Badali’s Fruit Market to celebrate 75 years on Bayview Ave.

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Dom and Sal Badali with their late mom Lena

Badali’s Fruit Market will mark a signal event on Bayview Ave this June. It will be 75 years from the day Leo and Sam Badali, and their mother, opened the  fruit market at No. 1587 on the happy street that is now known as South Bayview. Badali’s is easily the longest surviving business on the street and its generations of customers is enormous. Some remember when the angle parking was free. None can resist popping into the store, now run by brothers Sal and Dom to get some expert advice on produce and share the local gossip. To mark the anniversary Sal, Dom and their mother, Lena, will throw a party at the store on Saturday, June 15, 2013. Now 90, Lena continues to own a share of the business and has a lively interest in things.

HERE IN 1896

The Badali family took root in Canada in 1896 when four brothers, Leo, Gus, John  and Sal, arrived from Italy. Gus, grandfather to the current owners, had two sons, Leo and Sal. It was Leo and Sal who by 1938 had scraped together enough money to purchase one of the recently constructed shops on Bayview  By a fascinating quirk of history, this was the same year that the Roman Catholic Parish of St. Anselm’s was founded. There was no church so Father Francis Caufield held mass among the melons and other produce at Badali’s until the first St. Anselm’s. a smallish yellow brick church, was finished. Sal and Dom are true sons of Leaside, having grown up in their father’s home on Macnaughton Rd.

HOW HOME WAS PURCHASED

But as Italians, the Badalis didn’t always feel so welcome. When Leo first tried to buy the Macnaughton home he was told by the Realtor that the owner didn’t want to sell to an Italian. It’s a shadow on the history of Leaside. But the outcome reflects the ingenuity of Leo Badali who persuaded a non-Italian friend to buy the home and then re-sell it to the family. Which is why the modest little fruit market at 1587 Bayview has a lot to say about us all, small as it is.  Mark June 15 on the calendar and we’ll see you at Badali’s.

Explosion rocks tourist district of old Prague

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A strong explosion rocked the centre of Prague on Monday morning, leaving dozens of people injured. The blast, which the authorities say may have been caused by a gas leak, severely damaged a building on the edge of Prague’s Old Town. Rescue workers are now searching the rubble for any people who might be trapped inside. The explosion occurred shortly before 10 a.m. local time inside a building in Divadelní Street in central Prague, near the National Theatre and a block away from the embankment of the Vltava.  The National Theatre is the last the great 18th century theatres remaining in Europe and was an important venue for Mozart and others. The blast shattered windows in many buildings in the area, and the shockwave was felt as far as the other bank of the river where people said they felt the tremor.

Garden Society Plant Sale on Saturday, May 11

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Leaside Garden Society has two events scheduled in May. The regular meeting is Thursday, May 9th Speakers are Jack and Jackie Looye Topic: Rhodos and Azaleas.   Leaside Library, 165 McRae Drive 7:30 p.m., refreshments at 7 p.m. Visitors and new members welcome. Membership fee: $25. individual or $30 family. Then on Saturday, May 11, 2013 you can check out the  Garden Society Plant Sale. They say there will be a great variety of locally grown, top quality perennials as well as member donated plants. It all happens between 9 a.m. until 12 noon at Trace Manes Community Centre 110 Rumsey Road

Liberals inch into tie with PC opposition

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A Toronto Star poll by Forum research puts the Ontario Liberal Party in a tie with the Progressive Conservatives in popular support.  The parties both register 36 per cent according to the poll, while the NDP has slipped to 24 per cent. The news will buoy up Premier Wynne although the outcome of a vote is clearly in question.  PC leader Tim Hudak is vowing to call for a  non-confidence vote today in the Legislature over the gas plant cancellation scandal. If the vote is held, the NDP will have to decide if they want to carry  their support for the government on this issue into the bumpy political future.

“There Are Places I Remember” says Harper

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Prime Minister Harper has made a brief address to guests at the Leaside 100 Gala in which he offered a sensitive and detailed recollection of memories of the first 12 years of his life. Mr. Harper used a John Lennon composition, There Are Places I Remember, to set the tone for his own reminiscences of earlier times. He called the song one of the Beatles truly great artistic achievements. The prime minister said the music evoked the same fondness and sadness for him of Leaside friends and relatives no longer here. He recalled seeing the Canadian Maple Leaf flag raised at Northlea Public School and the intense differences of  opinion that gripped Leaside during “the flag debate”. Emotions ran high, he noted, as sympathies were divided between old flags and the new designs. He drew a laugh from guests at the Gala when he confessed that his family preferred the design with blue borders. Mr. Harper recalled coming back to Leaside  about 25 years after moving away. On this sentimental journey he walked by the family home at 332 Bessborough Drive and as he did so he said “I saw a boy about six. As he turned I could have sworn it was me. But when I looked again he was gone. That was a lifetime ago and I can never go back but I can never entirely leave it either.”  There is an audio recording of Mr.Harper’s complete remarks on the column at the left. It runs about 14 minutes and will remain there for two weeks. 

Canada Post: Snail mail has had its tail kicked

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How do you feel about picking up your mail at a “community mailbox” like people who live Canada’s hinterland. Or, maybe you would prefer to get mail every other day. Those are a couple of options Canada Post has for you  Or, you may be one of the increasing number of Canadians who don’t care if you ever sees a postage stamp again. It’s worth thinking about as Canada Post launches a national consultation with the public about how to make the service pay for itself. Although the Canadian postal model is exemplary compared to the antiquated state of things in the U.S., our post office is still headed for a $1 billion annual deficit by the end of  decade. As a writer for the Kitchener-Waterloo Record observed recently, “The great race between email and snail mail is over. And the snail got its tail kicked.”   CBC

Lawn sales blossom in the late April sunshine

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You can’t have missed them. Lawn sales are bursting out all over on this lovely Sunday.  Here on Imperial Street just off Yonge north of Davisville, a multi-home sale yielded wonderful old radio sets. Left, 1920 wood box was the height of “furniture radios”. At right, proud vendor of a Crossley reproduction mantle top piece made in the style of a 1950s radio. But it is a reproduction piece from a little later with a tape deck included.      

Harper calls Leaside a “pretty special place”

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Stephen Harper has spoken briefly at the Leaside 100 Gala tonight and called the community of his youth “a pretty special place”. When he was growing up here five decades ago, the PM noted, Leaside was a place where you felt that everyone was looking out for you and that you could knock on any door. He added dryly, “Of course, if you were doing something wrong, you could be  pretty sure that your parents were going to find out about it.”  CBC  and CBC Video 

Storage facility transformed into banquet hall

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Things are all ready to go for tonight’s  Leaside 100 Gala dinner to be held in the All Canadian Storage Facility on Laird Drive. The building has been transformed into a series of venues for the reception, dining and dancing. Inset left, MCs Dave Sparrow and Deb McGrath polish up a couple of routines and right, a 1928 Durant sedan which was manufactured at  the company’s plant on Wicksteed Ave. Guests may have their pictures taken with this great old vehicle and we will guess that after a couple of glasses of fine wine there will be lots of hamming it up on the running board. We’re thinking. The long banquet room is fully fixed up with screens so no one will miss anything that happens on stage. Prime Minister Harper will join other dignitaries at about 6.45 to kick off the evening.  Previous post two down.  (Saturday, April 27, 2013) 

Marking 200th anniversary of the Battle of York

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Many streets will be temporarily closed downtown today as a parade winds its way from Queen’s Park to Fort York to mark the 200th Anniversary of the Battle of York. This morning troops performed a “dynamic military display” on the south lawn of Queen’s Park followed by the presentation of a new regimental colour by His Royal Highness Prince Philip, The Duke of Edinburgh, to the 3rd Battalion, The Royal Canadian Regiment. The Prince has been colonel-in-chief — an honorary title often given to members of the Royal Family — of the regiment since 1953. Regimental colours are like a ceremonial flag that historically provided a rallying point for soldiers on a battlefield. A 21-gun salute will be part of the ceremony. Details of the closures.   Story of  the Battle of York.

Sorel Etrog works mark Davisville Ave. landscape

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225 Davisville

The Art Gallery of Ontario opens a retrospective on the work of sculptor Sorel Etrog  today. His near-lifetime of creating works in bronze and other metals around Toronto will be particularly familiar to those who live and work in the Davisville Ave and Balliol Street neighborhood between Yonge St. and Mt. Pleasant Rd. His work became a kind of signature for the Greewin developments in that area when principals of the company commissioned a number of pieces in the 1960s. Etrog will be 80 this year and the career-spanning exhibition at the AGO will cast the artist in a new light in his adopted hometown of fifty-four years. It will include his archetypal sculptures as well as drawings, paintings, book works and prints from the AGO’s collection and private collections. One of the highlights, and one of Etrog’s pivotal works, will be his rarely seen film, Spiral. This meditation on the human condition, from birth to death, will be a catalyst for renewed reflection on the accomplishments of one of Canada’s most diverse and challenging artists. Art Gallery of Ontario site

Prime Minister will attend Leaside 100 Gala

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Playing for Leaside

Prime Minister Stephen Harper will attend the Leaside 100 Gala Saturday night in the community where he grew up.  Mr. Harper will jet into Toronto in time to take part in opening remarks along with Premier Wynne and John Carmichael,  the member for Don Valley West.  It was generally not known whether the prime minister would make an appearance at the gala, but the notice was posted on Mr. Harper’s website Friday evening. The gala is an ambitious buffet dinner being held in the All Canadian Self-Storage Facility at 1 Laird Drive, a location which is right across the street from the Leaside Arena where he played as a kid. The event is sold out. It will offer celebrants a chance to immerse themselves in the history of the town and enjoy such things as a Champagne/Martini reception with hors d’oeuvres, some vintage 1913 dancing, and a photo-op with a Leaside-built 1928 Durant automobile. There will be a gourmet dinner catered by Grilltime from just up the street on Laird Drive. Music will be provided by the Toronto All Star Big Band and Celebrity MCs are David Sparrow and Deb McGrath.