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 fedge
    
Location: Gaud Corners, Ontario, Canada
Gender: Male
you blight up my life™®
 |  |  | Historic hidden well almost claims man and his dog!
< on 1/5/2008 3:28 AM >
|  | | | One hole of a mystery
Century-old well unearthed -- then covered up again
By TAMARA CHERRY, SUN MEDIA
David Finley, with dog Duey, yesterday looks at freshly laid cement covering a hole he nearly stumbled into in front of Neil McNeil Catholic Secondary School. Historian Gene Domagala estimated the hole, an old well, is one of 500 in Scarborough. (Tamara Cherry/Sun Media)
The hole was just wide enough for a body to have fallen through.
That's what David Finley thought after stumbling upon a historical well in front of an east-end all-boys school the other night.
It was New Year's Day around 1 a.m. His dog Duey was sniffing around on his extended leash.
Finley, who has lived near Neil McNeil Catholic Secondary School for several years and has walked his dog through the parking lot for the last two, considered sticking his foot in to see how deep the hole was.
That was a stupid idea, he decided.
So he threw in a stick instead.
It vanished.
Finley recruited a couple of cops parked across the street. Their flashlights determined the hole was a lot deeper than a few feet.
Police tape went up and Finley went home.
The next day, a few trucks showed up and some men got to work.
The top of the well started about 2.5 metres below the surface.
There was about a metre of brick piled atop a layer of shale that sat around the hole.
A 6-metre ladder lowered in by the workers vanished into the abyss. It's now under cement.
It, and a piece of Toronto history.
By today's standards, Peter Paterson would be worth about $50 million.
The wealthy manufacturer built the well in the 1880s on what is now a grassy area on the east side of Victoria Park Ave., just south of Kingston Rd. It was about 12 to 18 metres deep and was one of likely two wells on his estate, local historian Gene Domagala said yesterday.
The land was called Blantyre.
Blantyre was given to the Catholic church in the 1890s and Paterson's home -- used as a summer home by the archbishop of the time -- would become St. John's Training School.
"There was no water until the city started taking everything over in 1910," Domagala said.
So the well provided water for all the bad boys sent to learn a trade.
Domagala estimates there are "easily" 500 wells scattered around Scarborough, waiting to be found.
Instead of being filled in, most retired wells were simply boarded up, only to be built or grassed over and forgotten about until someone -- such as Domagala's neighbour who unearthed a gaping hole in her Lee Ave. backyard while mowing her lawn some 25 years ago -- stumbles upon it. And hopefully, not into it.
St. John's traded hands in 1958 when it became Neil McNeil boys school.
"A caretaker noticed the police tape," a curious teacher who has worked at the school several years said yesterday. "No one knew about it (the well)."
It's not clear just who filled in the hole Wednesday afternoon.
The city says it knows nothing of it. Neither does the Toronto Catholic District School Board.
Finley said the workers had a peek down with a camera but he wasn't sure if they saw the bottom.
"I didn't notice any footprints because there was snow," he said. "But you probably wouldn't survive a drop like that. You wouldn't be calling up."
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Avatar-X
   
Alpha Husky
Location: West Coast
Gender: Male
yay!
| | | Re: Historic hidden well almost claims man and his dog!
<Reply # 1 on 1/10/2008 9:28 PM >
| | | | Neat story -- but it figures that it's from the Sun. No wonder the paragraphs consist of one sentence each and seem to be written by an 8-year-old.
huskies - such fluff. |
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nomeus
This member has been banned. See the banlist for more information.
Location: FLA
Gender: Male
www.FLURBEX.com
| |  |  | | Re: Historic hidden well almost claims man and his dog!
<Reply # 2 on 1/10/2008 11:18 PM >
| | | | this guy is lucky..i just read where a dog killed his owner with a shotgun. the gun was laying in the back of the truck, the dog somehow stepped on the trigger and the shots went through the tailgate, hitting the owner in the thigh. they hit an artery and he bled to death.
boy is that dogs face red!
www.terraincognito.com
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Axle
 
Location: Milton, ON
Gender: Male
Sieg oder Tod
| | Re: Historic hidden well almost claims man and his dog!
<Reply # 3 on 1/11/2008 1:06 PM >
| | | | My dad went to Neil McNeil for High School.
Cool story.
Celer at Audax
Para la Victoria Siempre Alemanes! |
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