In this episode, we discuss Toronto's crackdown on communist activity in the city in the late 1920s! This episode gets into the interrelated histories of policing, the issue of free expression, access to public space, journalism, leftist politics, and more.

For those interested in learning more about the topics covered in this episode and/or want to read some of the sources we quote from in the episode, check out the following:

• Lita-Rose Betcherman, The Little Band: The Clashes between the Communists and the Political and Legal Establishment in Canada, 1928–32 (Ottawa: Deneau, 1982)
• J. Petryshyn, “Class Conflict and Civil Liberties: The Origins and Activities of the Canadian Labour Defense League, 1925 - 1940" Labour/Le Travailleur 10 (Autumn 1982), 39–63
• Bryan D. Palmer and Gaétan Héroux, Toronto’s Poor: A Rebellious History (Toronto: Between the Lines, 2016)
• Dennis G. Molinaro, An Exceptional Law: Section 98 and the Emergency State, 1919–1936 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2017)
• Manifesto of the Workers’ Party of Canada, December 1921, accessible at https://www.marxists.org/history//canada/socialisthistory/Docs/Leninist/WP_Manifesto_21.htm
• “Toronto Police Use Fists, Feet and Batons to Clear Queen’s Park,” Toronto Daily Star, 14 August 1929, 1–2
• “Toronto's 'Red Demonstration' Proves to be Immediate Fiasco As Watchful Police Arrest Six” [Page 2 Title: "Toronto's 'Red Demonstration' Fails"], Globe, 14 August 1929, 1–2
• Editorial, “No Compromise with the Reds,” Globe, 30 July 1929, 4
• Editorial, “The Right of Public Assembly,” Toronto Daily Star, 30 April 1929, 6
• The Observer, “The Law and the Courts Sufficient Protection,” Toronto Daily Star, 30 April 1929, 6
• "Evidence Lacking against Woman Garrow Finds” Toronto Daily Star, 19 November 1929, 1–2

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Listening T.O. History is created and hosted by Steve Penfold and Louis Reed-Wood. Our artwork was made by Nethkaria, our intro music was recorded by the National Promenade Band, and our outro music was created by Holizna. Follow us on Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/listeningt.o.history) and Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/people/Listening-TO-History/61553456499160/) for additional content and announcements, and get in touch at listeningTOhistory[at]gmail.com!

In today's episode, we discuss the classic Canadian movie Goin' Down the Road! Released in 1970, this movie tells the story of two Maritimers who come to Toronto looking for better pay and good times. We chat about the how the movie portrays Toronto at the time, and how that portrayal compares to other historical sources.

For those interested in learning more about the topics covered in this episode, check out the following sources:

• Greg Marquis, "Confederation's Casualties: The 'Maritimer' as a Problem in 1960s Toronto," Acadiensis 39, no. 1 (Winter/Spring 2010): 83–107.
• Geoff Pevere, Donald Shebib's Goin' Down the Road (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2012).
• Daniel Ross, The Heart of Toronto: Corporate Power, Civic Activism, and the Remaking of Downtown Yonge Street (Vancouver: UBC Press, 2022).
• Keith Whitney, "Skid Row," in The Underside of Toronto, ed. W. E. Mann (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1970). Available at https://archive.org/details/undersideoftoron0000na/mode/1up.
• "It's the Yonge Street Strip for Action on Saturday Night," Toronto Star, 20 September 1969, 1.

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Listening T.O. History is created and hosted by Steve Penfold and Louis Reed-Wood. Our artwork was made by Nethkaria, our intro music was recorded by the National Promenade Band, and our outro music was created by Holizna. Follow us on Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/listeningt.o.history) and Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/people/Listening-TO-History/61553456499160/) for additional content and announcements, and get in touch at listeningTOhistory[at]gmail.com!

On today's episode, we discuss student activism at the University of Toronto in the 1960s and '70s, with a specific focus on a conflict over who was allowed to access the stacks at Robarts Library. It’s also a chance to talk about how the university changed from the late nineteenth century, the last time we covered its history, to the 1970s!

For those interested in learning more about the topics covered in this episode, check out the following sources:

• Martin Friedland, The University of Toronto: A History, 2nd ed. (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2013)
• Doug Owram, Born at the Right Time: A History of the Baby-Boom Generation (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1996)
• Kenneth Cmiel, "The Politics of Civility," in The Sixties: From Memory to History, ed. David Farber (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1994)
• Karen Dubinsky, Catherine Krull, Susan Lord, Sean Mills, and Scott Rutherford, eds., New World Coming: The Sixties and the Shaping of Global Consciousness (Toronto: Between the Lines, 2009)

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Listening T.O. History is created and hosted by Steve Penfold and Louis Reed-Wood. Our artwork was made by Nethkaria, our intro music was recorded by the National Promenade Band, and our outro music was created by Holizna. Follow us on Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/listeningt.o.history) and Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/people/Listening-TO-History/61553456499160/) for additional content and announcements, and get in touch at listeningTOhistory[at]gmail.com!

In today's mini, we talk about how Toronto has voted in Canada's federal elections of the past.

Here are some resources for those interested in learning more about the history of Toronto and federal elections, or the history of Canadian federal elections more generally:

• Stephen Clarkson, The Big Red Machine: How the Liberal Party Dominates Canadian Politics (Vancouver: UBC Press, 2005).
• Cara Spittal, “The Diefenbaker Moment” (PhD diss., University of Toronto, 2011).
• Thirstan Falconer, “Building an Ethnic Coalition? The Liberal Party of Canada, Ethnocultural Communities and the 1962 and 1963 Federal Elections in Metro Toronto,” American Review of Canadian Studies 48, no. 3 (2018): 281–296.
• Eerik Riivo Ilves, “New-Build Gentrification and the Changing Inner City Vote in Toronto and Vancouver” (master's thesis, University of Toronto, 2007).

And if you're interested in exploring past election results yourself, you can find them here: https://lop.parl.ca/sites/ParlInfo/default/en_CA/ElectionsRidings/electionsElectedCandidates.

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Listening T.O. History is created and hosted by Steve Penfold and Louis Reed-Wood. Our artwork was made by Nethkaria, and our music was created by Holizna. Follow us on Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/listeningt.o.history) and Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/people/Listening-TO-History/61553456499160/) for additional content and announcements, and get in touch at listeningTOhistory[at]gmail.com!

In today's mini, we discuss the history of Toronto in Ontario provincial elections. If you'd like to explore for yourself the results of Ontario's elections throughout the province's post-Confederation history, check out this database: https://results.elections.on.ca/en/data-explorer?fromYear=1867&toYear=2025!

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Listening T.O. History is created and hosted by Steve Penfold and Louis Reed-Wood. Our artwork was made by Nethkaria, and our music was created by Holizna. Follow us on Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/listeningt.o.history) and Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/people/Listening-TO-History/61553456499160/) for additional content and announcements, and get in touch at listeningTOhistory[at]gmail.com!

In our first-ever Listening T.O. Mini, we discuss the history of free trade and tariffs in Canada's and Toronto's history. In particular, we focus on 1911, when a group of Toronto elites who had supported the Liberal Party broke with it over the party's pursuit of a free trade agreement with the United States. We also discuss the federal election held later that year (which was largely a referendum on the proposed agreement) and how Toronto voted in it.

A few additional sources, for those who are interested:

• Paul Stevens, The 1911 General Election: A Study in Canadian Politics (Toronto: Copp Clark, 1970)
• Patrice Dutil and David MacKenzie, Canada 1911: The Decisive Election that Shaped the Country (Toronto: Dundurn Press, 2011)
• The Manifesto of the Toronto Eighteen, in the Toronto World, 20 February 1911, accessible at https://www.canadiana.ca/view/oocihm.N_00367_19110220/1

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Listening T.O. History is created and hosted by Steve Penfold and Louis Reed-Wood. Our artwork was made by Nethkaria, and our music was created by Holizna. Follow us on Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/listeningt.o.history) and Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/people/Listening-TO-History/61553456499160/) for additional content and announcements, and get in touch at listeningTOhistory[at]gmail.com!

This episode is the first of a two-part series on the history of the TTC, and particularly streetcars, in Toronto! In these two episodes, we get into how Toronto's streetcar system came to be, why it moved from private business to a municipal agency, why the city kept using streetcars when other cities got rid of them, and how streetcars have shaped the development of the city. We also get into the history of streetcars from various perspectives—those of riders, workers, and owners.

The early period of public transit in Toronto, the focus of this first episode, is a surprising tale of conflicts between gilded-age industrialists clashing with city hall, their workers, and the public more generally—a tale of the conflict between private profit and public good.

For those interested in learning more, here are some further resources we used in putting together these episodes:

• Brian Doucet and Michael Doucet, Streetcars and the Shifting Geographies of Toronto: A Visual Analysis of Change (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2022)
• Michael J. Doucet, “Mass Transit and the Failure of Private Ownership: The Case of Toronto in the Early Twentieth Century” Urban History Review 6, no. 3-77 (February 1978), 3–33
• Donald Davis, “Mass Transit and Private Ownership: An alternative Perspective on the Case of Toronto” Urban History Review 7, no. 3 (February 1979), 60–98
• Christopher Armstrong and H.V. Nelles, The Revenge of the Methodist Bicycle Company: Sunday Streetcars and Municipal Reform in Toronto (Don Mills: Oxford University Press, 1977)
• Howard Levine, ”Streetcars for Toronto Committee: A Case Study of Citizen Advocacy in Transit Planning and Operations” Transportation Research Board Special Report, Issue 221, 1989, 190–198
• Jay Young, “Search for a Better Way: Subway Life and Metropolitan Growth in Toronto, 1942–78” (PhD diss., York University, 2012)
• Jonathan English, “The Better Way: Transit Service and Demand in Metropolitan Toronto, 1953–1990” (PhD diss., Columbia University, 2021)
• Steve Munro’s Transit blog: https://stevemunro.ca
• Sean Marshall’s transit blog: https://seanmarshall.ca/blog/

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Listening T.O. History is created and hosted by Steve Penfold and Louis Reed-Wood. Our artwork was made by Nethkaria, our intro music was recorded by the National Promenade Band, and our outro music was created by Holizna. Follow us on Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/listeningt.o.history) and Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/people/Listening-TO-History/61553456499160/) for additional content and announcements, and get in touch at listeningTOhistory[at]gmail.com!

When you think about student protest movements, you probably don’t think about the Victorian era. But maybe you should—because in 1895, University of Toronto students challenged the university’s administration by going on strike! In this episode, we discuss what led to this protest, what happened during the strike, and campus life/culture in the nineteenth century more broadly.

Here are some recommendations for further reading:

• Martin Friedland, The University of Toronto: A History, 2nd ed. (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2013).
• Robert Craig Brown, Arts and Science at Toronto: A History, 1827–1990 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2013).
• Keith Walden, “Respectable Hooligans: Male Toronto College Students Celebrate Hallowe’en, 1884–1910,” Canadian Historical Review 68, no. 1 (March 1987): 1–34.
• Caitlin Harvey, “University Land Grabs: Indigenous Dispossession and the Universities of Toronto and Manitoba,” Canadian Historical Review 104, no. 4 (December 2023): 467–93.

For anyone interested in what the University of Toronto was like in this period, also check out the university's calendar (essentially, its handbook) for the year of the strike—it's pretty interesting to flip through and compare to today! https://archive.org/details/uoftcalendar1894/

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Listening T.O. History is created and hosted by Steve Penfold and Louis Reed-Wood. Our artwork was made by Nethkaria, our intro music was recorded by the National Promenade Band, and our outro music was created by Holizna. Follow us on Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/listeningt.o.history) and Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/people/Listening-TO-History/61553456499160/) for additional content and announcements, and get in touch at listeningTOhistory[at]gmail.com!