Why This Site Is Here

Okay, so what's going on here? I punch Cabbagetown into a search engine and all I get is a bunch of pages on trendy restaurants and high priced stores, real estate agents and some place in Atlanta, Georgia with the same name. No old friends, no familiar places, nothing that reminded me of that once great little community where I used to live. Come on you old Cabbagetowners, where are you? Since nobody else seemed interested in telling the Cabbagetown story, I guess I'll have to do it

In the 1800's and early 1900's many immigrants landed on Toronto's doorstep. The families that were penniless were shuffled off to Cabbagetown which, at that time, was mostly a shantytown. They worked in local industries such as the Gooderham Worts Distillery or the shipyards, railyards or many other of the industrial sweat shops in the area. This was before welfare and unemployment insurance so many of the new residents would plant every square inch of their yards with cabbages to live off during hard times. This is how the area got it's name. I've had some people deny this but I've been hearing it from my Cabbagetown elders for over four decades, so I'm sticking with it.

The original Cabbagetown in these stories is long gone. It is dead and buried beneath tons of modern brick, mortar and concrete. These relatively new buildings, like giant gravestones, stand as morbid reminders of what was once a great community. Although our living conditions improved, and I spent the remainder of my childhood in one of these huge buildings, it was never quite the same as the old neighbourhood. Oh, it was still a tight community, but it seemed a little bit more bland and sanitized. Every house and apartment building was a mirror image of the one next to it.

Although it was right in the heart of downtown Toronto, Cabbagetown was a separate entity, it was the boondocks, the slums, the wrong side of the tracks, take your pick. However, it was never quite a ghetto until the City decided to install two large housing projects starting around 1950 and finally finishing in the late fifties. Even then it took twenty years to become a real ghetto.

What I've tried to put together here is neither a wake nor a celebration. It's just a bunch of stories and memories about a goofy little kid that used to live in Cabbagetown. That kid was me.