Wandering Wellington Street in Scale Yet Again

S. Anglin offices, Bay and Wellington Streets

I wandered the layout at extreme street level tonight. One iPhone, 75 images, 45 minutes. Fellow modeller and rail enthusiast Mark Perry of Winnipeg made a comment, one that I consider high praise, having seen these photos: 

"Let me first just say I love that Eric shares these images, I love looking at them. They sure tell a story! The story I get from them, is:

A) his layout is a lot more sceniced than most people's layout (including my Plywood Pacific), his efforts need to be applauded for that!

B) it is not the most super detailed 100% accurate layout any of us have ever seen and it doesn't have to be, Eric is happy with it and he probably gets hours and hours of enjoyment doing what he is doing model wise. I think it is killer, I love all the little details instead of the endless new super detailed plastic locomotives and high priced freight cars.

C) model railroading is all about fun, take what you can out of it, after all it is only a simple hobby to enjoy, it is certainly not a way of life. Or is it?"

Sowards Coal office, Place d'Armes

Esso limestone warehouse, North Street

Houses, Wellington Street

Millard & Lumb, Place d'Armes

Bajus Brewery, Wellington Street

Davis Tannery, Rideau Street

Frontenac Floor & Wall Tile, Cassidy Street

K-D Manufacturing, Montreal Street

Quattrocchi's Specialty Foods, Montreal Street at Railway Streets

Dye & Chemical Co. of Canada Ltd., Orchard Street

Pigeons roosting on the roof of Bajus Brewery, Wellington Street

Tank car unloading Queen City Oil Co., Rideau at Cataraqui Streets

National Grocers, Cataraqui Street

 

Cooler Weather: Back to the Hanley Spur

During the spring and summer, my wife and I usually head to our sunroom after supper to enjoy the sunset while pursuing our respective hobbies. Now it's often a little cool in the sunroom in the evening, so it's time for me to spend an hour each night on my HO-scale Kingston's Hanley Spur home model railway layout. 

This past week, I reset the layout after its summer slumber. That means checking and repositioning the freight cars on CN and CP lines, moving vehicles around, cleaning up layout-top detritus and generally preparing to operate the layout after summertime visits from our grandsons. They both enjoy making realistic and sometimes fantastic scenes on and around the layout trackage.  

While doing the reset, I was building a CN switching run that would switch the industries in the vicinity of the CN Outer Station: Frontenac Floor & Wall Tile, the Davis Tannery, CN Express and Presland Iron & Steel. The engine crew is pictured here in one pose but multiple photo angles with my iPhone.

Each night between now and when the weather warms up, I'll be 'on-duty' from 1830-1930 hours each night. With the CBS Evening News and Erin Burnett OutFront keeping me updated on current events in the background, I do a deep dive into 1970s Kingston. I'll be learning about the real-world outside while doing my best to escape it in this tiny world I've created - moving freight cars around and serving Kingston's once-diverse waterfront industries as realistically as possible!

Kingston & Pembroke's Original Enginehouse

Its request refused to build on Fort Frontenac lands, the Kingston & Pembroke (K&P) instead settled on Place d’Armes in 1873. Its principal address was listed as Place d’Armes in 1885. The original station of the K&P in Kingston was built there. It later became the office building for the Frontenac Lumber & Coal Company. A spur was later laid here to serve the Montreal Transportation Company grain elevator. A small two-stall engine shed and turntable was nearby, in use between 1877 and 1883. 

Andrew Jeanes recently shared an excellent analysis of the above photo, made from a glass negative in the Queen's University Archives Vosper Collection. It shows one of my favourite parts of Kingston's industrial waterfront and its trackage. The photo may have been taken from a building on the east side of Barrack Street.

Andrew writes:

The photo shows the lumber yard of the Rathbun Company and the coal yard of the James Sowards Coal & Wood Co. at Place d’Armes and Ontario Street in downtown Kingston. 

Boxcar No. 444 belonged to the National Despatch Line, a private car operator that existed between 1869 and 1914. According to the June 1890 and June 1895 Official Railway Equipment Registers, National Despatch boxcars nos. 400-999 were all assigned to the Grand Trunk Railway, along with about 495 other boxcars in several number series.

James Sowards began conducting a coal and lumber business at the corner of Place d’Armes and Ontario Street in 1889, and the Rathbun Company moved its operations there from the foot of Queen Street in 1893. By 1907, the Frontenac Coal & Lumber Co. had taken over the Rathbun operation, so the photo must date from sometime between 1893 and 1906.

What’s really interesting to me is the building behind the boxcar with the large Rathbun Company sign and smaller Sowards sign on the roof. This was the original Kingston & Pembroke Railway enginehouse, built in November 1877. It was reported in the Whig as 70x53 feet, of frame construction, covered in iron and having a fire-proof roof. There was a turntable in front of this engine house from 1877 to 1883. In the 1908 fire insurance plan the building is labelled iron-clad “storage, cement salt etc."

In 1883 the K&P relocated to its new roundhouse at the foot of North Street, which was still there in the late 1970s. The old turntable at Place d’Armes was removed and the former enginehouse was leased for commercial purposes. The building survived until January 1920, when it was torn down along with a number of other buildings on the property. Today, this site is covered by the reconfigured intersection of Place d’Armes and Ontario Street and a portion of the Frontenac Village condo development.

An aerial view, circa 1915, shows the original K&P station and its engine house at opposite ends of the green line.

The buildings were located at the bottom left of this map:

A 1908 fire insurance map shows the station and engine house along Ontario Street:

Frontenac Lumber and Coal Company circa 1915 (below) Ontario Street at Place d Armes. Earlier, this was the first K&P station (Queen's University Archives, Kingston Picture Collection).