History
The area currently occupied by the square was part of the Ward and was a major immigrant reception area during the first half of the twentieth century characterized by poverty during the late 1800s and early 1900s, with Black families settling on the site followed by the large wave of Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe during this period. From 1910s leading up to World War II, the immigrant neighbourhood was gradually settled and developed by the Chinese immigrants into Toronto's first Chinatown.
Following the war in 1946, this city prepare to construct a civil square in the then Chinatown, through a by-law which prohibited further development except for public purposes or parking lots. With voter approval in 1947, the city began acquisition of sites inside Chinatown from 1948 to 1958, with the controversial expropriation and demolition of various shops and restaurants in 1955 for the development of the square. With the procurement of the land completed and the design of the then new City Hall finalized in 1958, construction of the civic square and City Hall commenced in 1961 and was completed in 1965.
Since the 1980s, the square has been used as the set for a number of films, such as The Kidnapping of the President, Resident Evil: Apocalypse, and The Sentinel.
After the death of federal New Democratic Party leader Jack Layton, citizens flocked to the square and covered the walls, pillars and statues with messages written in chalk for Layton and his family.
Read more about this topic: Nathan Phillips Square
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“Regarding History as the slaughter-bench at which the happiness of peoples, the wisdom of States, and the virtue of individuals have been victimized—the question involuntarily arises—to what principle, to what final aim these enormous sacrifices have been offered.”
—Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831)
“No one can understand Paris and its history who does not understand that its fierceness is the balance and justification of its frivolity. It is called a city of pleasure; but it may also very specially be called a city of pain. The crown of roses is also a crown of thorns. Its people are too prone to hurt others, but quite ready also to hurt themselves. They are martyrs for religion, they are martyrs for irreligion; they are even martyrs for immorality.”
—Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874–1936)
“False history gets made all day, any day,
the truth of the new is never on the news
False history gets written every day
...
the lesbian archaeologist watches herself
sifting her own life out from the shards she’s piecing,
asking the clay all questions but her own.”
—Adrienne Rich (b. 1929)