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Urban History Review Revue d'histoire urbaine

Levitt, Cyril H. and Shaffir, William. The Riot at . : Lester and Orpen Dennys, 1987. Pp. xii, 305. 8 black and white plates. $26.95 Paula J. Draper

Volume 17, numéro 3, february 1989

URI : https://id.erudit.org/iderudit/1017641ar DOI : https://doi.org/10.7202/1017641ar

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Éditeur(s) Urban History Review / Revue d'histoire urbaine

ISSN 0703-0428 (imprimé) 1918-5138 (numérique)

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Citer ce compte rendu Draper, P. J. (1989). Compte rendu de [Levitt, Cyril H. and Shaffir, William. The Riot at Christie Pits. Toronto: Lester and Orpen Dennys, 1987. Pp. xii, 305. 8 black and white plates. $26.95]. Urban History Review / Revue d'histoire urbaine, 17(3), 219–221. https://doi.org/10.7202/1017641ar

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Metcalfe, Alan. Canada Learns to Play: prevailed. The culture of the rural, the to support them. British elite ideas about The Emergence of Organized Sport, francophone, and the working classes were, sport, of course, persisted. 1807-1914. Toronto: McClelland and as Metcalfe says about the last group, Stewart, 1987. Pp. 243. Illustrations. "largely confined to the sidelines." It would Lacrosse, which enjoys an entire chapter, is $15.95 (paper). appear that the culture of a new, pushing used by Metcalfe to illustrate the nature of business class suffered the same fate to the amateur/professional clash —embodied, In this volume, Alan Metcalfe examines the some degree. And since the victory was in fact, in the conflict between the elite clubs growth of organized sport in Canada from chiefly that of Montreal and, later, Toronto, it of Montreal, representing traditional society 1807, when the Montreal Curling Club was was also a central Canadian one. and its values, and the Shamrocks, an Irish, founded, to 1914, when the Amateur Athletic Roman Catholic, working-class organization, Union of Canada had established control of The book builds to what is arguably representing modern structures and values. the amateur in sport. Metcalfe's considerable Metcalfe's best chapter, which is also, Even though they were the best club on the accomplishment lies somewhere between happily, his central one. It describes, if in field, the Shamrocks were unable to control that of Nancy and Max Howell's Sports and over-abundant detail, the growth of he the development of the sport in the face of Games in Canadian Life (1969) and John amateur ethic and its challenge at the end of elite resistance. Without support of traditional Hargreaves' study of Britain, Sport, Power the 19th century by professional, commercial institutions and an organizational centre, and Culture (1986). He appears to be aiming sport. There was to be no compromise. A lacrosse died as a commercial, and for a book like Hargreaves', one in the proposed compromise intended to permit proletarian, enterprise. So, too, did the tradition of E. P. Thompson, and at times he amateurs and professionals to play on the assertion of a commercial and proletarian approaches the standard. But he retains, still, same team was rejected by the purists. They culture. The middle-class, amateur ethic, much of the minutiae typical of the Howells underlined their declaration by the which arose in Montreal and spread to and sport historians of their genre. repudiation of the amateur status of Tom Toronto, was assailed by the proletarian Longboat, selected to run for Canada in the values of the city at the turn of the century, Metcalfe sees his book as a history of the 1908 Olympics. By 1909, the conservatives but they were at that time not strong enough emergence of new sport forms that had also achieved organizational control of to change the face of sport. correspond to the 19th-century evolution of sport, and, in doing so, confirmed as urban-industrial Canada. In this process, dominant the notion of the amateur. Metcalfe has produced a book that ranks spontaneous play forms, according to among the best yet produced on Canadian Metcalfe, gave way to a more rationalized Professional sport by no means disappeared, sport, but it is one that still lacks much structure of spectators, rules, and indeed commercialization of sport proceeded necessary descriptive clarity and analytical administrative bureaucracy. Despite the apace. The middle classes exploited the vigour. We still seem to be awaiting a changing nature of the larger society, and of market potential of their sports facilities and Canadian Hargreaves'. sport itself, the underlying and guiding ethic the working classes were quickly in sports remained amateurism, a product of consumerized. A history of professionalism Bernard F. Booth an earlier, elite society. is provided, including horse-racing, bicycle- University of Ottawa racing, and the touring professional who In this way, then, the roots of Canadian sport made his living travelling from city to city. are seen to lie in a clash between pre- Ned Hanlan is presented as the prototype for Levitt, Cyril H. and Shaffir, William. The industrial values, as represented in the the sport hero who is marketed by the press. Riot at Christie Pits. Toronto: Lester and amateur ethic, and those of the newer urban- But commercialization appears to have been Orpen Dennys, 1987. Pp. xii, 305. 8 black industrial patterns, as represented in confined to sectors, baseball, for example, and white plates. $26.95. commercial sport. By 1914 the former was because it had American support, and largely victorious, and the amateur ethic hockey because it was rural and somewhat It was the summer of 1933. Young men and (sport seen chiefly as avocation) prevailed in beyond the reach of the urban amateurs women paraded on the city's eastern much of the sporting world. Commercial, (though this last judgement seems beaches sporting swastika badges and t- professional sport was confined to certain questionable). More to the point is Metcalfe's shirts. One morning, residents of a downtown areas. discovery of hockey's professional roots in neighbourhood awoke to find a large the amateur game. British sports, such as swastika and "Heil Hitler" painted on a roof of Looked at in a social sense, the culture of cricket, existed in Canada only so long as the Willowvale clubhouse. During a junior the urban, anglophone middle classes there was a strong core of British expatriates league Softball game in Willowvale Park,

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(known locally as Christie Pits), between a exclusively Anglo Beaches neighbourhood devoted to newspaper accounts of Nazi predominantly Jewish team and a team were horrified by weekend invasions by atrocities. A helpful series of charts sponsored by a church, a swastika flag was immigrant bathers. These newcomers, some summarize the geographic, age, language unfurled and voices cried: "Heil Hitler" and of them Jews, monopolized the picnic tables, and occupational distribution of Jews in "Kill the Jews". In the riot that ensued several were noisy, nursed their babies in public, Toronto. The book is carefully documented. people were injured badly enough to be changed in their trucks and littered the The authors were frustrated in their attempts hospitalized, yet only one combatant was beaches. Local youths, adopting Nazi to interview former members of the Swastika eventually jailed. Responding to the ethnic paraphernalia, created "Swastika Clubs" Clubs and the non-Jewish fighters from the strife, the mayor threatened prosecution of which began a campaign of intimidation and Pits. This does not detract, however, from anyone displaying the swastika emblem. This occasional violence to rid of the vibrant picture they present, a picture was "Toronto the Good." He called on its these foreigners, conveniently lumped enhanced by their colourful use of quotations citizens to keep it that way. together as Jews. The Jewish community from Jewish old-timers. was quick to react. The authors argue in For most of Toronto's inhabitants, the riot at convincing detail that no one in Toronto could Levitt and Shaffir are concerned with a Christie Pits was quickly overshadowed by be ignorant, even at this early date, of the variety of issues raised by the events they the mounting tensions in Europe and the Nazi identification with the swastika and its describe. Their discussion of the changing enormous human tragedy of the Second symbolic connection to their treatment of ethnic mix of Toronto is enhanced by their World War. But the Jews of Toronto never Germany's Jews. Every newspaper in the look at interconnections between ethnic forgot the events of the summer of 1933, and city was replete with front-page reports on conceptions of territory and self-defence. the riot has become permanently embedded the abuse and murder of Jews under Nazi They also examine the changing face of in their ethnic mythology. It is a particular rule. The anti-Semitic incidents at the anti-Semitism in Canada and make strong point of honour to have participated in the Beaches were further sensationalized by the arguments to connect it, not only with a rioting, or even to have witnessed it. The press. As soon as the uproar on the generalized xenophobia, but with the growing fighting spirit of Jews against a perceived waterfront was resolved, through public world-wide influence of fascism. Their study Nazi threat was significantly enhanced meetings, the problem popped up again in of Toronto's newspapers during the early 30s through the "prism of the Holocaust." So too, the city's core. No longer was the issue one offers some suprising evidence of the extent show the authors, were the ironies. Several of of occasional territorial infringement, and the of knowledge about Nazi Jewish policies the Jewish and gentile youths who fought results were much more serious. available to Canadians. In light of the one another so viciously in Toronto found baseball riot, the whole issue of sports as a common graves in the battlefields of Europe. As their economic situation improved, the means of keeping youths out of trouble Jewish community began to shift northward during economic recession is perhaps too For forty-five years the anti-Semitic episodes from the immigrant areas of Spadina towards briefly touched upon. of the summer of 1933 remained a footnote . Christie Pits, located on the in the history of Toronto's Jews. Sociologists north side of Bloor, served as a symbolic Levitt and Shaffir also draw our attention to Cyril Levitt and William Shaffir perceived a geographic boundary. In their analysis, Levitt the relevance of their study today. Drawing wider significance and, in their detailed study and Shaffir demonstrate the ethnic tensions parallels to other anti-Semitic incidents in of the Beaches and Christie Pits episodes, which led inevitably to conflict at the park. Toronto's past — notably the they paint a colourful picture of a city Predominantly Anglo Toronto was undergoing riot in 1965 and recent Holocuast Denial undergoing the labour pains of an irreversible transformation. Through their trials — they illustrate that such outbursts are multiculturalism. Recreating the atmosphere re-creation of the riot between local Anglo no longer tolerated by the general public. of depression-era Toronto and its shifting gangs and Jewish youths (aided by some of Likewise the Jewish community has become demographic composition through an their Italian and Ukranian fellow immigrants), more sophisticated in its dealings with other emphasis on oral interviews and newspaper the authors open a window to our past and ethnic groups and with government. accounts, Levitt and Shaffir demonstrate how to new ways of understanding the ethnic prejudice and xenophobia could escalate integration of a North American city. The authors have given us a valuable case into condoned violence. study of the effects on the urban landscape The method of presentation is not particularly of economic recession, xenophobia and The story is presented as a series of chronological, a fault that leads to some prejudice. By adding the influence of global connected incidents of antisemitic repetition and confusion. There is also an insecurities, particularly events in countries of provocation. The residents of Toronto's overabundance of detail in the chapters origin of specific ethnic groups, they have

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illustrated how easily demographic shifts can But Holdsworth does not explain why the book is thus welcome on that account alone. cause urban violence. As Levitt and Shaffir Toronto model works better, just that it does. Professor Litchfield is the author of three fine conclude, "the swastika battles in Toronto Yet why should the government construction essays on Florence in this period: on the during August 1933 were among the most of a carpark and its subsequent operation as demography of the patriciate (Journal of violent expressions of ethnic animosity in the regulated private enterprise lead to a Economic History, 1969), on their city's history." Their book is a tribute to the situation where one "has to park one's car, commercial investments (Annales, 1969), new "Toronto the Good," a city which has unlocked, in a seedy lot in some larger and on their access to office (Renaissance taken great strides towards making the American city ...?" Holdsworth seems to Studies in Honor of Hans Baron, 1971 ). It has scores of different ethnic groups who suggest that urban pathology can be been almost 20 years since he promised us constitute the multicultural mosaic of the city prevented by government-operated carparks. in those essays a general study of the feel safe, secure, welcome, and at home. In No doubt the Parking Authority would agree. patriciate during the principate: at last his doing so, they have enhanced our But should scholars? Is not the difference long labours have reached fruition. understanding of the development of the between government ownership and "city that works." regulation too minor, and the municipal Unfortunately the end product is not a great carpark too insignificant (especially when book. The patriciate as members of the Paula J. Draper most of Toronto's have been privately- bureaucracy provides Litchfield with his Research Associate owned), to account for either American guiding theme but little he has to say on this Multicultural History Society urban decay or the success of Toronto? subject (for all the care and effort he has of And, since the "Toronto model" had only one brought to it) surprises or excites. One other application in Canada, it surely cannot cannot help regretting that he did not provide a foundation for differentiating complete the more general social history of Holdsworth, Deryck W. The Parking Canadian from American cities. the patriciate that he seems once to have Authority of Toronto, 1952-1987. Toronto: planned. Press, 1987. Pp xii, Basically, Holdsworth expects too much of 122. Illustrations, maps, bibliography, the carpark. It simply did not have the impact At the centre of his early work were the index. — judging from his own evidence — to make economic strategies of the patriciate: Toronto the "city that works." But as a book marriage customs designed to prevent the In writing this brief, authorized history of the on a parking authority, there are penetrating dissipation of patrimonies and extensive Parking Authority of Toronto (1952-1987), insights here into Toronto's traffic history, and investments in land and (until the mid 18th Holdsworth, a geographer, had both full the debate over the automobile around 1970. century) in Florentine commerce. Office- access to the Authority's files plus (to quote Urban specialists should read this small holding, in his original view, gave them an the foreword) "complete freedom in his book, perhaps the best on the subject when influence on policy that served to protect work." He used that freedom to extol the the subject is parking. their commercial investments: as a source of Parking Authority as "demonstrably income it was of limited (though not economic, self-sufficient, and exemplary — Donald Davis negligible) importance. With the end of the and consequently representative of the Department of History Medici dynasty that influence collapsed. established Canadian preference for benign University of Ottawa They saved what they could from the government." In other words, when he is not wreckage of their commercial investments, narrating the Authority's history, garage by abandoning commerce to the urban middle garage, Holdsworth is anxious to contrast Litchfield, R. Burr. Emergence of a class. But they were compensated by the (superior) Canadian public enterprise with Bureaucracy: The Florentine Patricians, end of controls on the grain trade which had (inferior) American private enterprise. "The 1530-1790. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton kept down prices. What they lost in trade American model was," he writes, "largely one University Press, 1986. Pp. xiii, 407. they stood to make up in rents. Paradoxically, where municipalities built and then leased Illustrations, tables, bibliography, index. then, their loss of power freed them from an garages to private bidders, using their $47.50 (U.S.). outmoded economic strategy based upon leverage over parking rates as their window guild monopolies. on the industry. Toronto, in contrast, chose a There are few good books on Florence after different variant on the authority model, one the collapse of the republic, with the notable Litchfield's book provides, in its last two where the municipality owned and operated exception of Eric Cochrane's well-known sections, a much more developed account of the facilities." Florence in the Forgotten Centuries. This patrician land-holding. Particularly interesting

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