Looking west on College towards Lansdowne in 1939. The houses in the centre of the photo were demolished shortly afterwards to aloow College to continue and join up with Dundas Street.This is the location of a famous police shoot out with the Boyd Gang in 1952.
"On the morning of Thursday March 6, 1952 Suchan and Jackson would leave the Wright Avenue hideout to case a local bank for a future robbery. After laying low for almost four months the gang members were short of cash. As Suchan drove the 1951 Mercury Monarch, with the license plate 418-A-2, north on Roncesvalles Detectives Edmund Tong and Roy Perry of the Toronto police fell in behind. The detectives had been watching the Mercury for days on a tip that is believed to have come from one of the gangs girlfriends.
Suchan turned at College and as he approached the intersection at Lansdowne, the detectives instructed him to pull the Mercury over. As Tong approached the car shots rang out and a bullet ripped through his chest severing his spinal cord. Perry was wounded in the arm.
Suchan and Jackson sped off east along College for four blocks turning onto Sheridan Avenue where they ditched the Mercury and took a cab back to the Sorauren Avenue hideout."
-Michael Wilkins www.Examiner.com
In 2010 the Supertest gas station is gone and a Tim Horton's stands in it's place.
A Supertest Station.
Posts
I did an article in the early days of my blog on the Boyd Gang. I wrote it for my son who was then 9. I had no idea they had a hang out on Wright - where I live. I've got to do more research.
ReplyDeleteDid you find out the address on Wright Ave? What house number??
DeleteThere's a new feature film about the Boyd Gang that's just been shot in Sudbury (doubling for Toronto in the 1950's) They also had a hideout in an old garage on Bright Street in the East End (according to one of the senior residents)
ReplyDeleteThe film was actually shot in Sault Ste. Marie, not Sudbury
ReplyDeleteI will correct that fact.
ReplyDeleteYou did your 9 year old sons project ?
ReplyDelete