We were first contacted by a staff member of this unique building in regards to a possible haunting in the Fall of 2005. A brief history of the building follows:

Toronto's first Stock Exchange building was built in 1912 at 234 Bay Street. The Exchange merged in the 1930s with the Standard Stock and Mining Exchange and a new structure was erected on the same site. Designed by architects George and Moorehouse with associate S.H. Maw and completed in 1937 it combines streamlined modern, art deco and stripped classicism. The dominant style, however, is streamlined modern. Its elegant proportions and sophisticated detailing perfectly suited its Bay Street address. Revered as an architectural and technological marvel, a "masterful expression of its time, place and function" with "the most up-to-date trading floor in the world." The Toronto Stock Exchange building was designated a heritage property on August 14, 1978 because of its "architectural value and historic interest." The Exchange moved in 1983 to its current headquarters at the corners of King and York streets. The original building has remained wholly intact and parts were fully restored by the developer. It is currently home to the Design Exchange, which is open to the public. Please check the Design Exchange's website listed below for further details.

The activity reported to us by the staff member include poltergeist-like phenomena such as turning on taps in the kitchen, interference with the electrical system, footsteps, apparitions, eerie feelings of a presence, and possible images of this strange creature caught on a surveillance camera. Older reports do exist and are similar to those mentioned above.

Matthew Didier and Sue Demeter conducted a preliminary investigation at the Design Exchange on Saturday October 29th. Staff reports were taken as well a tour of the affected areas. EMF readings taken at the location "hotspots" did not indicate anything out of the normal range that would be expected. 1-2 milligauss. Photos taken at the time do not show any anomalies. Sue did notice an immediate change of atmosphere upon entering the trading floor (this could be due to the structure itself and acoustics). Unfortunately all video surveillance tapes were destroyed and they were unable to be examined.

A further in-depth investigation is planned with a larger team and we are working on a full historical background check.

If you have had an experience that you cannot explain in this building either during it's years as the Toronto Stock Exchange or as The Design Exchange and/or you can provide further information we would appreciate hearing from you.

Sources

* The Design Exchange - http://www.dx.org/dxflash.html

Private Correspondence with staff members

In-person Interview October 29th 2005

If you have anything to add or something you feel we should know, please contact us:

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The Design Exchange - Bay Street, Toronto

The purpose of this study is to provide information for the inquiry into unusual circumstances at the former Toronto Stock Exchange, now The Design Exchange. This report is threefold. First, the original geological situation of the property is described briefly. Second, the tenants of the location prior to the building and use as the Toronto Stock Exchange is explored. Finally, information relevant to major persons and events with regard to the building's use as the TSX from 1913 through 1983 is included where available.

Geology information submitted by Scott Smith, PSICAN

Quaternary Geology - Downtown Toronto
1980 information source
Resource - 3501 C5.1891 Prelim map 2204 (East Sheet)


Bedrock: (Palaeozoic Ordovician)

Grey shale with interbedded dolomitic siltstone and minor limestone (Georgian Bay Formation) that were deposited in shallow seas about 450 million years ago. These beds, named the Georgian Bay Formation (a term proposed in 1969 for lithostratigraphic unit of blue and grey shale with some limestone interbeds) are approximately 600 feet thick and dip to the SE at about 5k/km. Georgian Bay shale is used extensively for brick manufacturing.
Following long periods of additional sedimentation and erosion the ancient Laurentian River and it's tributaries cut deep, poorly defined bedrock valleys trending northwest - southeast across the Toronto area.

Overburden: Pleistocene: (older tills - Middle Wisconsinan and older)

Above the bedrock we find the Ice Age deposits of silty clay to silt till and sandy silt till to clayey sand till. North of Queen we begin to see Lake Iroquois (once this lakes shore line went as far north as Davenport, around Yonge Street, the 401 on the West side of Toronto and Eglington around the Don River) shallow deposits beneath the top layer (sand and silty sand). Just south of Dundas is an older lakes layer; deeper-water deposits of silt and clay.
Anything south of Front is fill.

The area in question is approximately 250 to 275 feet above sea level.

Relevance to this study: Because the limestone deposits are minor and primarily small locals, it is unlikely that any anomalous sounds can be attributed to intermittent limestone weeping as is generally found in smaller structures or more prominent limestone deposits. The sediment of siltstone and sand is interesting because of the possibility of deep settling which could cause some minor relocation of small objects from time to time. It is my belief that such would not occur necessarily in any repeatable pattern but rather in a random way and only after significant earth movement or serious moisture introduction. As this location has been settled and built upon for over 200 years it is unlikely that sediment shift would cause repeated poltergeist-like activity.

Tenancy to 1983

Aboriginal Peoples
The region was populated by Indians of the Huron and Petun tribes until around 1600, when they withdrew to land south of Georgian Bay. The first European to stand on the shores of Lake Ontario in the vicinity of what is now Toronto was French explorer Etienne Brule in 1615. The Toronto region had been populated for at least ten thousand years before the arrival of Brule.

European Arrivals
In 1750 The French built Fort Toronto on the east bank of the Humber River; it was soon felt to be inadequate in comparison with British forts like Fort Oswego, so a larger French fort called Fort Rouille was built three miles east of the Humber, on the grounds of the present day Canadian National Exhibition.

In 1787 Lord Dorchester negotiated the Toronto Purchase, which transferred the title to a fourteen mile stretch of land along Lake Ontario from present day Scarborough to Etobicoke, and nearly 30 miles inland, from the Mississauga Indians to the British.

On July 30, 1793 John Graves Simcoe arrived at Toronto with his wife, Elizabeth, their servants, and members of the Queen's Rangers. A village and blockade was constructed between present day Queen and Bloor Streets, north of the area in question. At the first town meeting in July 1797, 241 inhabitants were enumerated. The initial population at York consisted of British officials and their families, soldiers, and a small assortment of labourers, storekeepers and craftsmen. By 1812, York had a population of a little over 700.

The area of Bay Street between Wellington and King was farmland.

Post 1812 Settlement

Toronto City Directories list the following tenants and year of residence:
1856
#39 Bay Street (later #82) Francis Stanly
#41 (#84) Francis Boyd, John Boyd (Barrister and Attorney), William Boyd (Attorney)
#43 (#86) Hugh Boomer


1861
#82 Chief Justice Sir JB Robinson
#84 Captain Francis Boyd, William Boyd (Solicitor)
#86 David S Keith (Plumber and gas fitter)


1870
#82 Joseph Simpson (Manufacturer of Knitted Goods)
#84 GL Maddison (Insurance)
#86 N Strang (Second Hand Broker)


1880
#82 Mrs M Whittemore (Widow of EF Whittemore)
#84 Harry Holman (Tailor)
#86 Robert York (Boarding House)


The Great Toronto Fire of 1904 devastated the area which was largely commercial warehouse property. A post fire photo of the Northwest corner of Bay and Wellington (just south of our research location) can be found by clicking here.

According to the atlas of 1910, the properties at 82-86 Bay Street (which would become the Toronto Stock Exchange) were two full lots which backed onto Mincing Street (formerly Mincing Lane) and one half property facing Bay Street (#86)

Searching back issues of the Toronto Star beginning 1894, there is no mention of 234 Bay Street until 1928. At that time it was occupied by WR Houston & Co, Oils of Western Canada. 84 Bay Street is listed in a help wanted add for an office girl to report to AS Houston in 1920. It is likely the renumbering occurred between those two mentions. 84 Bay Street was the location of McDonald Bullock & Co, investment bankers, in 1917. Mention of the building as "The Toronto Stock Exchange Building" occurs in 1916, prior to merging with Standard Mining Exchange. The Standard Exchange was located on Richmond Street West at the time of the merger. Perhaps the combined exchange operated from the Richmond Street location during construction of the Bay Street facility. In 1903, 84 Bay was the location of the Davis and Henderson Lithographers.. By May 1910 the CH Westwood Manufacturing Company was doing business there making men's garters.

86 Bay Street was the location of Royal Securities Corporation Limited in 1914.

82 Bay Street was home to the Clavir Hat Company during the years 1918, 1919, and 1920.

Completion of the current building for the Toronto Stock Exchange was completed in 1937 and the TSE moved in in April of that year.

Because the TSE was not at this location it is unlikely that persons associated with the Exchange prior to that date would return post-death. Three is one notable exception. Lyndhurst Ogden, born 12 March 1847 at Isle of Man, came to Toronto in 1876 and was the secretery for the Standard Stock Exchange (TSE) for 33 years, retiring just before his death on 26 April 1915. He was also secretery of The Toronto Club. It is likely that he would continue to hold deep attachments to the TSE wherever it's location.

A full list of principles for the TSE from 1937-1983 is in development. So far, only one name has surfaced Arthur J Trebilcock was the executive manager of the TSE from 1936 to 1956. In 1956 he became its first paid president, and held the post in 1957 as well. He was also the first person to serve as president who was not a stock trader. He was still living in March of 1969 when his wife died, but no obituary is found via standard sources. Ontario death records are held private for the previous 72 years so while it is likely that Mr Trebilcock has passed on, the date remains elusive.

Building Specifics
The current Design Exchange became home to the Toronto Stock Exchange in 1937 with the first day of trading at the location on March 20, 1937. The building was designed by Samuel Maw in consultation with George and Moorehouse. Artist Charles Comfort did the murals. The original trading floor was constructed from natural maple with black trim and treated to aid acoustics.

This was the first building in Toronto to have air conditioning.

A series of pneumatic tubes ran from the traders to the basement where they were delivered the changes to the person operating the ticker.

The facility stood empty from 1983 until renovations began in 1988. The Design Exchange moved in in 1994.

Specifics on equipment (Source: click here)

TELEREGISTER MAGNETRONIC BID ASKED
Teleregister Magnetronic Bid-Asked Stock Quotation System MANUFACTURER The Teleregister Corporation APPLICATIONS Data processing associated with stock exchange bid- asked price quotations PROGRAMMING AND NUMERICAL SYSTEM Binary digits per word 24 ARITHMETIC UNIT Timing Synchronous Operation Sequential Five seconds of additional time are required for a transaction when input/output data are transmitted over teletype lines. STORAGE A single magnetic drum storage unit is utilized. The drum capacity is 100,000 binary digits. The system is designed to handle a maximum of 8 million average transactions/hour. Relays are used for temporary storage of information. INPUT There are 200 special input/output devices located in Toronto, Canada. These are located near the printing mechanisms. For remote locations, special transceivers are utilized to serialize and check data. OUTPUT Visual verification of input/output data (response) is possible at the originating input point. Input error or data rejection is immediately signalled to the originating input device. Automatic checking and data verification controls are built into the system. PRODUCTION RECORD Number produced to date 1 Number in current operation 1 COST, PRICE AND RENTAL RATES Cost was dependent upon customer requirements. System was installed but is not being maintained by the manufacturer. RELIABILITY, OPERATING EXPERIENCE. AND TIME AVAILABILITY Operating ratio (Good/Attempted to run time) 0.999 The system is operated on line 7 hours/day, 5 days week. ADDITIONAL FEATURES AND REMARKS Special purpose system. System is operated "on line" with current updating features. Status reporting feature included. Control is possible from all input transactions recording locations. System incorporates remote control of the data processor from input/output stations. The following is a technical, operational and historical description of the system: The electronic equipment at the Toronto Stock Exchange represents the first use of electronic digital computer techniques for the storage and dissemination of stock quotations. In 1937 The Teleregister Corporation installed for the Toronto Exchange an automatic, electro-mechanical system for displaying, storing and disseminating bid-asked prices on the more actively traded stocks. Bid-asked prices, generated at the trading posts on the floor of the Exchange from orders placed on the outside, were transmitted by reporters over an interphone system to keyset operators in the basement of the Exchange building. These keyset operators entered the bid-asked prices into the automatic system. The prices were displayed on electromechanical indicator units located at the posts on the floor for the information of the traders at that location. Simultaneously, the same prices were posted on indicators in a "check-board" located in front of the keyset operators. The system also included a Canadian National Telegraphs network from the common equipment at the Exchange to broker' offices in the Toronto area, who were provided with dial- ticker units. A broker desiring the current bid-asked prices for a particular stock, looked up the three digit code number for the stock in a code-assignment register. When he was ready to dial, he pressed a request button on his dial set. The operation of this button connected his dialing circuit arid ticker liner through the line connecting equipment, to one of 24 transmitters which may be idle at the time. When the connection to the transmitter was completed, a ready lamp lighted on the broker's dial set, telling him that the equipment was ready to receive his dialing. The operation thus far is similar to that of a telephone exchange when the subscriber picks up the hand set sad receives a dial tone. The dialed code numbers were stored in the transmitter, which was conditioned to extract the requested bid-asked price from the system's memory. Up until several years ago the display indicators in the check board served a dual purpose in that they were also used as storage devices or memory units. These indicators were pulse actuated mechanisms which display the digits 1 through 0 and blank, on a 11-position rotatable drum. An indicator was set to display the desired digit by transmitting counted pulses to its winding after it has first been pulsed to its blank display position. In order to respond to a broker's dialed request, the indicators displaying the selected stock prices were actuated by exactly 11 pulses. This would leave the indicators in the same display position as before, but since it was possible to determine the number of pulses required to move each unit from its display position to its blank position, a coded readout of the stored prices was accomplished. These prices were then automatically sent by one of the 24 transmitters to a ticker at the calling broker's office. After careful engineering analysis of the problem, it was decided to use electronic techniques and a non-volatile magnetic drum storage to process the 50,000 daily requests which were being received from broker's offices. Since the existing display posting system represented a major capital investment, it was necessary to integrate much of the old electro-mechanical system with the new electronic data processing equipment. This integration presented the major engineering problem, since the electronic components had already been developed and proven in service in an American Airlines reservation system, which processes an inventory of airlines seats in place of stock bid- asked prices. It was also decided to use the old price storage circuitry as a fall-back, so that a manual switch-over system had to be provided. The magnetic drum storage equipment is time shared between the 24 transmitters and the 6 operators positions by the seeker equipment. The purpose of the operators' positions is to keep the prices displayed at the Exchange and stored on the magnetic drum up to date with the trading. The seeker is a relay switching device which connects the next transmitter or operator's position awaiting access to the drum storage, which is time- shared to all positions. When a transmitter gets access to the storage, the 3-digit code number, dialed by a subscriber and stored in the transmitter, is translated by the selector into the energization of one of 600 single-wire selection leads which were previously used to connect the transmitters to a specific section of the check-board display when that unit was used as the system's memory. In the new system these 600 leads are coded by use of a diode matrix with the position code of the same information on the magnetic drum storage. The output of the diode matrix is connected through drum selection coding relays to the drum connecting relays which, in turn, select one of 40 channels on the drum. If one of the six operators' positions has been given access to the storage drum, the electronic equipment is used to write the new price information stored on the operators' keyset in the section of the drum selected by one of 100 keys on the. operators' keyset. The magnetic storage unit consists of a solid aluminum billet, eight inches in diameter and fifteen inches high, coated with an iron oxide film about 0.003 inches thick. The drum has capacity for storing approximately two thousand sets of prices, six hundred being the initial usage. Prices are stared in permutation code on the drum coating as positively or negatively magnetized spots,.the coding being changed as the prices alter. The drum is divided into circumferential tracks, or channels, each channel providing price storage for twenty-five! stocks. The packing factor for this a ication is approximately 40 bits (or code elements) per inch along the track. A read-record head is mounted over each channel with a clearance of .001 inch from the drum surface. In recording, these beads polarize the magnetic coating as the drum rotates at a speed of 1,450 RPM beneath them, under control of electronic writing and gating circuits which are triggered off as the operators send in new prices. In a reading operation resulting from a broker's dialed request, the selected magnetized spots passing under the read-record head induce positive and negative pulses which are amplified and shaped into usable dynamic pulses. The electronic equipment is under control of a program unit which is basically divided into seven circuits; starting, function determination, counting, 1 of 25 stock selection, 1 of 6 stock digit selection, read gating and write gating. Counting is in binary code and under control of three permanently magnetized tracks on the drum which are called synchronizing or "clock" tracks. These tracks deliver 1,256 and 600 pulses, respectively, for each revolution of the drum. The clock pulses to the electronic counters of the program unit open electronic gates at the precise instant that the desired storage area on the drum is passing beneath the selected read-record head. There is a reference pulse from the drum which assures that the electronic counting will always start in synchronism with the drum rotation. There are pulses which are used to select one or a combination of the six digits representing a bid-asked price. Since each price digit has a 4 element permutation code, there are 25 x 6 x 4, or a total of 600 storage bits in use on each drum track. The function of the shift registers is to read the amplified serial bid-asked price pulses from the drum and send the price in parallel to the transmitters, 24 elements at a time. In the case of a write operation, the shift registers control serial writing into the drum from parallel price code inputs from the operators' keysets. The electronic equipment contains approximately 400 tubes envelopes, of which about half are Western Electric 396-A twin triodes and the remainder Western Electric 415-A pentodes. A few 6Y6 tubes are used in the drum record circuits. All electronic components are mounted on functional plug-in sub-assemblies, using printed wiring techniques. An open construction is employed for better heat dissipation and lower operating temperature. INSTALLATIONS Toronto Stock Exchange Toronto, Canada _

Additional research questions outstanding:

Who were the presidents of the TSE/TSX from 1917-1983, discounting those living at the time of first phenomenal occurrence?
Is the magnetic Teleregister still present in the building? If so, is it in usable condition and is it ever demonstrated?
Are the pneumatic tubes still present? Are they operational?