The General Engineering Company of Ontario
An innocuously titled company with a terrifying and lethal product line
In the words of General Gordon Sullivan, Chief of Staff of the United States Army, “World War II was the largest and most violent armed conflict in the history of mankind.”
Over fifty years have passed, and while the events of World War II continue to stir the interest of military scholars and veterans, historians, and students, a generation of the global community has grown up mostly unaware of “the political, social, and military implications of a war that, more than any other, united us as a people.”
By June of 1940, the world was waging war against Germany, a formidable world tyrant that had already conquered Poland, Denmark, Norway, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Belgium, and France, and was planning an all out assault on Great Britain. Canada stood at the ready, eager to help their fellow citizens across the pond. If England was to have any chance against the incredible power of the German military, they needed a steady supply of arms. Defending themselves against such a foe, let alone expecting to win the war, without a stable stream of munitions, could have meant utter annihilation. With the advancing German offensive, Britain’s ability to produce and supply their own munitions was weakening. With frequent air raids over London, and the subsequent blackouts, production was inconsistent and sluggish. England’s only reprieve was in Germany’s aggressive and arrogant plan to invade Russia, a more daunting opponent than England. But the break wouldn’t last long. In Warren Evans ‘Salute to Scarborough,’ he states, “Without the export of munitions to reinforce England’s depleting arsenals, the Empire, the King and Churchill would eventually have to surrender to Hitler and his mob.”
And from the Milwaukee Journal, these ominous words: “We win or we become serfs of the barbaric Nazis and the barbaric Japanese. There is no compromise. It is victory for us or it is extermination.”
Britain needed help and Scarborough, Ontario was about to play a vital role in helping to win the war with the allied forces. Winston Churchill sent out an urgent plea across the world for help. Canada’s Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King offered to build two munitions plants: one in Bouchard, Quebec and the other in the vicinity of Toronto, Ontario. Never had such a massive undertaking – planning and constructing over 170 buildings, assembling and shipping over thousands of filled fuses each day – been attempted in Canada before.
By 1943, over 130 Canadian plants would become engaged in the manufacturing of heavy ammunition. Some would make chemical products, some would make chemical explosives, and many would manufacture empty parts and components. Scarborough had the unique opportunity to specialize in filling initiators and shipping them directly to the front lines or to other plants to be assembled into complete rounds of ammunition.
The Canadian government hired the Hamilton brothers of the General Engineering Company (Canada) Limited, operating out of Toronto, to design, build, and oversee the larger of the two munitions plants, called Project 24, in the surrounding area of Toronto. They, along with a team of engineers, worked tirelessly to plan and design the munitions plant. The plans had to be ready to go as soon as a suitable site was found. The world was running out of time and Scarborough was chosen to step into the fray, and up to the plate.
Scarborough met Project 24’s critical requirements including easy access to a large labour force and hydroelectric power, cheap land, access to the Canadian National Railways for shipping, and remoteness of location to minimize destruction of the surrounding community in case of explosion.
On January 27th, 1941, His Majesty, King George expropriated land from seven landowners, including the local Scarborough Hough family. On February 6th, 1941, without pomp or circumstance, without a single speech or a silver shovel, the frozen ground to the future GECO plant was broken. Dynamite was used to break through 18-24 inches of frozen earth and snow. The blasting agitated farm cattle and farm wives alike, and GECO personnel had to deal with their wrath. But their complaints were of little consequence. The war wouldn’t wait for Canada’s spring thaw.
The world was at war and defeat was a real and dreadful possibility.
By early the following month, construction crews were working around the clock building GECO, peaking in June 1941 with 2,585 workers employed. The construction program would require two million man hours in the field to complete. Workers received 80 cents an hour based on a forty-four hour workweek. February and March were bitterly cold that year and working outside was a true test of Canadian fortitude and dedication.
GECO’s projected cost to build the plant was $2,965,000.00. Its actual cost was $6,317,322.36, a huge amount of money for the 1940’s.
Just three months after the groundbreaking, the first shipment of ‘empties’ arrived at GECO on May 28th, and production was underway. By the end of 1941, the expansive GECO plant was complete, built in record time – just 236 days, about the time that Hitler had promised to be in Moscow. As Bill Taylor of Building 126, Engineering, said, “Scarboro was built in a hurry—and well built.”
At the peak of its production, over 5,300 employees worked for GECO.
Most of the over 170 buildings were connected via a series of above ground galleries that were heated, covered, and clean. Even more unique was the extensive underground tunnel system spanning almost 14,000 feet, or over five kilometers under the complex. The tunnels were used to protect GECO’s employees and munitions not only from the weather but from possible air raids and explosions. Munitions travelled the tunnels and were stored below ground while awaiting shipment. The tunnels also housed service lines for water, electricity, and steam, and had transformer rooms and washrooms. The tangled web of concrete tunnels stood eight feet tall by eight feet wide, tall and wide enough to easily accommodate the skids of munitions and employees alike.
An eight foot barbed wire fence contained the GECO property, a mini-city tucked in amongst farms and gently rolling countryside. The complex truly operated as a self-sufficient community from behind the barbed wire fence, needing only outside supplies. GECO boasted a complete medical service with ambulance, five doctors and twelve nurses, two fire halls, a bank, complete laundry facilities, mechanics shop (where actual GECO trucks were built,) a newspaper shop, a time and motion study, complete food services, a sophisticated telephone system that would rival a fair-sized town, including receiving over 5,000 calls in an average day shift, and an extensive recreational club.
Many social activities were made available to GECO employees, including ice hockey (6 teams), bowling (66 teams), baseball (32 teams in 5 leagues), badminton, volleyball, shuffleboard, lawn bowling, darts, table tennis, monthly dances (upwards of 1,000 in attendance each), an over 55-member choral group, and sewing, dance, and health and beauty classes. There was truly something for everyone.
GECO issued a bi-weekly employee newspaper called “The Fusilier,” whose subtitle read, “A Powder Magazine issued in the interests of employees by General Engineering Company (Canada) Limited, purveyors of headaches for axis assassins.”
In its inaugural edition on March 28th, 1942, the Fusilier’s front page spoke about the ‘Fourth Arm of the Service;’ GECO employees who marched alongside the Navy, Army, and Air Force in their battle to defend the things they stood for. Employees were reminded that while they all can’t be “the man behind the gun,” they all can be “the man behind the man behind the gun,” and that “it is up to us to be good and sure that ‘the man behind the gun’ has plenty to put in his weapon when he brings his sights to bear on the hordes of Axis assassins.”
And in its second issue, GECO was compared to “the big war machine that will, in the fullness of time, teach our enemies that we can’t be pushed around with impunity.”
During the over four years of life at GECO, a grand total of 256,567,485 fuses/primers/tubes/gaines/tracers/igniters etc. were filled—without one fatal accident.
In the CBC’s (Canadian Broadcasting Corporation) tribute to the workers of GECO in February, 1944, the commenter states that “…there has been an unbeatable spirit in the ceaseless efforts of this great army of war-winning workers. From their hands are flowing vital parts for the missiles of war that are blasting the enemy.”
And in the words taken from the final edition “The Fusilier” after the war: “Scarboro will never die. The tradition, outgrowth of the tragedy of war, will live on, a vibrant shining thing through the happier years of peace to come.
“Long live Scarboro!”
Barbara -
Its such a delight to find your web site because it happens to have information and pictures about GECO. My father worked there one summer as an engineering student. He has written a few of his memories down and I am marrying them up with images from the internet to create a “memories book” for Christmas for him. Finding your page about GECO is amazing! Well done! Its also interesting to learn that this information is from a romance writer – the irony here is that writes as a engineer – almost no emotion at all! Quite the opposite of your style, I’m sure. Once again, thank you so very much for your information.
If you should have the time, send a message. It would be a pleasure to hear from you.
Merry Christmas to you and yours.
Sincerely,
Peter French
Peter:
Thanks for dropping by! I’m glad you’re able to use the information in my GECO pages to share with your dad and take a wonderful walk down memory’s lane. Yes, I’m a romance writer (among other writerly pursuits.) Research for my third romance novel “The War Below” took me to the tunnels of GECO and to the Archives of Ontario. I was so impressed with not only the work of GECO but with the dedicated thousands of men and women that worked there, I needed to share GECO with the world. GECO was such a unique piece of Scarborough’s history, how could I not? Merry Christmas to you, too!
With kind regards,
Barbara Dickson
Barbara -
Pls write to me – I talked to my father about your desire for an interview. He is keen if it can be done over the phone. So… pls write to me and I’ll send you his phone number so you an chat. I am not sure if this is what you had in mind but it works for him and he is enthusiastic – very cool!
and – belated to be sure – Happy New Year.
cheers,
Peter FRench
Hi Barbara
It was very interesting to revisit the past. It was a different world then
Hartley
Would you like to meet someone who worked there?
(Mrs. Drier)
Hi Mike,
I’d love to meet someone who worked at GECO! I’ll contact you off-line and we can make arrangements.
Thanks again!
Barbara
Hi Barbara
Over a year ago someone mentioned to me that it would be funny to look up the history of my employer. Needless to say that small casual mention snowballed into a personal history project. My employer currently has 2 buildings side by side. The smaller old one is one of the last few GECO buildings left. I have found all of GECO so very interesting. I to plan to put a “scrapbook” together of the area and my building. The way the people came together was incredible. I hope to go to the toronto archives in the next month to get more info and pictures. Glad to know it hasn’t been forgotten.
Trace
Hi Trace! Nice to hear from you! How cool to work in an original GECO building. Does the building still have access to its tunnel? Have you been down in the tunnel? May I ask where you work? Maybe from the map of GECO we can figure out what the building was originally used for. Sifting through the Archives is a lot of fun! Good luck! Barbara
Funny enough i went into the tunnels today. I’ve taken lots of pictures and going to get then developed tomorrow so i can remember which direction and where I was standing in each picture. The tunnels are home to raccoons and the odd stray cat now adays. Sadly the building has seen better days. I believe that we made fuses in our building.
Trace
Would love to see your pictures, Trace. Yes, more than likely fuses were filled in your old GECO building. Let us know how your tunnel excurions turn out! Barbara
Good morning,
What can you tell me about Research Enterptises. Its dog toothed roofed building stood at Eglinton and Laird. My grandfather worked here up until Sunnybrook Hospital was opened in 1948. He had been wounded in Cambrai France in October 1918, invlalided home and after years in the Dominion Orthopeadic hospital in Toronto and the Calydor Sanitorium in Bracebrige, he must have taken this job. I remember him going to Resarch daily but nothing about what he did there!
Donna George
Whitby Ontario
Hi Donna,
Nice to hear from you! Thank you for sharing your grandfather’s story. I’m always humbled by the tremendous giving spirit of the courageous men and women who served and continue to serve our country through the military.
I hadn’t heard of Research Enterprises until your query. I did a little research and found this on Wikipedia: “On July 16, 1940, Research Enterprises Inc. was incorporated. The company operated only during the war, closing in 1946. The company was, however, the largest single employer in Leaside’s history, employing over 7500 men and women at its peak. The site manufactured military radio equipment and optical supplies…” The description is a little generic to be sure. I wonder what ‘optical supplies’ meant…
Hope this helps a little.
Thanks again for your post. With kind regards, Barbara
Barb, thanks for publishing the best-ever article about GECO. I worked in one of the units, years ago, and had no idea of the history of the area.
Have you considered submitting your website/informatin to History Television?- What an amazing documentary this would make!
Hello Meg,
Thanks for your GECO post. I’m glad you enjoyed the articles. I’ve had a great time researching the history of GECO, along with its present day condition. Wow, the History channel, eh? Wouldn’t that be cool? I’d love to hear about where you worked and if the tunnels are still accessible under the building.
Nice to hear from you. Wishing you all the best,
Barbara
Hi Barb,
History Channel should consider this.. I agree -now that would be a worthwhile show, definitely a cool idea.
I think the address was 126 Manville, in a small Engineering office (back from 1971-1974) – the building has been taken down – just flattened, but I guarantee that the tunnels exist underneath. If you drive down Manville, you’ll see an empty lot on the west side – that was it. There was easy access to the tunnels then.
My husband attended cadets when he was a teenager in one of the old GECO buildings on Manville and tells me that they used to go down into the tunnels, exploring, and found they could access other units.. seems that others did as well – this would be back in the late 1950′s.
Meg,
Thanks for your post! When the snow melts, I’m heading to GECO to hunt out the remains of 126 Manville
The remains of an entrance to the tunnel system can be found at Comstock and Warden, so perhaps there’s something left of 126 Manville too. If you’d like to join me, we’ll plan to meet! If any other GECO enthusiasts would like to meet for a GECO tour, let me know! Take care, Barb
Hi Barb,
We drove down Manville yesterday, and it’s 124 Manville that is gone *my apologies* The demolished site is now a parking lot, with a chain link fence on 2 sides. I would love to join you, with other GECO enthusiasts – thanks so much- Please!…just let me know when. I’m curious to know if entrances to the tunnel still exist in each surviving GECO building (they did at one time).
Yes, please do keep us informed, because I would like to go as well.
What a great site about Geco. My aunt worked for Geco and was also Miss Geco one year. Is there any photos available of all the “Miss Gecos”? I have a photo of my aunt, with some other women in their Geco uniforms.
Nancy
Hi Nancy,
Thanks for your post! I’m actually down at the Archives this week with the GECO archives. If you give me your aunt’s name that she used while she worked at GECO, I might be able to find you some information. Do you know what year she was named Miss GECO? Look forward to hearing from you! Barbara
Hi Barbara,
No I’m sorry, I do not know what year she was Miss Geco. I do know that she worked there for most of the war. Her name was Phyllis Topping. I would happy to share the picture I have for your site.
Thank you in advance,
Nancy
Hi Barbara,
I’m also looking for anything about the aunt of a dear friend of my mother. The aunt’s
name was Elizabeth Wright (could have been known as Lizzie or Betty)
I worked at a company in the Pharmacy and Eglinton area for 12 years and there were also tunnels that far over as well. Went in one of them.
Nancy
Hi Nancy,
Well, I sifted through the Fulisiers (the employee newspaper) down at the Archives hoping to find a mention of your two ladies, Elizabeth Wright and Phyllis Topping, but no luck. With between 6000 – 7000 women working there, I knew the odds of finding a mention of two particular ladies was a long shot but I tried. Unfortunately I didn’t order the photo archives this time round but I don’t think it would have made any difference. While there are many pictures of the beauty pagents they held, there weren’t any real captions with the photos. The people of GECO were single-minded in their focus — fill fuzes. Everything else was fluff.
I’d LOVE to have a copy of the photo of your aunt as Miss GECO! If you give me your permission, I’ll uplodad it to the website and I can write a blurb about her and add her to my Ladies of GECO page. Wouldn’t that be wonderful?
As well, it’s so cool that you were able to get into tunnels at Pharmacy and Eglinton. You may have discovered something that even the GECO maps don’t reveal. Could you tell us more about where the tunnel you were in, is located?
Looking forward to hearing from you.
Barb
Hello, Would very much like to rea your novel The War Below. Where can I obtain it?
Bill Horgan
Hello
This the first i have saw of your site.I moved ther in 1947 along with many other families as Toronto was in dire need of housing and this was modifies only slightly to acomodate upwards to aprox 1000 families.The tunnels were still there as we as kids would go down there to play.We lived in #134 Building and later moved up to # 16 Building and i beleive they still bare thes numbers today
Don Walton
Wasaga Beach
Ont
Hi Bill,
Thanks for the query about my novel, “The War Below.” Unfortunately, it hasn’t been published yet.
I guess it’s time to start looking for a publisher! I’ll let you know when I find one 
Until then, enjoy these GECO pages. I’ll continue to update them. Kind regards, Barbara
Hi Don,
Nice to hear from you. Thanks for sharing your post-GECO experience with us. The housing complex certainly was needed after the war. I’m glad GECO was there to give you a home. How cool to have the tunnels to play in! Do you have any pictures of your time there? We’d love to see them.
Take care and stay in touch,
Barbara
Hi Barbara,
I sent you an email. I hope you got it.
Nancy
Hi Barbara
I’m wondering if you .. and a group of GECO enthusiasts would be interested in getting together to see the remains of GECO ..I’d love to do that! Definitely looks like better weather now.
Hi Meg, yes I agree, the weather definitely looks better! Let me get through the next 2 weeks — I have a few public speaking events I’m committed to but I should have a little more time mid-May to inquire about getting access to the GECO tunnels. Stay tuned! Thanks for your interest. Barbara
I moved to GECO with my mom and brothers to live there after we were evicted from our home in East Toronto.
I just completed reading the book “Corky, Peggy and the Goldfinch’ written by Warren W Evans in 2004, published by AuthorHouse.
He too lived there in his teenage years and this book recounts his story.
I would love to meet and chat with a fellow Gecoite about those years.
I don’t do email but my wife Robin does. I would prefer to chat verbally about these days if anyone would like to call. I live in Rosseau, Ontario area.
Thanks.
Gary White.
Hi Gary,
So nice to hear from you. Yes, there are other GECOites that lived in the post-GECO housing that have made contact with me. You can find them in the blog entries above. I removed your telephone number from your post, to ensure your privacy and security.
If anyone would like to get in touch with Gary, please contact me and I will pass along Gary’s contact information.
Take care, Gary. And thanks for dropping in!
Barbara
F.Y.I.
“At noon this coming Wednesday, [7/22/2009] there will be a Heritage Toronto historic plaque unveiling commemorating the wartime GECO munitions plant and the subsequent creation of Scarborough’s Golden Mile that took over the site in the 1950s. The unveiling will take place at 1900 Eglinton Ave. E. (west of Warden Ave. and opposite Lebovic Ave.).”
(from Mike Filey,Toronto Sun,7/19/2009)
Hello Barbara,
I immensely enjoyed the GECO info that you have
researched, especially since I am one of Carol Knight’s sons! As kids growing up in Scarborough, we often passed the GECO site, to the extent it became part of the household Knight-lore. It is good to see that GECO is finally being recognized for it’s historic importance.
I intend to take Mom to the above-mentioned unveiling, and wonder if you will be attending?
RK
RK:
So nice to hear from you! And thank you for letting me know about the Heritage Toronto plaque unveiling this Wednesday July 22nd. I will do my best to be there! What time is it being unveiled? I look forward to meeting you and seeing your mom again!
Barbara
Hello All, Just wanted to pass on something that was in the Sunday Sun, July 19th, 2009.
It reads:
At noon this coming Wednesday, there will be a Heritage Toronto historic plaque unveiling commemorating the wartime GECO munitions plant and the subsequent creation of Scarborough’s Golden Mile that took over the site in the 1950′s. The unveiling will take place at 1900 Eglinton Ave. E (west of Warden Aven. and opposite Lebovic Avenue)
Nancy
Hi Nancy, nice to hear from you again. Thanks so much for posting this important event! Hope you can make it. Barb
Barbara
Filey’s Sun article says the unveiling is at noon.
RK
Hello, you are very welcome. I see RK put that the article said noon. I did put that in my original post. A plaque will be wonderful.
Nancy
My friend had her son killed in a car accident while living in GECO. Do you know anyway i might fine an article about this accident???
Hi Phyllis,
Sorry to hear about your friend’s son’s death while living in the post-war housing situated at GECO. My best advice for finding out more information would be to read through the Toronto Star archives. I know the Toronto Reference Library has an extensive collection of newspapers. Perhaps other libraries have a collection as well.
There is a small group of past GECO residents that lurk this site and they may remember the accident. Perhaps they will see your post and reply too.
Thanks for posting!
Barbara
Hello, I have access to archives of The Toronto Star and The Globe and Mail and would be happy to look and see if anything was in the paper. If Phyllis has a time frame, I can start looking right away.
Nancy
Phyllis:
If you’d like Nancy to search the newspaper archives, let me know and I’ll pass along the message. Nancy, thanks for offering to do this for Phyllis and her friend. A couple of past GECO residents replied to my inquiry about a fatal accident during their stay at GECO, and while they didn’t remember a car accident, they did remember a young boy, about 11-12 years of age dying by falling from the water tower. Could this be the fatal accident you were looking for?
Barbara
No problem, just let me know
Dear Ms Dickson,
My wife and I very much enjoyed your GECO presentation at the Eginton Square library this week . My aunt,Mrs.Sadie Thomas,worked at GECO. If you or anyone is planning a tour of the area, I would very much like to be involved . I taught at W.A. Porter C.I. for 30 years and am vaguely familiar with the area. My email address and telephone number are given above.
Sincerely,
Albert
Hi Albert,
I’m glad you enjoyed the presentation. I’ll be sure to include you in any upcoming tour of an original GECO property. I’ll be in touch. Until then, enjoy the GECO pages here.
With kind regards,
Barbara
Hello Barbara
I heard about your recent presentation about GECO at the Eglinton Square Branch of the Toronto Public Library, which I understand met with a very enthusiastic response.
GECO is of particular interest to library historians. When the Scarborough Public Library was organized in 1955, Robert Bonis notes in his History of Scarborough, “temporary library headquarters were obtained in an old G.E.CO. building beside the municipal offices on Eglinton Avenue …(p. 236). Bonis also includes pictures of the building on p. 237.
In addition to your presentation and your website pages, have you written a book about GECO that we could add to our collections?
As you are no doubt aware, two books by the General Engineering Company (Canada) now are in the Toronto Public Library catalog: Facts & figures 1947, 96 p.) and Ammunition saves lives (1944, [8] p.)
We plan to index and create a link to your GECO website pages on the Toronto Public Library’s Virtual Reference Library. I suggest that your website would be greatly enhanced by having the images identified and credited. This should be easy to do, since almost all of them are from the Archives of Ontario and are identified on its online visual database. See http://ao.minisisinc.com/scripts/mwimain.dll/463/3/0?SEARCH&ERRMSG=IMG_WEBimg_simNo.htm
Wouldn’t your readers be interested to know, for example, that Mary Pickford is pictured in the fourth image on the main page. I am also curious if Ray Corley created the “Engineer’s drawing” of GECO. He was a dear friend of mine and had a great interest in GECO; he also did presentations on the company before he died.
I look forward to hearing fom you.
Hi: My grandmother worked at GECO. I was hoping to put some sort of scrap book together for both her kids & grandchildren and great grandchildren.
Not sure what her exact job was…..but my mom says that she had to shower before and after work at the plant. She also wore special shoes.
Do you have access to old employee records. Her name was Emily Voss (nee Harris).
If you could even direct me to websites with either photo’ or old employee records if possible. I realize life isn’t that simple but technology has come along way.
Thanks again.
Deborah Sutton (Peterborough, ON)
Dear Barbara and Deborah, thanks for your posts. My apologies for the long delay in responding. I’ll respond to your posts privately but I wanted to say thank you for your interest in GECO. I have written one book about GECO (fiction) and am working on two non-fiction books. I’m excited about the great strides GECO will take in 2010. Happy New Year.
Thank you for your Very interesting ‘site’. My father Jack Atchison [a 'vet', now deceased] worked as a ‘fireman’ at one of G.E.C.O.’s 2 firehalls after the War. I think it may have been Firehall #1. Are there any records re the firehalls & their post-war late-1940s employees? My long-time friend from that era also remembers as a child visiting the GECO post-war housing there. We are both working on family-histories & are interest in its post-War housing-use. [Dad was also involved in the firemen's temporary adoption of an ownerless dog who rescued a child from a street-manhole--apparently there was a newspaper-article about that rescue--& he subsequently found the dog a home with my friend's family.] My aunt Bertha ‘Bertie’ Withers also worked at GECO during the War.
Hi Meg,
Fleshing out the page is a top priority for me in the next few weeks. I hope to feature newspaper articles including the rescue you mention. Warren Evan’s book, “Corky, Peggy, and the Goldfinch” offers great insight into GECO housing. Warren lived in the post-war GECO housing. His writing style, along with the incredible adventures he had while he lived there, will give you an excellent working knowledge into life at GECO. Of course I must put a caveat in here – the book is R rated, in my opinion for language, violence, and sexual content. But a great read, nonetheless!
Thanks for your post. I’m working on building a post-GECO housing webpage but other writing deadlines and a pesky hospital stay have delayed my progress
If you subscribe to my e-newsletter, you’ll be the first to know when the page is up and running. Take care, Barbara
There was an access hatch in the floor in the warehouse at 140 Manville Rd. You could only walk so far (towards Lake Ontario) and the tunnel was bricked up. There were rooms down there. Not sure if the building still exists?
I was wondering where exactly the remaining tunnel is. I grew up at Birchmount and Chelwood, just up the street from comstock and went to school at W.A. Porter. I had never heard of the tunnels until today on a site remembering Scarborough on Facebook. I would love to take my kids there if it is possible to see and go into the tunnels. Any information would be appreciated.
Thank you
Cheryl
Hi John, nice to hear from you. I believe the building and tunnels under 140 Manville still exist. I remember the hatch. I’ve been down in the tunnels but didn’t get far. The current owner is using them for storage. How did you come to learn of 140 Manville? Take care, Barbara
Hi Cheryl, I lived in the area across the road from Pine Hills Cemetery, south of where you grew up! I didn’t learn of the tunnels until much later, as well. There are still some tunnels running under the area. The trick of course is to figure out where and how to get into them. They are dangerous, to a great extent now. I hope to schedule another tunnel tour this spring. Last year’s tour was a great success. I’ll add your e-mail address to my GECO mailing list, and be sure to let you know when the tour is set up. Thanks for your interest. Barbara
If there is a tour this spring, I would love to go.I am very interested in the tunnels.
Thank You
Andrew
Hi Barbara
A few years back I was looking for information on GECo as my family lived in a building where the Ford Dealership is now. I was about 5 years old but I had three older sisters and a older brother. My brother, Kerry Ian Taylor was 9 years old when he fell of the water tower and was killed, this was in 1953. I just wanted to thank you for this great article and keep in touch with any new tours of the area. Thanks so Much Dennis Taylor
Hi Andrew, I’ve added your name to my list. Will be in touch if and when we get a tour together. Take care. Barbara
Dear Dennis, thanks so much for your post. I learned last year, through several other GECO residents, about your older brother’s death. It hit the GECO community very hard back then. I’m so sorry for your loss. I hope through these GECO pages that we can preserve the memory of those who worked, lived, and died at GECO. I will be in touch should a tour be scheduled. God bless. Barbara
Barbara
Just finished re reading the coments from various people with an interest in the the tunnels.While my Mother in law was in Bay Haven Nursing Home Collingwood Ont a lady that was in the same room had worked at the Munition Plant GECO.
I don’t know if this means anything but a ‘Phyllis Topping’ lived next door to me at O’Connor Drive and Victoria Park as I was growing up in the 50′s. Is this the same person Nancy is commenting on?
Hello, I think you may mean my grandmother Phyllis Topping. The Phyllis I am commenting on, Topping was her maiden name and she lived just across from my grandmother on Victoria Park.
Maybe I know you Diane?
Nancy
There was a restaurant at the NW corner of Dawes Rd. and Danforth Ave. with a small lot behind it where the bus from GECO would bring workers at the end of their shift. I had a newspaper stand in front of the restaurant and about 5 pm some of the day shift would buy a newspaper from me when they got off the bus. I was only about 9 years old and I remember that the hit song on the restaurant’s jukebox was ‘Don’t Fence Me In’. It played about every 5 minutes. I was so sick of hearing it and I was glad when I sold all my papers and could go home. I lived on Main St. just north of Danforth. I think that was maybe my first job and in a small way, I guess it was my contribution.
I never went to GECO until several years later, but I would like to think that a lot of the workers knew me.
Hello Roy,
Thanks so much for sharing your GECo story. GECO touched the lives of not only the thousands of women and men who worked there, and the residents who lived there after the war ended, but it touched the hearts and lives of countless others who helped enrich the lives of those who worked and lived there. You, at the tender age of nine, contributed to the war effort! What a wonderful memory.
Barbara
Nancy Haines, I know who your mother and grandmother are now. Also, I remember the ‘other’ Phyllis lived on Victoria Pk and there was a daughter named ‘Poppy’. Your mother was the oldest child of Phyllis – I really didn’t know her because she was older than her siblings. I played with Bev, Ken and Alan. Before we lived there we lived in GECO. I remember taking the bus to Dawes and Danforth Roy speaks of when I was about 4 yrs old and also many other things from GECO.
Hi Diane, you have some of the family info incorrect but that’s okay. Barbara will give you my email address and I will explain in further detail.
Nancy
Barb
Roy Robertson that wrote the article of him selling papers in front of the restaurant Dawws and Danforth is a distant cousin to me and my sister worked in that very restaurant Roy speaks of.
Just discovered this website. We are very interested in participating in the tour of the GECO area – hope we are not too late. We attended a GECO reunion held at the Embers Restaurant in 2003.