More old photos of the W.E. & LS Railway, from the Bernie Drouillard Collection, digitized by John Stefani.
Waiting Room & General Offices at Kingsville. From the Ontario Hydro archives. c. 1921.
Waiting Room & Freight Shed at Essex. From the Ontario Hydro archives. c. 1921.
The Powerhouse at Kingsville. From the Ontario Hydro archives. c. 1921. The powerhouse is still standing in Kingsville. Click here to see John’s photos of the powerhouse on Flickr.
A photo of car # 318, location unknown. The back of the photo is noted “OHSC Archives Neg. No. HP 2828”. From the Ontario Hydro archives, c. 1921.
Here’s another shot with the Kingsville powerhouse in background. Car # 25 in the foreground. From the Ontario Hydro archives, c. 1921.
This shot was taken at the Car Barn on Chatham St. The barn is visible in the rear, to the right you can see the corner of the Eaton-Clark warehouse, that is still standing on Chatham St.
The four cars staged and ready to be moved in December, 1939. The photo must be on Aylmer St. downtown, around the corner from the car barn. The only section of rails left in the road stretched from Chatham & Aylmer to Howard & Erie. All four cars are on rails, so this was somewhere in this stretch.
Moir Cartage, was hired to tug the cars along the rails. As there was no longer any power lines above the tracks, the cars were not able to move under their own power. Note the children playing in the street, near some streetcars being pulled by a truck. I’m certain that there wasn’t any safer place for those children to be. 🙂
On the back of this photo written in pencil, it says: “”#507 at Cock Bros. Feeds & Grains Whse”. There is also a National Archives of Canada stamp on the back, Neg. No. PA152224. In September 2006, I did a post on the Cock Brothers, but I have no idea if this was the same building or where their warehouse was.
Car # 507 as seen above at Cock Brothers. This photo is dated 1931, somewhere along the route.
You guys continually amaze me with the things you unearth. Is our municipal archives/museum doing any of this work or is it up to the Bernie Drouillard/John Stefani dynamic duo to safeguard Windsor’s history for us?
Maybe if our museum & archives weren’t treated as afterthoughts, but as cultural resources by our City Governemnt and actually given funding, and the proper facilites, they would be able to tell Windsor’s story a little better.
As it is, I am certain that all matters of Heritage are viewed more as an irritant, than as somthing to protect.
If it wasn’t for this site, and all the private collections that I feature, most of these stories would remain in the dark.
Which is why we need you. Don’t go anywhere, Andrew, OK?
Maybe we could find an empty storefront downtown like Christian Aldo did to display your work and others like you. Probably could get a government grant to hire a student or two for the summer.
Keep up the GREAT work Andrew.
Does anybody know where some of those rail cars ended up? Didn’t some go to Toronto and then eventually to the States…
It would be nice to get one of them back and displayed somehow.
Does any one know, where some of the rail cars are today? Didn’t some go to Toronto and then to the States. It would be nice to get one of them back.
Andrew – old post i know, but in the second last picture you said you don’t know if this is the same building or where the wearhouse was for the cock bros. if you never resolved this question, i’m ALMOST positive the building behind the streetcar is at the corner of hanna east and howard. it would be hidden now by a repair shop for cabs or somwthing. if i’m right, the tracks in the foreground are for the ERT.
also, again if i’m right, my first job was in that building making effing lead fishing lures!
sorry…..ETR (Essex Terminal Railway)
It’s too bad Windsor and Essex County have not done more to preserve its railway history. Looking at the waterfront today, one would never know how busy it was with rail transportation. All that remains is CNR 5588 (The Spirit of Windsor) and some hardware used by docking rail ferries (with nothing to indicate to the public what these really are). Then there are the ‘cuts’ which permitted CPR and Michigan Central access to the riverfront… one of which is soon to be converted to a canal.
Lived in Windsor 1950-1960 and recall tracks partially buried north side of Riverside Dr. with a ‘turnout’ southward into the Carling Brewery building on south side on Riverside. Would these be the route of SW&A to LaSalle (and Amhertburg??)–or Windsor, Essex and Lakeshore, or just an industrial spur to serve the brewery? I recall observing electric locomotives at Michigan Central/CPR passenger station near Pelletier/Tecumseh and an underground passageway from the station itself to the tracks opposite on the east side.
I stumbled on tracks peeking out from under the asphalt, turning from eastbound on Park St. to south on Ouellette; possibly the last remnant of Windsor’s transportation history.
p.s.: ex-pats of Windsor here in The Big Smoke all share and enjoy this great blog…
i hear ya JBM. i seen a picture of the ferry docks on Flickr and this dude was going on and on about how they were machines used to form the breakwalls and straighten out the riverfront!
Ken, great to have you guys with us! that’s interesting about the spur to the brewery, and i don’t see whynot. the car in picture number 5 looks like a freight car and they did advertise freight service. it would probly be the SW&A since the tracks headed down riverside,and followed 18 to amherstburg. (i’m no expert, but i think i’m right).
i beleive to get to essex by interurban, you’d take the WE&LS up howard to where the mall is, then the tracks follow talbot road to essex, ruthven, kingsville and leamington.
all those tracks you spoke of are gone as far as i know, and the only tracks left in the road are at sandwich and mill.