Caption: A somewhat unconventional streetcar photo: TTC PCC 4457 on Dundas Street East waits at the light westbound at Jarvis Street, doors open for any last-minute passengers. More than a few open windows with elbows poking out suggests it's a warm day, with other riders at the back going about reading their papers. The elevated left-hand vantage point might be from aboard one of those British double decker buses the TTC tried in tourist service around this time, sitting behind in traffic. Another PCC car approaches in the distance from around Church Street, and beyond that the towering Eaton Centre shopping mall and office tower at Yonge Street. The brown building in the middle is the Bond Place Hotel.

But the real attraction here (in a matter of speaking) is the Warwick Hotel, another one of those seedy establishments of ill-repute in the general Yonge-Dundas area of Toronto. "Star Strip Revue", "Stripperrama", and "Nude Girls" advertise the kind of entertainment one may expect to witness inside, as well as rooms charging a $7 per person rate, rather than per hour. Other photos show retail shops sharing space on the ground level of the hotel included Lisa Variety at the corner, and some place called the "Nut Nest" (a nut shop, selling nuts). Aptly named.

Research shows the Warwick Hotel was originally built as a hotel known as the Royal Cecil Apartments, owned by James Franceschini, an Italian immigrant who originally came to Canada from the old country before the war with no money and no English, but who picked up a pickaxe and went on to found and grow the Dufferin Construction empire. The Royal Cecil was originally just a hotel, and featured dance bands during the 1940/50's, but changed to its later questionable offerings by the 60's. City of Toronto Archives photos show the wrecking ball would come knocking on the Warwick in a few years, brought to the ground by Teperman Wrecking during 1980-81. The site would become home to a rather uneventful parking lot for many years to follow.

Roger Jenkins photo, Dan Dell'Unto collection slide.