There's no place like this home for Toronto's pesky raccoons (edited for space)
JEFF GRAY January 24, 2007
TORONTO -- In the middle of the real-estate agent's paradise that is Toronto's Riverdale lies a spacious Victorian semi that would ordinarily be filled with polished hardwood and stainless steel appliances by now, a half-million-dollar home for a professional couple with a baby and a Bugaboo stroller.
Instead, inside the crumbling red-brick house at 21 Langley Ave., which neighbours say has been vacant for at least 30 years, lies a festering mixture of rotting furniture, mould, garbage, flyers, raccoon feces and raccoons, both alive and dead (...)
The raccoon house is the legacy of an eccentric old man named Wlodzimierz (Walter) Schimming, who owned it and another decrepit place next door, where he lived. He also owned a bigger but also dilapidated and now empty house on nearby Broadview Avenue.
Believed to be in his 80s, he died alone on the August long weekend last summer in his stiflingly hot third-floor bedroom.
With his heavy Polish accent, distinctive European cap and ever-present housecoat, Mr. Schimming become something of a Langley Avenue institution, a source of both annoyance and amusement to his increasingly wealthy neighbours, who still seem to enjoy telling stories about his strange behaviour.
Mr. Schimming appeared to have a deep-seated distrust of any government authority, several of his neighbours said. Ms. Downey said he told her he didn't want to sell the decaying house because he did not want to pay capital gains tax.
Property records show he bought No. 21 in 1961, for $17,600. It is currently assessed for tax purposes at $511,000. The neighbouring house where Mr. Schimming actually lived was assessed at $672,000. The 46-year-old property records list Mr. Schimming as a "painter decorator" and show he co-owned the house with a sister, Sophie. (A neighbor says) he had a library of philosophy books, she said, Polish-language versions of Hegel and Descartes. But he became more "paranoid" as the years went on, she acknowledged, once calling the police when city property-standards officers showed up.
City Councillor Paula Fletcher (Toronto-Danforth) said she noticed the terrible state of No. 21 Langley while canvassing during the fall municipal election, and phoned it in herself in to city inspectors.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
1 comment:
Thanks for the story. It is interesting how 'urban myths' are created on our streets about certain houses and people. When I moved onto Victor Avenue in 1979, the woman who lived beside me and on the street since the 1920's told me that a former mayor of Toronto had lived at 20 Victor Avenue. For years I passed on that story until I did a little research and found that it was a famous runner Alf Shrubb not a mayor. The story is here
http://victoravenueriverdale.blogspot.com/search?q=20
It is also nice to see these houses come back to life.
Post a Comment