Haunted Ontario 3. Terry Boyle
site is also one of the most enchanting haunted locations in all of Canada. These two theatres were originally built by Marcus Loews as a flagship. His motto was, “We sell tickets to theatres not shows.” Marcus was born on May 7, 1887, in Queens, New York, into a poor, Jewish family. He left school at the age of nine to sell newspapers and lemons on the street. Marcus continued to work hard and started and failed at more than one business venture. He was bankrupt before he reached the age of twenty.
Then Marcus met Adolph Zukor, who became his friend and partner. Marcus purchased Zukor’s penny arcade business and set about expanding it across the United States.
During an opening of an arcade in Cincinnati, he was told of a competitor who was successful with motion pictures rather than mechanical machines. He promptly struck a deal with the Vitagraph Company for the necessary equipment and films, borrowed chairs, and based on nickel admissions, grossed almost $250 that very first day!
In New York, he bought a Brooklyn burlesque house and converted it into the Royal, a first class house that mixed vaudeville bills and movies.
Next, Marcus made a deal with brothers Joseph and Nicholas Schenck to form the Fort George Amusement Company in 1906. Over the next decade he worked on a slow and methodical plan to obtain theatrical dominance. By November of 1918, he owned 112 theatres throughout North America that offered the mix of vaudeville and movies.
He died on September 5, 1927 at the age of fifty-seven, bequeathing a $30-million-dollar estate to his wife, Caroline, and his sons. According to the Ontario Heritage Trust, “This complex was the Canadian flagship of Marcus Loew’s legendary theatre chain and was designed by Thomas Lamb, as a double-decker theatre complex. It contained the Winter Garden Theatre, which was constructed seven storeys above Loew’s Yonge Street Theatre (renamed the Elgin Theatre in 1978).”
The Davies Takacs Lobby has been the scene of several paranormal encounters.
The Winter Garden Theatre
Loew’s Yonge Street Theatre opened on December 15, 1913, and on February 16, 1914, the Winter Garden Theatre opened. The Ontario Heritage Trust adds, “The two theatres were distinct; the Elgin was all gold leaf and rich fabrics, a formal theatre of plaster cherubs and ornate opera boxes. The Winter Garden Theatre was a botanical fantasy, its walls hand-painted to resemble a garden, its ceiling a mass of real beech boughs and twinkling lanterns.”
The gold-and-marble domed “hard top” lower theatre (The Elgin) was home to continuous vaudeville shows and movies. The upper level, the Winter Garden Theatre, was an atmospheric country garden beneath the stars. This theatre was built for the big-time vaudeville market, and it had reserved seats at premium prices, that catered to the middle class. As well as competing in a different market, the upper theatre was used for theatrical experimentation without posing the risk of closing the lower theatre.
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The Ontario Heritage Trust describes the acts, “The theatres played host to such great acts as George Burns and Gracie Allen, Sophie Tucker, Milton Berle, and Edgar Bergen and Charlie McCarthy.”
According to the Elgin and Winter Garden Theatre booklet, “Loew’s Yonge Street Theatre was the larger of the two theatres, seating 2,149. The Winter Garden Theatre seated 1,410 patrons.
“The Elgin could accommodate a show that consisted of eight to ten vaudeville acts, interspersed with newsreels and a silent movie. This downstairs theatre was the ‘grind’ house, with continuous daily shows starting at 11:00 a.m. The Winter Garden Theatre was intended as the more prestigious of the two theatres, featuring higher ticket prices, reserved seating, and a single evening performance.”
The popularity of vaudeville declined with the advent of talking pictures. In May of 1928, the Winter Garden Theatre was closed. The theatre remained closed for more than half a century, a time capsule of a bygone era. Loew’s Yonge Street Theatre (The Elgin) remained open.
By the 1960s, the staircase leading up to the Winter Garden Theatre was hidden behind a partition wall and a drop ceiling. The existence of the Winter Garden Theatre was all but forgotten.
The Elgin Theatre continued to operate as a movie house. As the decades passed the theatre gradually slipped into disrepair. On March 17, 1978, Leow’s Yonge Street Theatre was renamed The Elgin Theatre.
In 1981, the Ontario Heritage Trust purchased the building. Prior to launching into a massive restoration of the theatres, the successful production of Cats ran for nearly two years at the Elgin Theatre. The Trust adds, “The most successful pre-sales theatrical event in Canada at the time.”
In 1987, a $29 million restoration initiative of the building and the two theatres was begun. The trust describes this awesome task of restoration and the treasures that were found during the process.
“The gilt plaster detail work in the Elgin Theatre required more than three-hundred thousand wafer-thin sheets of aluminium leaf. The walls of the Winter Garden Theatre had to be cleaned using fifteen-hundred pounds of raw dough to avoid damaging the original hand-painted watercolour artwork.”
According to the Elgin and Winter Garden booklet, “The Winter Garden Theatre’s most unusual aspect, its leafy ceiling, was still intact; the leaves, brittle and dust-covered, had to be replaced. For this purpose more than five thousand real beech branches were harvested, preserved, painted, fireproofed, and woven into wire grids suspended from the theatre ceiling.
“In the downstairs Elgin Theatre, major plaster elements [including the theatre opera boxes] had been removed and the original colour scheme obscured by as many as twenty-seven layers of paint in some areas. Using the original design drawings and historic photographs as guides, missing elements were faithfully recreated, damaged elements repaired, and the original colour scheme accurately restored.”
The Trust states, “More than sixty-five thousand square feet of new space was created, including the lobby and lounge areas, and an eight-storey backstage pavilion housing modern dressing rooms and two rehearsal halls.”
On December 15, 1989, the Elgin and Winter Garden Theatres re-opened. “The theatres have once again become one of finest theatrical stage complexes.
“One of the greatest treasures discovered during the restoration, is the world’s largest collection of vaudeville scenery — hand-painted flats and drops dating from 1913. Several restored pieces, including the magnificent Butterfly and Scarab Scenery Flats, are now displayed in the theatre centre.”
Imagine an entire theatre, intact with all its decor, sealed up for so many years! A perfect recipe for spirit activity, time travel, and spiralling energy! Is this the case?
According to Cecilia Aguilera, an employee who works in the box office located in the lobby of the theatre, “We are not haunted, nor are we petrified. The theatre is like a vortex of energy.”
Late one afternoon this past fall (2013) I met Linda Atkinson, who had agreed to tour me through the building. Linda is a delightful and informative volunteer tour guide of the theatres. She displays enthusiasm and shares a deep connection to the historical perspective of the Elgin and Winter Garden Theatres and to the spirits who come and go in the building. She is very aware of, and familiar with, the spirits and the energy that inhabit the structure. She described many of the areas of the building where one can potentially see a spirit and experience spiralling energy.
She began with the spirit they call the Lilac or Lavender Lady. During the 2002 theatre season there were four months when the Winter Garden Theatre was “black” (a term used to describe a time when no shows are playing). There is a superstition that an emptied theatre, left completely dark, will invite a ghost to take up residence. Another version of the same superstition claims that the ghosts of past performances return to the stage to relive their glory moments. To prevent this, a single light is left burning at centre stage after