Toronto Reference Library Blog

New Gallery Opens Today: Bringing in the New with Respect for the Past

Toronto Public Library is thrilled to reopen the newly expanded TD Gallery, a vital exhibition space, located on the main floor of the Toronto Reference Library. Renovated as part of a five-year, $34 million revitalization of the Toronto Reference Library, the TD Gallery opens today, Saturday June 16th, with the exhibition, A Passion for History: The Legacy of James Bain.

The premiere exhibition features maps, prints, and books personally collected by James Bain, Toronto Public Library's first Chief Librarian (1883-1908).

As a collector in his own right, James Bain amassed a rich inventory of Canadiana, which has been donated by his family to the Library, where his legacy is preserved in the Special Collections of the Toronto Reference Library. Bain recognized the Library's role in preserving our cultural heritage.

 

 

The gallery expansion was made possible through a major corporate gift to the Toronto Public Library Foundation’s re:vitalize – Toronto Reference Library Campaign from TD Bank Group.

TD’s gift has enabled a significant redesign and expansion of its gallery space, which is primarily used for four expertly curated exhibitions each year featuring a broad range of rare and original materials that are drawn from the Special Collections in Canadiana, performing arts, documentary art, early children’s literature, speculative fiction and Arthur Conan Doyle materials. Opened originally in 1997, the gallery closed in early 2010 for renovations. Features of the expanded TD Gallery include:

•     A 40% increase in size to 2,600 square feet;
•     A new curved glass wall to increase gallery transparency and profile;
•     New interactive technology features to enable new mixed media presentations;
•     New museum standard HVAC, lighting and other conservation features.

We invite everyone to come by and have a look at the newly renovated spaces at the Toronto Reference Library, visit the newly re-opened TD Gallery, and check out the exhibit, which runs to Sat Sep 1, 2012.

How can you resist an invitation from James Bain, our first chief librarian and, a gentleman with such a twinkle in his eye?

 

Urban-Based Vertical Farming

   

A key component of urban sustainability is growing food locally, efficiently and in an environmentally sound manner.

Vertical farming, championed by Dr. Dickson Despommier, is a fascinating concept that builds on existing hydroponic farming. In The Vertical Farm: Feeding the World in the 21st Century, Despommier outlines the advantages of stacking crops in an artificially controlled environment, thereby allowing farmland to revert to its natural state.

Crops grown indoors are not affected by weather, and instead, thrive in an optimal growing environment. Indoor farming does not rely on pesticides, herbicides or fertilizers and does not produce agricultural run-off.  Many of the farming activities that require fossil fuels are eliminated, such as plowing, harvesting and transporting food from rural areas to cities. Vertical farms would likely use 70-95 percent less water, and in some cases, could purify grey water.

Despommier envisions a time when land depleted by traditional farming returns to its natural state. He suggests that these forests will consume large amounts of carbon dioxide and help cool the planet. 

As for what a vertical farm might look like, take a look at these futuristic designs, which the author admits are more fun and experimental than actual plans.

In The State of the World's Land and Water Resources, 2011, The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations predicts that by 2050, food production will need to increase by about 70 percent globally and nearly 100 percent in developing countries. This will be a huge challenege given that one quarter of agricultural land is highly depleted.

Let's hope that urban-based vertical farming can become a truly viable alternative.

The Vertical Farm is at the Toronto Reference Library, in the Business, Science and Technology Department, as well as at some branch libraries.

A Young Soldier, Castle Frank, and the War of 1812

For many Torontonians, Castle Frank is a rather obscure subway stop on the Bloor-Danforth line, used mostly by students from Rosedale Heights School of the Arts.

Once though, it was the location of the summer home of John Graves Simcoe, first lieutenant-governor of Upper Canada. It was named for Simcoe and his wife Elizabeth's eldest son, Francis Gwillim Simcoe.

Young Frank was "the most engaging pretty child you ever saw at his age," wrote his fond mother in 1793. "The Boy has a passion for ships, boats, cannons, paddling, roving, etc., we may respect his will to become a sailor..."

 

 

 

 

Frank Simcoe left Upper Canada with his family in 1796, studied at Eton, and became, not a sailor, but a soldier. 

Meanwhile, the Napoleanic Wars rocked Europe, and spilled into North America in what we call the War of 1812.

Lieutenant  Francis Simcoe, aged 20, was killed in action on April 6, 1812 at Badajoz, Spain, during the Peninsular War.

Think of him next time you pass Castle Frank.

 

United Nations Connections

Almost all international stories nowadays seem to involve the United Nations at one level or another. Yet the United Nations website includes such a vast amount of information that trying to get a sense of its size, contents, and activities, is like trying to sip water from an open fire hydrant.

A sampling of a dozen examples, pointing to the huge range of areas covered - all related to their large and ambitious mandates of promoting world peace and security, development, human rights, humanitarian affairs and international law - should illustrate this point:

1. UN Databases
2. Resolution 2040 and an announcement that the Security Council Extends Support Mission in Libya for additional 12 Months
3. The International Court of Justice
4. Treaties . . .  Agreement between the United States of America and Canada on Great Lakes Water Quality, 1978
5. Current Peacekeeping Operations
6. Statements and Speeches of Ban Ki-moon
7. Oceans and Law of the Sea
8. Report of the Security Council Mission to Afghanistan
9. The Kyoto Protocol - UN Framework Convention on Climate Change
10. A current story on Syria from the UN News Centre
11. International Merchandise Trade Statistics
12. The Status of Food Security in Africa by the Economic Commision for Africa

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The UN website can be challenging to navigate due to its large size, complexity of resouces, and multiple access points. If you are feeling daunted, you may want to come down to the library to get help consulting print and other resources.

These resources will give you an added perspective and understanding of the United Nations: following are five suggestions for getting started:

1. Of the many reference works on the United Nations, three stand out for special mention:
   

   Encyclopedia of the United Nations, 2nd ed.	United Nations Handbook, 2011	Encyclopedia of the United Nations and International Agreements, 3rd. ed.

2. For excellent topic overviews, mostly full text essays in encyclopedic sources, try searching the Gale Virtual Reference Library - this will require your library card for sign in.
3. Click Here for a search of over a thousand works by or about the UN at the Toronto Reference Library  - Note how the topic subdivides by subject at the bottom left hand column of the screen, eg. United Nations - Armed Forces
4. Click Here for books authord by the UN or co-authored by them within TPL
5. For articles . . . there will be a good selection to be found in the Social Sciences category of Article Search on our website - Note, this will also require your library card for sign in.

 

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Queen Elizabeth Celebrates Her Diamond Jubilee

On June 2nd, Queen Elizabeth marks the anniversary of her coronation and celebrates her sixtieth year as Queen of Great Britain, Canada, and other Commonwealth countries. 

For those interested in the lives of the royals and the spectacle of the coronation, the Toronto Reference Library has a collection of souvenir books and the coronation numbers of English magazines like The Commonwealth Today.  The souvenir books illustrate the crown jewels and regalia and give the history behind the coronation ceremony.  The magazines have lots of photographs of the Queen and the royal procession.The Baldwin Room in Special Collections also has original souvenir  programmes, music, photographs, and scrapbooks chronicling the Queen's coronation.

For a brief background on the Queen's coronation, visit The official website of The British Monarchy.  The Royal Archives have posted the following 3 films, Long To Reign Over Us: Parts 1, 2, and 3, on a webpage entitled, The Accession and Coronation.

  

 

 

 

  

 

The Internet Archive, Library and Archives Canada, has also released a video of The Golden Jubilee Concert of the Coronation of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II (June 1, 2003). Documentary footage (below) of 2.  Procession to the Abbey, 4. The Oath, and 10. Putting on the Crown, are just part of the larger concert video and image archives.