Getting ready for the book sale.
Our gardener explains how we care for the plantings in the Blue Canoe.
Our small gift shop offers tiny handmade delights to decorate your home.
Summer fun includes an outdoor activity such as this one—colouring wool tassels with natural dyes.
Two winners of our History of Toronto Quiz!
Our volunteers removing the ramp wall to make the doorway more visible.
Until the 1950s, what is now leased from the City by the Community History Project for the Tollkeeper’s Cottage, was the Davenport bus turnaround.
Our board members and friends visit Spadina House to learn more about Black history in the area.
A class of school children learning to play old fashioned horseshoes.
At the beginning of May, our docent introduces the Jane’s Walk from the Cottage and into Wychwood Park.
A dancer in Tollkeeper’s Park for the Day of Truth and Reconciliation.
The gardeners at the Tollkeeper’s Cottage keep the plpants thriving to attract pollinators in the canoe as part of the Butterflyway Project.
A few docents taking a break during the Truth and Reconciliation Celebrations.
Our volunteer Board of Directors are elected each year and are responsible for decisions that keep the Cottage viable and well maintained.
Our gift shop offers unusual, one of a kind items such as these hand-made books.
Our Victoria Day Tea attracts many of our supporters for a relaxing afternoon of tea, biscuits and good conversation.
Our book sale allows us to recycle books and share good reads with many readers!
Programs for schoolchildren teach them about chores before labour-saving machines.
The Cottage reflects the home-made decorations of Christmas past.
Our rotating displays show various aspects of life in the 19th century: here we see a collection of toys.
Our Talks pick up on the Victorian interest in spirituality with seances, dowsing rods and a game of Ouija.
Our colourful crazy quilt has saved many a family from the cold of early Toronto winters.
Cookie Day in December brings out the sweet tooth in everyone! Everything is homemade by our dedicated volunteers, with prices kept reasonable so all can enjoy the season!
Our table is always decorated with the abundance of the time of year, to show how the land provided for our tollkeepers.
We welcome the Davenportagers and their canoes as they re-enact the trail of the
coureurs-de-bois in the 17th and 18th centuries.
Our docents’ warm welcome and historical expertise make your tour here both interesting and fun!
A big bee lights on an echinacea flower in our summer garden.
Evening at the Tollkeeper’s Cottage is filled with the Spirit of the past.
Our Walks are a popular feature of days when the good weather allows the leader to point out architecture, former residents, botany and other aspects of our neighbourhoods. The brochures are also available as a reminder or as an aid to do the walk yourself.
Roads were important to tollkeepers, so we treasure the history of Gete-Onigaming, or Davenport Road. This old route was essential for animals and Indigenous people as it followed the coast of old Lake Iroquois.
Docent Brad Young describes the operation of the Cottage Findlay stove, made in the Ottawa Valley by a company that lasted more than one hundred years.
When the cold weather hits we sell many of our one of a kind handknitted hats, mittens and socks.
David Woodhead is one of the many volunteers who has helped to make our history come alive. Here he is refreshing our model of the Cottage and adding animals and wagons to create a lively street scene.
Our shop has many stained glass items that celebrate the craft in the windows of some of Toronto’s old Victorian homes. They are made by a local craftsperson.
An outdoor event is made better with some music!
We provide pea and lentil soup and biscuits to the voyageurs on their portage across Davenport road.
We were pleased that M.P. Carolyn Bennett came to support Every Child Matters.
Our crows keep a watchful eye as docents tend the herb garden.
Maureen Jennings, author of the Murdoch Mysteries, shares some of her favourite things with an the enthusiastic group.
A display outside the Cottage celebrates the tassel dyeing we did with several classes of children.
Our lush pollinator garden toward Fall.
On our tours, we point out the many interesting and original old objects from a century ago or more. For example, this is a bed warmer.
Maya Bannerman re-enacted with great feeling parts of the beloved story of Anne for our audience.
Elderly bug hobbles away from the Tollkeeper’s Cottage, from our Photo Event.
A Mississauga Elder chats with a Board Member after a ceremonial planting of a birch tree.
Docents taking a short break from the Truth and Reconciliation activities.
Although our tollkeepers were not rich, they often brought cherished family pieces with them when they came to Canada.