Dramatic Skies

Looking across Lebreton Flats from the west end of Slater Street, July 24 2024. As always, click on the pic to view larger. The partly-hidden rib-roofed oval form just below the middle of the image is Ādisōke, the Ottawa Public Library's new main branch, still under construction.

The 216,000-square-foot, five-story building is roughly 85% complete. Delayed past its original 2026 window; the OPL has extended the lease on its current main branch (120 Metcalfe Street) through the end of 2027 while construction finishes. Budget — approaching $352 million amid construction delays and "contractor challenges."

yes, THAT Shannon Tweed

 

Shannon Tweed, Miss Ottawa Valley, the Ottawa Journal, October 21 1977

"Shannon's" restaurant/bar and dance club opened at 321 Bank Street in late November 1977, just north of Barrymore's — photo by Lynn Ball for the Ottawa Citizen. The Citizen would later describe Shannon's as a "seedy little rock bar." The address had previously been home to the Victoria Dining Lounge ...

... and before that, a t-shirt shop.

After Shannon left Ottawa to pursue an acting and modelling career, the club became Hooper's Restaurant/Club and then Fanny's Cabaret (re-numbered as 317 Bank.) The building underwent major renovation in 1998 and reopened as the Babylon Nightclub*, with the Cue & Cushion billiard hall upstairs. It now hosts a Dollarama store. 

Ms Tweed would eventually marry Gene Simmons of the rock band KISS — the couple remain happily married to this day.

*don't get me started on Babylon. Really.

Garter Snakes in the the Spring

"The eastern gartersnake (Thamnophis sirtalis sirtalis) is highly variable in colour and patterning but tends to be dark green to black with three yellow stripes: one down the back and one on each side, on the second and third scale row. Some individuals have whitish chequered or speckled patterning along the back, and melanistic individuals (black back with no stripes) are very common in some regions (such as on Pelee Island). The eastern gartersnake has a yellowish chin and belly. This species typically reach 45 to 80 centimetres, but large females can grow to over a metre in length."

(source)

Photo taken in Hurdman Wood, April 2016.

36 First Avenue, the Glebe, Ottawa

 A 2½-storey brick-veneer-on-wood with a gambrel roof, a narrow house on a narrow lot, built some time between 1900(?) and 1912. As with the previous post, a renumbering of this part of First Avenue in the 1900s, combined with the lack of Directories from 1902 to 1907 make it difficult to pinpoint a build date or name a first occupant.

60 First Avenue, the Glebe, Ottawa

Intriguing. Also mysterious. Sixty on First appears on Goad's sheet 147, 1912, as a small brick-veneered 2½-storey wooden home, reaching halfway back on its 100-foot-deep lot. Goad indicates that the address was previously 40-something. Weren't we all?

I'm going to say early 1900s, occupied by ... someone.

Barely decipherable aerials suggest that house may have been extended backward to nearly the rear of the lot as early as the first half of the 20th century. The current high-quality stone veneer (and associated rebuilding?) must be at least 30 years old. The half-gambrel is either original, late-original, or sheer sass, I can't tell which. And if that's the original-original limestone foundation (sadly hiding behind some cars in this image), I am in quiet awe.

Realty sites describe #60 as a condo, suggesting more than one unit. This makes me wonder if projecting front bay is a stair-well. 

 

33 Argyle Avenue, Golden Triangle, Ottawa

This house was built in the early 1900s and was first advertised as a rental in the spring of 1903, when Argyle Ave was still called "Archibald," for the son of William Stewart, original owner of the property (part of "Stewarton", Lot F, Concessions C & D, Nepean Township.)

Do look at those rents, would you? They make me want to jump off the balcony of my $1,500/month studio apartment, only my apartment doesn't have a balcony.

Note the spelling of Catharine Street, with a second 'a' — the current spelling of Catherine was adopted, we are told, in 1913. Catharine Stewart was the wife of William.

I shot this photo as something of an experiment. I usually shoot in colour (on iPhone) then convert to B&W, trying to enhance the contrast in Photoshop. Here, I've shot with iPhone's "Noir" filter, which is contrasty to a fault, and then tried to rescue the mid-tones. I almost like the effect.

 

190 Cartier Street, Golden Triangle, Ottawa

 This brick 2½-storey has accrued a robust collection of sun-porches over the decades. Likely built c. 1904-1905, first occupied by Hubert D. Lyon, proprietor of the Ottawa Transfer Company.

31 Bower Street, Old Ottawa East

 The house appears on the 1928 aerials (green arrows) at a time when the Bower/Mutchmor neighbourhood was roughly half built up on what had lately been market-gardening lots. The likely first occupants were John and Edith Brown — he was a bookbinder at the Library of Parliament.

The (newer) Canadian Martyrs Catholic Church, Main Street, Old Ottawa East

The church, completed in 1953, was built to replace the original that had become too small for OOE's growing English Catholic parish. Details here. The sign in front of the church in the 1953 photo reads "Doran" — the building contractor.

232 Lisgar Street, Centretown, Ottawa

 Built 1887-1888, first occupied by "Oxley James M, clerk Department Marine."