Vintage Video on Yonge Street (1974) - Toronto, Canada

Film I shot on Yonge Street while studying at Ryerson in 1974 - converted to digital in 2019. No drones back then - I was flying the plane to capture the aerials. Title design credit goes to my brother, Andrew Csefko (who also appears at :29s - with the beard). Enjoy!

[@Parkwaymania]

Who else watches these old videos and looks for people you knew?

[@maryanngonneau2856]

I looked for myself lol

[@xierraleone1905]

I don’t because I’m not old

[@PopShoppekid]

​@@maryanngonneau2856 yes I was 15 at that time. And we would come in from Mississauga and get into a bit of trouble on Yonge St 😂

[@funkfunkable]

Yes..I'm 66 and found one!! Me and my best friend walking east on Charles St ( where I lived) towards Yonge Street . We were like 8 or 9..all alone, not a care in the world. Best childhood ever. I saved the video. I was shocked to see my young self.

[@barney6888]

I was looking to see Sam leaning out on his front door.

[@Redhackle]

This was my Toronto. I was 22 a starving art student at the Ontario College of Art. It was very safe and people were friendly.

[@oliviajohnjohnolivia8142]

I hope you are not starving 😊

[@sevind7]

probably rose tinted glasses. Yonge street was far from safe back then. It's much better now.

[@ianarchibald1423]

@@sevind7 Yeah, in those days it was dirty, sleazy, and crawling with weirdos. Toronto, like most cities has been completely gentrified. Is it ideal? Perhaps not, but the city is generally safer now I would think.

[@thegoldendog7991]

⁠@@sevind7 Yes. Yonge St went through a change following the Emanuel Jaques murder.

[@1dilligaf]

@@ianarchibald1423 I was 14 years old and me and my friend used to go down and hang out on Young Street all the time ( at the arcade by Sam the record Man ) and we never once had an issue I wouldn’t dare let my 14 year-old kid go and hang out down on Young Street now

[@northhavencreative]

The Imperial Six and Sam The Record Man. That's when you knew you were on Yonge Street in the 70s.

[@bgorveatt]

Why is it B/W?

[@GP-ed1ti]

The candy apple and popcorn carts! I can still smell them!

[@curiousbo]

I was obsessed with those popcorn / candy apple carts when I was a kid

[@michaelsweenie-lane359]

This is the first year I hit Yonge Street as a teen - Still remember exiting the Wellesley Subway station on my way to buy a pair platforms and Master Johns

[@ingenewell5359]

Omg! Good times, had 2 pairs of there shoes, add some satin pants, and off to see Bowie at the okeefe centre 👍♥️

[@marmaly]

Outstanding film. It really captures the look and feel of 1974.

[@MML996]

I was 14 and miss those days

[@Jim-ku6ry]

Memories... Hook up with the boys after work on a Friday. Start off at Yonge St Station for 50 cents draughts ordered by the tray. Sometimes we'd head over the Old Spaghetti Factory for a bite or just hit one of the many pubs on Yonge. Tons of live music back in the day. The Gas Works was great rock club. Not too hard to take a gal home after. Once things closed, 1 am back in those days we'd usually hit the Happy Lucky Chinese food joint at Bloor St or head up to Yonge and St Clair and hit Frans all night diner for bite to soak up the booze and head home. No bar fights. No shootings or stabbings. No BS. Just a great night out on the town. Really miss those days

[@intercommerce]

Yonge St. used to be fun! Too bad it got ruined...

[@TheAverycross]

Great film with a touch of jazz! I enjoyed it very much:)

[@GFiacconi]

This is a great video that deserves more views! Thanks so much for sharing this awesome footage of our city!

[@monicapushkin3274]

Awesome, this is priceless. So sad this is all gone.

[@glennledrew8347]

And 50 years from now folk will be bemoaning the loss of those glorious days of 2024. ;) It has ever been the so, and always will be, when nostalgia is given free rein. The halcyon days of our younger years elicit potent feelings about those simpler and more care-free times. Particularly where our teen years are concerned, when we begin to leave childhood behind while still having the security of a family and home. But this nostalgia thing is a rolling train, following us throughout life, trailing behind by about 30 years and more. Calling to us with memories given a rosier tint, being always compared to the current travails of modern living. And who would have it any other way? That special mixture of wistful longing and warming glow of reflecting back on long past times is one of the wonderful pleasures afforded by an imaginative, reflective, contemplative consciousness. It is an aspect of the way in which time heals.

[@monicapushkin3274]

@@glennledrew8347 Very true. I recall reading one of the ancient Greek writers bemoaning his present day, and how much better it was in the "good old days" 2500 years ago! You can find this throughout literature going back centuries.

[@RideAcrossTheRiver]

@@glennledrew8347 Nobody is celebrating Toronto today.

[@RideAcrossTheRiver]

@@monicapushkin3274 No, now that cameras and AI are here, it'll be about five years.

[@khent712]

I emigrated to Toronto Canada from England in 1974, this brings back memories for sure.

[@marymarymillidweeb2661]

I wish it was longer! But thanks for sharing what you have.

[@elid3906]

Me Too 👍🏼

[@kenkur27]

That was the summer I moved to Toronto for grad studies at U of T, spent a fair bit of time exploring Yonge St. A long stretch of the street was closed to cars and turned into a pedestrian mall.

[@gregoryian123]

boy did we love city back then

[@RideAcrossTheRiver]

It's a hole now.

[@lee-ann1589]

I remember it and I loved the film!

[@BeeRich33]

Whoah, memories! I was 5. Imperial 6 = Star Wars / Close Encounters.

[@shawnattwells5355]

I miss Sam the Record Man. 😢

[@JustFluffyQuiltingYarnCrafts]

Excellent work. Thanks for sharing. ♥️

[@robmil2012]

Toronto was a safe place at one time mr sub at yonge and dundas was always open baskin robbins was open late at DUNDAS SQUARE Across from elcockador before the Eaton center was built 😊

[@canman5060]

1:45 I missed SAM The Record Man.

I was the guy at sam's and I was very polite and forthcoming with admiration and pontalnax with booky booky.

[@TributetoCanada]

Amazing and thank you!

[@rontyler1234]

Wonderful video, I spent a lot of time on the strip way back in the day. It's great to look back in time. Thanks man.

[@trainluvr]

Around the time of my first enchantment with T.O.

[@dg1006]

Mine was 1969.

[@johnchumadventures8075]

Dang I remember going g to that theater.

[@ecologics]

Thanks for sharing

[@howardhulstein6530]

Wow, that really brings a whole bunch of great memories!! ✌️👍

[@outonthetiles]

Awesome!! ✌️❤️🇨🇦

[@dlprod11]

Great film!

[@nikaa4237]

Great to see old videos of Toronto. I see a lot of comments where some people feel that it was safer while others say it was pretty seedy. On one hand I remember travelling downtown on my own when I was 15 to buy art supplies and I would go out and about on my own at about 12! Then again I remember being in my late teens and heading downtown and being followed by guys and creepy guys walking by and making comments. And yes I just wouldn't walk down certain parts of Yonge street.

[@Laughandsong]

At the time you shot this, I was 7 years old in Montreal I live in Toronto since 1994 and just love to see old footage. Great music score too! Did you end up working as a cinematographer? Thanks again!

[@andrewmarkmusic]

It was about this time I went down to Sam’s and bought the original Lynryd Skynard album with them in fire. I believe they were using helicopters to put up the CN. tower on that day. In a way, it was on that day at 15 that I knew (GNOSIS) what Toronto was and who owned it and why things have happened in the way they have. And yeah...I busked in the pit at Dundas and Young between 79 and 85...I still have the guitar that has the dents when coins hit it:-P

[@MissEddieBlueKawaiiKrafts]

I wasn’t born till 81’ but omg Tysm!! Even this is closer to what I knew then how it is now 😅💖

[@xierraleone1905]

You should follow me on Instagram

[@Sam-yg7pc]

I remember slum street very well.

[@peterhogan9537]

I remember the Yonge st. crossing back then. they had great bands.

[@americanparlor9994]

Great clip. Looking to contact you about it. Let me know if there's a way to get in touch. Thanks!

[@BrianBaileyedtech]

Awesome vid! I was 10 when this was taken and we used to drive down to Toronto from Kingston a couple times a year to stay in the big city. Used to stay at the what was then the new Holiday Inn beside the new City Hall on Chestnut street. You can see the stub of the CN Tower under construction, people were afraid that when it was completed it was going to fall and kill people in a wide radius (I kid you not)! The city today is completely unrecognizable. Yonge Street was the sleaze capital of Canada in those years just before they built the Eaton Centre. Amazing.

[@whackattack4634]

I loved the imperial 6. Actually everything back then was better

[@ayoutuber0202]

Did you know Dermot Kenney, he did the midnight til dawn show on CJRT? How about Tony Lamana? Third year RTA grads in '72.

[@gregoryworth84]

zumburgers ! likely the best burgers in toronto ! i often frequented the location on bloor east just east of yonge...MrMiniCooper79, thanks for the memories !

[@Argonaut121]

I have lived my entire life in Toronto. I turned 20 in 1974. Unlike a lot of folks my age I really don't look back at those days with rose-coloured glasses. As this video make clear, Toronto was dirtier, scruffier, less interesting all round. Great video, BTW.

[@bladder1010]

Yonge Street is Fun Street! 🤩

[@CosminNeagu]

Hi! Can I cut and use some of the shots for a video? This clip is awesome!

[@helenpage7988]

Love this. The gal around .57 secs. looks very much like I did then! Several friends agree, but would have been earlier than 74. Any chance some shots are earlier? It's just uncanny!

[@historybuff333]

This is super. I love it. How can I get a hold of you to ask a question ?

[@JJWiseFilms]

@MrMiniCooper79 I would like to use a clip from this video in documentary feature.

[@sadee1287]

Seems like the "red district" part of Toronto.... I recall those fur coats and the "hippie" hairstyles that carried over from the 60s. Wow - lots of garbage blowing around Yonge back in '74! And those Hare Krishnas chanting up and down.......haven't seen them around in decades. I wonder if you re-shot the same area today how it would compare 48 years later......

[@AlannahRyane]

Yep cruisin Young st in 74 was the thing to do... Zumburger and munchies

[@RideAcrossTheRiver]

Now Toronto is just a boring playground for the wealthy.

[@disprogreavette8545]

The year I was born and my mum was working for Bell downtown at the time. Maybe I'll see her waddling down the road ?

[@maryanngonneau2856]

That's awesome. Brings back some memories as I used to work downtown then. Lots of sex shops blatantly selling their toys and I remember back then they were busted and most run out of town when a little shoe shine boy was murdered.

[@MissEddieBlueKawaiiKrafts]

Omg that is so sad 😞 I wasn’t around there till the 90’s but my friend Junior was also murdered. We lived in an abandoned building together with about 20 other kids at the corner of Church & Carlton, I was only 14 when he was killed

[@maryanngonneau2856]

@@MissEddieBlueKawaiiKrafts wow 14 and living on the streets. Sorry to hear you were in that situation. :( The Shoe Shine boy was very upsetting. Here is the story en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_Emanuel_Jaques

[@stumarston6812]

kzbin.info/www/bejne/rIO4e6CeedVmqpY If you stop the video at around 2.42 there are two young boys in the picture. In the comments, a guy says he's certain that the young boy is Emmanuel Jacques and the older boy shining the shoes is his brother. The dates match up. The guy who posted the video says he took the pictures in late July 1977. Emmanuel was abducted around that time. Very sad.

[@ranaldthurgood4875]

@@stumarston6812 I'm confused. The video is only 2 minutes and 16 seconds long, and made in 1974. Are you perhaps referring to a different video? (Added: I think you're referring to a video called "Toronto 1977."

[@dennistowell343]

Were you in RTA or Photo Arts?

[@Bryan-nc3te]

It's like midnight cowboy set in Tirana

[@lamontcranston3177]

See the Canadian movie "Going Down The Road". Two Newfies come to Toronto for fame and fortune and wind up hanging out on 1970s Yonge St.

[@Grimenoughtomaketherobotcry]

I liked the SCTV version better.​@@lamontcranston3177

[@RideAcrossTheRiver]

@@lamontcranston3177 You mean the _SCTV_ parody.

[@lamontcranston3177]

@@RideAcrossTheRiver That too! Ha ha !

[@RideAcrossTheRiver]

@@lamontcranston3177 "Garth, Garth! I just got her pregnant!" "Mohhhhhhpe ... now I'll have to move to Etobicoke ..."

[@clearlynotwoke4929]

What’s missing from the crowd?

[@bobsfanjoy6569]

💖🙃

[@eltitojear]

Hello, I would like to use your video to animate a music video, would you give me permission?❤

[@donmorfeo8901]

Alot of wild and bad stuff happened on that street, 1977 was the end of it.

[@elainelane1119]

I was 17 yrs old😊

[@jvcpaints]

Look how thin everyone was.

[@ranaldthurgood4875]

Thanks for posting that. you captured it well, but... no Papaya Hut?

[@lamontcranston3177]

At Elm St. and Yonge?

[@ranaldthurgood4875]

@@lamontcranston3177 That's right, with the carved coconut heads. It seemed exotic at the time!

[@lamontcranston3177]

@@ranaldthurgood4875 I lived up the street on Elm. I would arrange to meet people at the Hut all the time.

[@waivedwench]

You can see why it was a place best avoided in those days!! Any idea what month of the year this was filmed?

[@RideAcrossTheRiver]

Toronto is best avoided today too.

[@davidmorgen4558]

One shot look like Abbie Hoffman ?

[@FrankKnight8846]

I was born in Toronto January 1974 👍🏻

[@buckodonnghaile4309]

How's it feel being 50? I've still got a few months before that hits. Cheeds

[@FrankKnight8846]

@@buckodonnghaile4309 so far so good, it’s going great

[@dodipe74]

It wasn't too diverse back then

[@urbexandbrokenthings4806]

Toronto was so nice back when people had civil liberties

[@MyViewToronto]

It looks like a Depression

[@Bryan-nc3te]

Schneiderman's music hall

[@WestboundPromo416]

toronto, city of champions

[@ricladouceur6202]

I could easily have been in this video! The only thing they missed was the Church of Scientology!

[@richardleonard4281]

I wonder what happened to the Hare Krishna people?

[@Hossak]

We had them in Adelaide, south Australia in the 70s and 80s. They would come chanting into the city mall daily. No idea what happened to them here either.

[@danielthoman7324]

They moved to Nunavut.

[@Hossak]

@@danielthoman7324 Found em! kzbin.info/www/bejne/fKvJiamKqr94Y6M&ab_channel=Shout%21Factory

[@lamontcranston3177]

Declined due to corruption. Public lost interest. No new converts. They're still around but they are no longer obsessed with growing.

[@MarcusDaGrand]

They became yuppies in the 80's.

[@wesdowling1340]

Sure this is Toronto don't see any guys wearing those funny cowboy hats

[@RideAcrossTheRiver]

Back before all the "world class city" nonsense.

[@rackrawan3191]

1:29 proves young street always had bums those were the for fathers for all bums you see on young street now 🤣

[@MissEddieBlueKawaiiKrafts]

Ikr when I saw that I was like this is the first true representation of Young Street yet 😅🙈😋

[@Alsatiagent]

That was a religious sect, they were called Hare Krishna's.

[@marks.3303]

And it was even worse in the 30s and before.

[@lamontcranston3177]

Those are members of Iskcon. They are singers of the names of the Lord.

[@mikeohagan2206]

no screaming protesters.

[@TheNZDoug]

Sam the Record Man. “ got any third Reich marching music”? 4rth floor!

[@L1V2P9]

I forgot all about Zumburger. Nothing remarkable about it accept the name.

[@andrewcharles459]

The Hare Krishnas made me LOL. Gawd, they were annoying.

[@markmarsh27]

Shocking how filthy the streets were back then.

[@jorgesoberanes2378]

70's fashion: yikes

[@sisuriffs]

But what pronouns were they using?

[@glen6945]

oooohhhhyes----1974

[@glen6945]

oooohhhhyes

[@celestemackenzie2024]

I would like to contact you about licencing part of this for a CBC doc. series. Could you post your email? Or, search for me on Facebook. Thank you.