Strange Street

The Doors, Strange

I’ll be heading off to The Stratford Festival to see Oklahoma! this weekend, and discovered that the local Rent-a-Wreck is already out of cars! There’s often a silver lining, however, and this arrived in the form of some odd Toronto trivia that I learned in the person of a Dr. Strange. Bob, who took my call at the rental place, explained that Dibble Street - where I now successfully have a car on hold - was at one time called Strange Street. Dr. Strange ran a hospital -’for humans’, according to Bob - that I imagine to have been the same vintage as the gothic-style Don Jail just up the road…nothing found so far by googling. Dr. Strange’s Hospital was demolished to make way for the GO line back in the 60’s.

Dr. Strange would have known this classic bridge underpass, just nearby on Eastern Avenue.

Maybe a flute rendition of The Doors classic hit is in order?!

(NOTE: Just days after this was penned, I heard an oddly familiar tune in my neighbourhood. This particularily engaging acoustic version of The Doors classic ‘People Are Strange’ was performed by a father-son duo, and offers a fine overlay of guitar-work, harmony vocals, a great bass riff midway through to anchor the piece, and then some fine picking toward the end. The remarkable thing that I learned afterward is that they had never tried playing this song prior to my chance hearing of it that evening.)