best” farmer's market in the world. It is. This is what Toronto does best, because it is, in the end, one giant market town, and there is nothing in the world wrong with being a giant market town. Toronto at its best stays in touch with ordinary life. As a result, more than in most big cities, ordinary life in Toronto tends to be worth living. Toronto is about the average guy. Fiddleheads in spring, blueberries in summer, salami in wintertime, all at an affordable price.

Wind Turbine, Toronto style.

Toronto has, by my count, three separate operational farms within the city limits, all publicly funded and open to the public. Can any other city of comparable size claim the same? There is the farm at Black Creek Pioneer Village near York University. There is Riverdale Farm downtown on the banks of the Don. And there is Far Enough Farm on Centre Island—for Toronto could not imagine a family amusement park without a petting farm. In addition, the small “zoo” in High Park, on the west side, is really a showcase for exotic farm animals: yaks, highland cattle, llamas, emus. This is the real Torontonian multiculturalism: farm animals from around the world. You have a little extra space, in Toronto, and the first thing you think of is putting in a pumpkin patch. What else did God make good land for?

And there is nothing so pleasant to do on a summer afternoon than to walk through Riverdale Farm and greet the animals.

There is yet another farm at the CNE, when it is in operation. The CNE, the Canadian National Exhibition, is, of course, the traditional end of every summer for anyone who grew up in Toronto. Nothing is more Toronto than the CNE, and the Princes' Gate at its entrance. At its heart, the CNE was and will always be a good old fashioned agricultural fair. It is just the biggest version of the little summer agricultural fairs once held each year all across the province: the Lansdowne Fair writ large. The surrounding farmers came with their best produce to compete for prizes, and at the same time to be informed of and perhaps to purchase all the latest technological innovations for better living. It is not so dominant as it once was, but it persists. It used to bill itself as the world's biggest annual exhibition. It is now only the seventh largest in North America. But it is surely still the largest hosted in big city. Most US State fairs are in smaller cities, not in self-respecting major urban centres.

Princes' Gate

If you have not gotten your fill of the heady smell of manure by the end of the CNE, the Royal Winter Fair, the harvest fair, is back at the same grounds in November. Complete, of course, with a petting farm.

These are still, for my money, Toronto's best attractions: The CNE, the Royal Winter Fair, Black Creek Pioneer Village, Riverdale Farm, Centre Island, and St. Lawrence Market. High Park could be, with a larger menagerie on display. Everything else is either embarrassing or generic to any large city in North America.

Unfortunately, it is typical of the nouveau riche that they disdain their own heritage, and seek instead to imitate others. Toronto has that curse. Locally, it is called “multiculturalism.” Both St. Lawrence Market and the CNE have come close to closing in the recent past. Thankfully, Toronto's summer festival of multiculturalism, “Caravan,” probably the original Canadian multiculturalism festival, once a very big ticket item, has died. It was just a modern “human zoo,” a way to humiliate recent immigrants. Not something Toronto can do with taste or dignity.

Site of the Battle of Toronto, War of 1812, today.

I used to live very near the spot on which the Battle of Toronto was fought during the War of 1812. It was completely unmarked. Except, that is, for a large memorial to the Polish victims of the slaughter of Katyn.

Toronto would do well to stop trying to be somewhere else, and concentrate on what is so very Toronto about Toronto. We need less signage for Little Italy and Little Portugal and Chinatown, and more cabbages in Cabbagetown. The roof of the new City Hall is going green, and this is good. But it should be growing market vegetables, not flowers. 

St. Anne's Anglican Church, Toronto

Another thing the local hospitality business has completely missed are the marvellous religious structures of “Toronto the Good.” Reviews of the Sunday sermons used to be the main Monday reading for Toronto residents. Screw the irreligious prejudices of political correctness: Toronto is squandering a big part of its unique heritage here. We need more promotion of the Toronto Blessing, of the remarkable Junction Shul, St. Anne's Anglican with its Group of Seven murals, Corpus Christi Catholic with its Kurelek mural, St. Michael's Choir School, and so on. I vote for a complete restoration, as well, of the Toronto Masonic Temple to what it would have looked like at its peak in 1925. That would indeed be a unique tourist destination.