Whither the Whig?

I recently came across some vintage Kingston Whig-Standard pages posted by Tim Gordanier. The ads and articles were interesting, and short of spending hours and (enjoyable!) hours in an archives room with a micro-reader and years of Whigs on microfilm, this was a nice, manageable dose of historical research and even nostalgia! But in this morning's Whig, I read the ad proclaiming the Whig being deployed into employees' homes! What? No more Whig 'building'? The prolific photographer George Lilley often snapped the Whig building at King and Clarence Streets to test his camera equipment (below in 1948, Queen's University Archives):

The Whig building, built in 1894, was central to downtown Kingston with the printing presses on site. Photos of the presses in action:

Donnacona Paper Co. was incorporated in Quebec in 1928. It was acquired by what is currently Domtar in 1962. Notice the transport mechanism to move the heavy rolls along the floor (above). The Whig was a well-known building for public relations tours, especially when newspapers were a vital part of information dissemination and daily life in Kingston:

The Whig offices moved to the Woolen Mill on Cataraqui Street in 1997, and presses had been  remotely located on Grant Timmins Drive as of 1989. Capital Movers & Storage posted these photos of the 1997 move to the Woolen Mill on their Facebook page:

I recently snapped this dead-on photo for use on my layout's Woolen Mill photo backdrop. The green-windowed main floor Whig offices are in foreground. Now vacant?

Got the word: 

Why pay heat, rent and light when writers' home offices are now the de facto Whig offices, with call centre functions like advertising being handled centrally for some time? According to Postmedia, the staff have been working from home since March, and the lease on the space has expired and will not be renewed. The paper is often down to 12 pages. All for $1.35 per copy. The masthead phone numbers don't work. It appears the paper has completely abandoned the community that built it. 

Douglas Fetherling wrote a Whig history, A Little Bit of Thunder. In 1963, a building was demolished for updating of the Whig's printing presses. A new building facing Clarence Street replaced two limestone houses. A multi-floor annex with a Goss Headliner press doubled the Whig's floor area. Completed in 1963, its facade was covered in black marble. In 1973, two more buildings were demolished along Clarence Street, as shown in this Whig clipping:

Marc Shaw kindly pointed me in the direction of this 1942 photo showing those buildings on Clarence Street. Likely the first demolished (below - on the left) the 1963 addition included a covered walkway linking it to the main Whig office on King Street. The 1963 addition was demolished in the 1990s, now a parking lot.

The End of an Era. August 1 - we have not renewed our Kingston Whig-Standard  subscription. For the first time in 50+ years, no daily newspaper in the house. We are getting breaking news online, days before the Whig or Global Kingston brings it to us. National and world news from CBC and CNN. We will read local news in Kingston This Week. The final straw? Withdrawing Monday publication, now Wednesdays. 

Becoming increasingly unresponsive to subscription shortfalls, this email does not even include the date of final publication. Printing presses gone, printed elsewhere, office space in Woolen Mill vacated due to pandemic, notices handled by a call centre, minimal local news coverage, and now a 12-page weekday newspaper. Whither the Whig? Now back to our regularly scheduled ads:

1913 ads for Anglin wood (above) and Kingston Laundry (Princess at Sydenham):

Taxi ads 1945:

Wartime grain business was booming in wartime: November 27, 1941:

Coal supplies for customers were a concern in 1943:

A 1953 coal ad:

Modelling the City Steam Laundry

At 294 Wellington Street stood the City [Steam] Laundry, across the street from CN's ex-GTR reight shed and down the street from the still-standing Bajus Brewery. This 1953 photo shows the storefront addition added sometime in the previous four years. (Queen's University Archives photos, top and below). 

1949 (above) and Snapshot Kingston view 1955 (below)

Ensconced by the fire, I was ready to begin the kitbash. I had come across this Smalltown U.S.A.Parcel Delivery Service I'd tucked away (hey, got it on sale!) and though the window arrangement is not exact, it had a lot of character, the right proportions and a false front.

The Smalltown front, pre white-washing, has been added to some Pola pickle factory sides that I'd stacked for an earlier kitbash of Winnipeg's Five Roses Flour mill. They were already painted the colour I wanted, and had a pilaster structure similar to the prototype.

The rear view, for which I used the Smalltown rear wall. I've glued a sprue for the roof peak. Using cardstock, this sprue was enough to support the styrene-free roof!

Adding the storefront addition:

There's not too much that doesn't benefit from a coat of paint! I can't tell from the black and white prototype photos what colour the trim was, so I'm going with basic black!

I blanked out two of the upper-storey windows with styrene, to replicate the prototype window spacing.

Addition has a roof now.

Signage. The prototype has a hand-lettered sign that didn't include 'Steam', so I left it out, though I did include (Kingston) Limited. After all this formatting, I too ended up hand-lettering the main sign lettering.

Signage added, including a 'Laundering' hung sign taken from a 1913 Whig ad for a laundry located at Princess and Sydenham Streets. Also a few stacks, window shades, and window-glazing using clear styrene.

On the layout, located between Bajus Brewery and my second typical Swamp Ward house. Earlier the site of a gas station/garage. I did not glue on the storefront addition, so it remains removable for flexibility on Wellington, my most visible street upon entering the layout room.

An October 26, 1956 Whig clipping:

A 1946 Whig ad from the year of Kingston's centennial:

Kingston's Laker Lay-Up Fleet

Kingston was a winter lay-up port for lakeboat fleets. Keystone, Canada Steamship Lines (CSL) and Hall Corporation (HALCO) not only moored their canallers here, but also provided work for local shipyards such as re-bricking boiler furnaces.  CSL ships were moored near their terminal near the foot of Queen Street. LaVerendrye/Keystone ships were laid-up on either side of the lift bridge. HALCO ships were moored at the end of the causeway closest to RMC. A December 22, 1927 article notes that 60 ships would be laid up, though producing a large boost to local employment and commerce. 

This October 3,1929 Whig article mentioned the CSL fleet at the start of the Great Depression:

Keystone Transports Ltd. was taken over by the Quebec Natural Gas Corporation's LaVerendrye Line Ltd., of Ville la Salle. In February 1962, a further change took place. LaVerendrye Line Ltd. was acquired by the Hall Corporation of Canada Ltd. 

Undated photo, pre-1941 due to presence of Richardson No.1 elevator at right (top) and Keystone ships laid-up at the LaSalle Causeway in 1961 (Don McQueen photo - below):

The CSL grain elevator, Portsmouth Harbour, Kingston Shipyards, the CSL terminal near Tete du Pont Barracks, LaSalle Causeway and Inner Harbour were all lay-up sites. George Lilley photographed HALCO ships at the LaSalle Causeway in 1951 (Queen's University Archives):

The range tower at right gives away this five-canaller location as Kingston's CSL grain elevator on Front Road, captioned 1959. Two more photos, posted to a lost lakers album online:

Moored at the CSL terminal at Queen and Ontario Streets, captioned August, 1959: City of Montreal, City of Kingston, City of Toronto (above) and 1958 City of Toronto, City of Kingston, City of Hamilton, City of Montreal, Canadian, Calgarian and Collier:

After the opening of the Seaway, it's more likely that these canallers were moored here for eventual disposition more than their usual winter lay-up.

Building the Vehicle Fleet

Vehicles, figures, buildings and railway rolling stock are four types of modelling used to nail down the era being modelled. Today, it was time to build up the vehicle fleet. I was inspired by this George Lilley photo of an Abramsky delivery truck unloading from CN boxcar 534237 at the CN freight shed team track yard in December, 1954 (Queen's University Archives):

I zoomed in on the photo and printed out an image of the truck lettering. 

I picked up this amazing lot of vehicles from fellow rail enthusiast Jason Sailer back in 2015:

Four undecorated vehicles were lying fallow and I used this old one to represent the Abramsky truck:

A bit of signage sleight-of-hand was employed to turn this Matchbox truck into two trucks. it's a Rosen Fuels truck on this side:

And an S. Anglin truck on this side! The above lettering is printed off from a 1958 telephone book cover, and the lettering below is one I printed off with Paint software:

These two Minix vans were lettered for Anglin and Ubdegrove. Parked beside an Ubdegrove service van the other day, I took a quick photo and reformatted it, printed off and glued to the van side. Even though this is obviously 2020, the lettering looked 'retro' to me, and a larger version will soon become a local billboard.

I painted the tired from silver to black, adding pinpoints of paint for headlights and taillights. All four in front of the Cataraqui Street National Grocers warehouse:

Modelling Another Typical Swamp Ward House

In a previous post, I attempted to find a typical Swamp Ward house - actually a two-family house. This time, I went in search of the 'average' house. A standard design with three windows and doors at front, two stories and tough to find today in original condition without exterior modernization. But I found one on Stephen Street (top photo).

This was a troublesome structure. It stood between me and the main Outer Station yard, and it was within sweater-sleeve range so often uprooted and eventually inadvertently picked up like a Kansas farmhouse! The roof peak is a little steep, and the roof dormer, front porch (originally two level, modified for two earlier iterations in Manitoba and Vermont modelled locales!) and addition were problematic, not to mention the third storey attic. I planned to fix it and move it from Montreal Street over to Wellington Street.

Making some progress, I cut the panes out of all the windows, scrapped the full-width front porch, ended up keeping the dormer, and added a smaller porch with front step from a Life-Like kit. Now, to find the ideal colour.

Well, it turns out there is no ideal colour. There's tan, pink, grey, blue, and off-white prototypes. I tried a tan colour bit it didn't look right, so I went with Americana Silver Sage Green craft paint with white trim. The original kit had nice brick detailing, but I covered it over with printed limestone left over from my Outer Station kit.

I painted the shingles black. Overall black would look too much like new shingles, so I dry-brushed black on:

Down to the layout: I left the back wall and side addition (which I moved to the opposite side) painted brown. I need to scenick the back yard and driveway, still.

 Street view along Wellington Street, with Canadian Dredge & Dry Dock in the background:

Anglin coal delivery coming down the street, past my previous project house!

We are sitting out enjoying the early evening air. Perhaps the typical Kingston humidity is abating!

Looking back up Wellington Street:

There are only two houses on the whole layout. Most space is given over to track and industry, so while houses pay the tax bills for the city, they don't earn their keep on the layout! But it is nice to have two that at least represent typical Swamp Ward streetscapes! The original kit is now marketed by Walthers as part of  their Trainline entry-level kit range. It lists for $23.99, about $20 more than I would have paid for that kit years ago!

Here are four of the house kits shown on the Winnipeg Railway Museum layout.