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Vintage Toronto Ads: Where Young Moderns Get Wrecked

By Jamie Bradburn

20090707wreck-room.jpg
Source: Toronto Life, November 1966

During a long night of testing out the latest dance moves with local swingers, isn’t it refreshing to know that hot canapes will be waiting for you when you need to step off the disco floor?
Those enticed by the trappings of the Wreck Room as presented in today’s ad might have been confused once they reached Avenue Road. Based on other ads that appeared in local papers throughout 1966, whoever submitted this one got the address wrong. If you wanted to boogaloo the night away, you had to cross the road to the Regency Towers Hotel (now Howard Johnson).
We also checked the phone numbers listed above, which don’t match the reservation line indicated in any other Wreck Room ads we have encountered. We found one of the numbers listed in a June 1967 Star classified ad as the morning number for a “coloured” nurse looking for a clean, three-bedroom unfurnished apartment near the TTC. Other details regarding the club match up, from its location within the building to the cocktail hour.
As the club awaited its liquor license during the spring of 1966, it was reluctant to admit to the Star if its cocktail waitresses would be of the scantily clad variety. The manager refused to allow any pictures to be taken for an article on the rise of Playboy Bunny–inspired servers around Toronto, fearing that any shots would “prejudice” the liquor board’s decision.
As for 90 Avenue Road? Originally built in the late 1800s as a home for an insurance agent, it housed Boba restaurant, until its closure last year.
Additional material from the May 28, 1966 and June 20, 1967 editions of the Toronto Star.

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  • http://undefined David Toronto

    It was 99 Avenue Rd.;someone mis-keyed the
    second digit. I remember the hotel because
    I lived on Bernard Ave. At my street corner
    the Scientologists had taken over a funeral
    home.
    The hotel had a large draught room in the
    basement and it was called La Place Pigalle.
    It was a standard tavern but there wasn’t
    as rigid a segregation between the mens
    and ladies and escorts sides.
    The whole place was cheapness writ large.
    I remember beer and other drinks glasses
    that had visible signs of wear after years
    of heavy use and cheap decor probably from
    some place like Honest Ed’s.
    Since it was located a long block up from
    Yorkville Ave., it was for the teenagers
    with their parents credit card. Most of these
    were from Forest Hill, Downsview or the better
    off areas of Etobicoke.
    I think there was dining available but it wasn’t
    promoted. It was there to fulfill the conditions
    of the liquor licence.
    Thinking back, it was closer to a higher class
    Brunny more than anything else.

  • http://undefined Toby von Meistersinger

    The seemed to miss a “u” in colourful.

  • http://undefined Jamie Bradburn

    Thanks for the memories…it sounds as if it lived up to the “wreck” part of the name.
    Would you believe the Regency Towers/Pigalle/Wreck Room was 89 Avenue Road? …check here for more ads for the Wreck Room.

  • http://undefined MariaPD

    Did “swingers” mean “people who do the dancing”? or did it have the meaning that we have today about interchanging partners?

  • http://undefined Jamie Bradburn

    I would suspect more the former than the latter.
    The groovy guy on the right looks a little like Mad Magazine’s Roger Kaputnik (of “The Lighter Side of…” fame), which to some would be the antithesis of hip, swinging style.

  • http://undefined David Toronto

    89 or 99, I can’t be exactly sure 41 years on.
    But I do remember that beer was 45cents and
    that was about twice as much for the same amount
    of draught downstairs in the tavern.
    The province had a regulated beer glass for
    all taverns and the frosted line indicated
    12 fl.oz. Nobody got short measure because
    of that.
    And you last had a draft for 25 cents, when?

  • Adam Sobolak

    He also looks like he might be along some Elton John/Truman Capote axis, if you get my drift.

  • http://undefined lunarworks

    So, The Annex Wreck Room has a precedent.