Our Main Project: Collecting Seniors' Stories
Extraordinary Women Series: The Remarkable Stories of Two Grandmothers
For our next Extraordinary Women Series event, Sunday, March 29, 12:30 pm at the Revue Cinema, we turn to our own history and the stories of two women who were, at one point, our neighbours: Jean Lumb, above left, who with her husband ran a grocery store in the Junction and a restaurant in Chinatown, and was invested in the Order of Canada for her community work and activism; and Foon Hay Lum, separated from her husband for more than three decades by Canada’s so-called Chinese Exclusion Act, a Parkdale resident who embraced the campaign for compensation because of the head tax and the Exclusion Act. Foon Hay Lum lived to 111.
We learn their stories through a documentary written, directed and produced by Jean Lumb’s granddaughter Keira Loughran, who with Foon Hay Lum’s granddaughter Helen Lee set off on a quest to learn their grandmothers’ stories. Joining us for the discussion are Helen Lee and Arlene Chan, Jean Lumb’s daughter and a Chinese Canadian historian.
Watch the trailer. Buy tickets in advance on Eventbrite and at the door for a suggested donation of $16. Click here.
Creating Art from Trash: Artists’ Talk this Sunday, March 15, 2:00 pm at the Studio
What will the legacy be of our consumer society? No doubt garbage dumps as one of our most dominant engineered landmarks. Fortunately, there are a few people out there, trying to repurpose material that really should not be consigned to the trash.
Meet The Salvage Sisters, Beverley Daniels, above right, and Melissa Fisher-Rozenberg, who have created installations, collages and woven pieces from beautiful materials otherwise destined for the dump. Their show closes this Sunday, March 15, but you can still see it from noon to 5:00 pm, Saturday and Sunday. As an added bonus, Bev and Melissa are presenting an artists’ talk Sunday, at 2:00 pm at the studio, 9 Neepawa Ave. in Roncesvalles, just a block south of Howard Park and east off Roncy.
Toronto’s stained glass treasures
Stained glass restorer Henry Knight gives an illustrated talk on the stained glass jewels in many of Toronto’s older homes.
Older Toronto homes are filled with stained glass windows featuring birds, flowers, vines and intricate patterns. Who designed and made these leaded panes? Henry Knight, a stained glass artist and restorer, has made it his urgent mission to find out. This city’s housing stock in historic neighbourhoods is being demolished, and antique features like the windows are being lost.
Join us on Wednesday, April 15, at 7:00 pm at Back Lane Studios, 9 Neepawa Ave., for Henry’s illustrated talk about Toronto’s stained glass treasures and the artists who created them.
This presentation has been organized by the Sunnyside Historical Society. Space is limited. Please reserve your place for free on Eventbrite. Click here. We welcome donations at the studio. If you sign up and then can’t attend, please cancel your reservation on Eventbrite or email us at info@backlanestudios.ca.
Back Lane Studios is located at 9 Neepawa Ave. in the heart of Roncesvalles Village, a block south of Howard Park Ave. and just east off Roncesvalles.
Learn some video skills! New program starts Monday, Jan. 26, 1-3:00 pm
The New Year is here! Why not try something new, and at the same time help us collect stories for our Mapping our Memories project? We will be scheduling a free six-session (or more if needed) hands-on video-making course on Monday afternoons, starting Sept. 26, from 1:00 to 3:00 pm. You’ll learn how to use the technology you most likely already have — smart phone and laptop computer — to make a short video, and to use free simple editing programs. You’ll also get lots of personal help. We would love to include the videos in our Mapping our Memories project if you agree.
Videographer Cheryl Rondeau is our instructor. Cheryl has made many short videos, most recently about Inuit art and artists. Also helping us to refine our videos is Boyd Bonitzke, a video and sound editor.
We continue to schedule drop-in video-making sessions Mondays from noon to 1:00 pm and Wednesday from 1:00 to 3:00 pm. Above, an image from a short video made by Maureen Chicorli on how she met her mother-in-law. Watch the video here.
Interested? Email us at ellen@backlanestudios.ca or call 647-313-1654. The programs are free. Donations are welcome!
Resources for Researching Toronto History
Wayne Reeves, recently retired from his post of Chief Curator for Toronto, has shared his knowledge on research tools that are useful for anyone researching Toronto’s history.
When the writers read: March 12, 7:00 pm
On Thursday, the writers in Carolyn Bennett’s memoir writing course shared some of their work at our public reading at the studio Thursday, March 12. This was a hardworking group! The stories were well-crafted, evocative and full of heart. Thanks to all of the participants. and to Carolyn, the course leader. We hope she will be available later this year for another memoir-writing course.
And, by the way, the food was great!!
Back Lane Film Club 2026: “Ladies in Lavender” up next!
The Back Lane Film Club was off to a frothy start this year on Jan. 4 with the spoof Murder by Death, leavened with cocktails! That was followed by more serious and challenging fare: Cloud Atlas.
This March 1, we’re featuring Ladies in Lavender, starring the incomparable Maggie Smith and Judi Dench. In this film, they are sisters living on the Cornish Coast as World War II is brewing. A mysterious young man is washed up on the beach … and the drama begins!
At Back Lane Film Club, members nominate and then vote on selections for the year. Screenings are usually the first Sunday afternoon of the month with a hiatus inJuly and August. Are you interested in joining the club? The fee is $25 for the year, with snacks included. Find the details here.
OldTO.org: Mapping Archival Photos
Welcome to OldTO. It’s an interactive map featuring a wealth of digitized historic photos from the City of Toronto Archives.
Are you interested in what your neighbourhood might have looked like? Do you want to revisit downtown before all of the condos went up? Have a look at the map and see. There are thousands of images, some dating back to 1856.
The map was originally created by Sidewalk Labs, the Google affiliate that was planning a downtown development in Toronto’s Portlands. Sidewalk abandoned its project in 2020 and eventually stopped hosting OldTO.org. However, they kindly left the source code freely available.
At Back Lane Studios, we were sad to see OldTO.org vanish. One of our main projects is our Mapping our Memories endeavour. This photo map parallels this interest, and we are thrilled to be able to restore it.
We will be forever grateful to software developer Michael Lenaghan for his terrific work bringing this mapping tool back to life!
Read the article about OldTO in BlogTO!