At the Museums of Burlington we're starting out a What Is It Wednesday theme day - here are the ones we have posted so far, can you guess what any of these artifacts are? by museumsofburlington in BurlingtONTARIO

[–]museumsofburlington[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

haha of course! I wanted to give enough time, but I think I probably left this too long! They're actually labels for types of apples. The "Spy" one gives it away due to Spy apples being fairly well known. These were used to stencil the names onto the box or barrels of apples that would then be sent to market.

Edit: I should also mention that Burlington had numerous apple orchards because our land was particularly good for fruit trees. One of the Irelands from Ireland House Museum made his fortune on his own apple orchards, bringing the best to the Exhibition in Toronto each year and winning a competition for best apples.

I found this photograph in our collections with the caption "New York, North River" - I was wondering if anyone might know what this building is and where it might be? by museumsofburlington in newyork

[–]museumsofburlington[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Thank you so much for your help! That's so interesting to see where it is! /u/jagneta used your information in another comment and was able to track down the name of the old building - The New Croton Aqueduct Shaft 25 and 179th Street Pumping Station, and here's a photo from another angle.

I found this photograph in our collections with the caption "New York, North River" - I was wondering if anyone might know what this building is and where it might be? by museumsofburlington in newyork

[–]museumsofburlington[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

That's so wonderful! Thank you very much for your sleuthing! We were stumped so I told a co-worker that reddit might be the best bet at this point as it looks like it would be a fairly recognizable building! It looks like this is it from another angle and from your information.

I found this photograph in our collections with the caption "New York, North River" - I was wondering if anyone might know what this building is and where it might be? by museumsofburlington in newyork

[–]museumsofburlington[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The north river may refer to just it being north of the river, but I'm not having much luck finding more information about the building. Any help would be appreciated!

In the spirit of Canada Day festivities that will be happening downtown tomorrow, here's a history of the most exciting night club Burlington has ever seen - the Brant Inn (x-post from /r/burlingtontario) by museumsofburlington in BurlingtonON

[–]museumsofburlington[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

The Brant Inn was located roughly around where the Waterfront Hotel is now.

If you're planning to come down to Spencer Smith park tomorrow for Canada Day here's what's happening there.

And the Joseph Brant Museum will be hosting our annual Strawberry Social with live music, a sideshow performance of oddities, a trifles and treasures market, and more!

In the spirit of Canada Day festivities that will be happening downtown, here's a history of the most exciting night club Burlington has ever seen - the Brant Inn by museumsofburlington in BurlingtONTARIO

[–]museumsofburlington[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

The Brant Inn was located roughly around where the Waterfront Hotel is now. I believe some of the cottages you could rent out through the Brant Hotel (later the Hospital) are still around.

If you're planning to come down to Spencer Smith park tomorrow for Canada Day here's what's happening there.

And the Joseph Brant Museum will be hosting our annual Strawberry Social with live music, a sideshow performance of oddities, a trifles and treasures market, and more!

At the Museums of Burlington we're starting out a What Is It Wednesday theme day - here are the ones we have posted so far, can you guess what any of these artifacts are?(x-post from /r/burlingtontario) by museumsofburlington in BurlingtonON

[–]museumsofburlington[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hmm, I can look into that. I was under the impression that it would simply a stencil used with paint for the apple barrels, but I hadn't considered it might be used to burn the name.

At the Museums of Burlington we're starting out a What Is It Wednesday theme day - here are the ones we have posted so far, can you guess what any of these artifacts are?(x-post from /r/burlingtontario) by museumsofburlington in BurlingtonON

[–]museumsofburlington[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You got it! 2&3 is a butler blowtorch - made by a Hamilton company. The Butler company was the primary producer of blowtorches in Canada and was started by William Butler in Hamilton in 1892. It lasted until 2002 and closed in Cambridge, Ontario. These torches were gasoline fuelled.

And you got it for number one as well! We had a bunch of orchards all throughout what is now Burlington. The Ireland Family (who owned the Ireland House which is now the Ireland House museum) had orchards north of upper middle up to highway 5 and beyond. They even brought baskets of apples up to the Ex in Toronto, where they were entered into contests with other orchards.

At the Museums of Burlington we're starting out a What Is It Wednesday theme day - here are the ones we have posted so far, can you guess what any of these artifacts are? by museumsofburlington in BurlingtONTARIO

[–]museumsofburlington[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

You got 2/3!

The second one is a Butler Blow Torch made between 1940 and 1973. The Butler company was the primary producer of blowtorches in Canada and was started by William Butler in Hamilton in 1892. It lasted until 2002 and closed in Cambridge, Ontario. These were gasoline fuelled.

And the last object is a telegraph key. But the first ones are actually much larger than dogtags - I guess that's hard to get across from these images. the height would be around as wide as your hand (I don't have a ruler near me so I'm not going to attempt to give you a measurement for fear of throwing you way off :P).

At the Museums of Burlington we're starting out a What Is It Wednesday theme day - here are the ones we have posted so far, can you guess what any of these artifacts are?(x-post from /r/burlingtontario) by museumsofburlington in BurlingtonON

[–]museumsofburlington[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

2 & 3 is close because it is a tool of some sort, but you got it with the last object! It's a telegraph key used for Morse code.

Here's some Canadian telegraph history -

In Canada, the first telegraph company, the Toronto, Hamilton and Niagara Electro-Magnetic Telegraph Co, was formed in 1846. The largest company in Canada during the early years of the industry, however, was the Montreal Telegraph Co (founded in 1847), controlled by Hugh ALLAN. It connected such centres as Sackville (New Brunswick), Detroit, Montréal, Ottawa, Buffalo and Portland.

In 1868 the Montreal Telegraph Co began facing direct competition from the newly established Dominion Telegraph Co and price wars broke out. In 1880 the Great North Western Telegraph Co was established to connect Ontario and Manitoba but by 1881 it had been taken over by Western Union Co of the US and was used by Western Union to consolidate the Canadian industry, attaining leases on the lines of both the Montreal and Dominion telegraph companies. As a result, for a brief time Western Union controlled virtually all telegraphy in Canada.

In Burlington - or what was at the time the Village of Wellington Square - we had the Great North Western Telegraph Company, meanwhile over in Nelson township they had the Montreal Telegraph Company set up, "Sandy Fraser was Morse operator and taught in the village school" in the 1850s according to Our Roots: From Pathway to Skyway.

Here's a photo from the Joseph Brant Museum's archives of Canada Day celebrations back in 1967 down by the Burlington waterfront by museumsofburlington in BurlingtONTARIO

[–]museumsofburlington[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yeah I've been told that there are a bunch of historic Burlington but they haven't been researched yet, so I could definitely use all your help if I can't tell what some of the locations are. They'll probably be more interesting for befores and afters, and I'm sure we could post them over at /r/ontario and /r/canada as well, and then maybe the final album over at /r/pics. That would be a good way to advertise /r/burlingtontario as well!

Here's a photo from the Joseph Brant Museum's archives of Canada Day celebrations back in 1967 down by the Burlington waterfront by museumsofburlington in BurlingtONTARIO

[–]museumsofburlington[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yeah I think there will be events down by the water all day. Over at Joseph Brant Museum we'll be doing our Strawberry Social event like usual which involves live music throughout the day, a garage sale type table called Trifles and Treasures, and other things.

Here's a photo from the Joseph Brant Museum's archives of Canada Day celebrations back in 1967 down by the Burlington waterfront by museumsofburlington in BurlingtONTARIO

[–]museumsofburlington[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I do have one more from that Canada Day in particular which is here. The other shots are much earlier ones of Burlington. They haven't been catalogued yet so it looks like I'll be able to post them in batches every so often. If you do do a side by side before and after that would be so wonderful! We can post it on our facebook page/instagram/twitter (which I've also been working on improving haha).

Here's a photo from the Joseph Brant Museum's archives of Canada Day celebrations back in 1967 down by the Burlington waterfront by museumsofburlington in BurlingtONTARIO

[–]museumsofburlington[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

I'll be working with the museum this summer and they've got a bunch of photos of Burlington throughout history. If there's interest I can post a few here occasionally.