This house was built in 1941. It features a double car garage, jacuzzi, upper patio and an outdoor pool.

It was last owned by a woman named Rosemary B. In 1984, Rosemary founded a massage therapy company. The business was sold in 2009.

In 2000, the house was transferred into her name for $2. This indicates that it was likely a family transfer. The property was purchased in 2020 for $2,200,200 by a numbered company. Rosemary passed away in August of 2021 at the age of 71.

The Explore

I first discovered this house in June of 2023. It was getting dark by the time I arrived. I anxiously tried the front door and to my delight, it opened. I entered and used my phone to look at some of the ground floor rooms. I was in the house for no more than two minutes when I heard the sound of something rustling in the kitchen. I was unsure what the sound was, an animal perhaps or someone trying to hide? In any event, I left quickly.

I returned the next day with camera in hand to document the house. I noticed two things: the side window was now open more than it had been the night prior and the front door was now locked. Perhaps an owner had secured the house? The window suggested to me that perhaps someone was squatting here.

I tried the back door and it opened! I called out, “Hello, is anyone here?” to which there was no reply. I started taking photos. As I made my way to the front of the house, I saw someone walking in the upstairs hallway. The person was a male, who appeared to be transient. I asked him if he was staying here, he responded that he had been walking past the house and was curious.

I’d later find some cigarette butts and a half eaten Pop Tart next to a bed which indicated that he may very well have been staying at the house – contrary to what he’d told me. I later observed him outside possibly waiting for me to leave. This is a reminder to the sad state of housing in this country.

The House

As you stand in the front entrance, to the left is a room with low hanging light fixture and fireplace. I feel like this may have been a room with a pool table, given the low height of the lighting. To the right of the entrance is an office den with a wall bookcase.

The kitchen is in a state of disassembly and I didn’t spend much time in it. To the west of the kitchen is a large room lined with wooden paneling and a spiral staircase leading to the second floor. There’s extensive use of wooden paneling throughout the house but not of the cheap variety.

To the east of the kitchen is what looks like the living room. The different rooms are somewhat confusing because I didn’t understand what the purpose of the rooms were. At the back of the house is another large room with an partition opening in the wall facing into the kitchen. It seems that any of these rooms could be a ‘living room’, leaving me to wonder what the purpose of the other rooms was?

Upstairs were a few bedrooms of non-interest. One bedroom had a bad with a sheet, a smell of fresh cigarette smoke and half of a Pop Tart.

The master bedroom is quite large. It features a walk out patio facing the back of the house. There is a jacuzzi tub at the top of a flight of marble stairs with oval windows on both sides. This is interesting to look at but not all that functional.

The upstairs bathroom features a large stain glass window in the shape of a key.

There’s some water damage primarily toward the rear of the house but otherwise it looks repairable.

The Basement

Down in the basement I discovered dozens of empty video card boxes. There was a room lined with insulating foil. I immediately knew what the room had been used for – it wasn’t a grow op, it was a Bitcoin mining room. Here, dozens of computer video cards hashed out mathematical equations in an attempt to mine cryptocurrency.

Exterior photos & video will be posted the first week of July.

Phone Photos

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I don’t have much information on this property. It looks like it might have been a seasonal home but it could have been a residence as well. I’d hesitate to call it a time capsule, it’s far from it. There’s a lot of debris but it’s held up quite well against vandalism and nature.

What happened to the Baxters and why do they no longer use this property? Ontario is full of mysteries like this one.

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This is one of four vacant houses along the same block of a busy highway. The land was sold recently for $18 million dollars. It’s most likely that for that price, the houses are to be demolished for new development.

This house appears to have been converted into two rental units. The upstairs is of no interest while the main floor has a nice staircase, wooden molding and pocket doors.

The photos aren’t the best and I expect to do a revisit soon.

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This home was owned by Richard and his wife Patricia since 1973. I know that a man named Geoff lived in the house and passed away in the home in August of 2020 at the young age of 49. He owned his own business and I’m surmising he rented the home. There was a sign for his business in the back room.

The house has been vacant for several years now and the grass is quite overgrown.

In 2020 this house was sold for $4.4 million and the company that purchased the land later sold it in 2022 for $18.5 million dollars.

There are three other houses along this section of the road that are also vacant and overgrown.

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A country home taken back by the financial lender. A sad testament to the overpriced housing crisis we face.

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This house was built in 1976 and was owned by a woman named Susannah V. The house title was transferred in 2012 to another family member.

I’m not entirely clear on the history but I believe this is accurate. The house was last owned by a man named William V. William owned a maple sugar bush which was popular with area residents. Most every home had a bottle of William’s maple syrup on their kitchen table. I found records going back to the early 1970’s that indicate he held an annual pancake festival for the community.

It’s unclear what the relationship between Susanna and William was, but they are both mentioned as taking part in the maple syrup festival. William married a woman named Maureen. William passed away in 2022.

It’s most likely that the family moved out of the aging home and into a more modern property next door to this one.

The fridge and washing machine are from the 50’s to 60’s era.

This was the home of Helmuth Hans P. Helmuth was born in 1923. He married and had two children, Michael and Ingrid. Helmuth worked in metals and alloys, and I believe he owned his own business.

There is no information available on the mother, I know that she passed away in 2017.

The parents separated sometime around 1973. A handwritten note from the son, dated 1973, indicated that he had moved away and was living with his mother. Helmuth remarried a woman named Edwina. Based on the 35 mm slides, I believe Edwina is the woman of colour in the photos.

The son, Michael, attended Bible College in the early 1980s and was married in 1984. As for his sister, Ingrid, there is no information to be found, and she’s not listed as a friend on her brother’s social media page.

Helmuth passed away in 1980 at the age of 57. This explained why I encountered such great difficulty trying to find information about him on the internet.

The house was built in 1956, and ownership was transferred to Helmuth in 1979 for $1. This is likely an indicator of a transfer within the family. Some of the photos showing the house are dated pre-1979. Helmuth passed away in 1980, but it’s likely the family had already been living in the home for some time.

The house was eventually connected to the garage.

Considering this house has likely not been lived in since 1980, it’s impressive to see clothes and jackets hanging in the closet and the kitchen cupboards filled with items. This is far from a time capsule house, but you can certainly envision the memories of an earlier era in this house.

I found several boxes of 35mm slides and scanned them in. Note that the orientation of the photos may be backwards and that the dates provided are from when the slides were developed, not necessarily when the photos were taken. Viewing these images, several thoughts came to mind: that many of the people in these images are likely dead now, and that Helmuth was probably a decent man who loved his family. The slides carried the same musty smell as the house did.

In the basement, you’ll find the model train set for which the house is named. You can see some of the model trains in the slide photos. Today, the track is dismantled, oxidised, and dirty. There’s a tiki bar with a few stubby beer bottles and an assortment of beer bottle labels on the wall. Note that there’s mould in the basement.

There are two sets of stairs leading to the main floor, both of which will take you to different parts of the house. The living room has a large (and heavy) floor-model television. It’s difficult to see the rooms because all of the windows have been boarded up.

I’m fascinated by the 1960s and 1970s, as this was a time without social media. People filled the streets, restaurants, and bars. There were no selfies or social media pages to fill with photos of one’s social life. The memories are contained on film, which lie in closets, not on YouTube. You and I are likely the only people to have seen these slide photos in the last four decades.

I’m not going to contact the son because I feel that the house being left abandoned is a testament to the children not wanting a relationship with the memories from this timeframe.

As for who Michael and Ingrid’s mother was, and what happened to Ingrid, those details remain unanswered. As for the house, forty years later it’s been rummaged through by passers by, mold and water damage have damaged the rooms, but the home retains some untouched areas.

Research: TWP

Cell Phone Photos

Historical 33mm film slides

November 1964

March 1967

Assorted

Over 100 more 35mm slides from this house can be seen here.

35mm slides as found inside the house. Original post can be found here.

August 1965

June 1967

Expo 1967 (September)

July 1968 & Assorted

October 1969 (Muskoka / Niagara Falls)

March 1971 (exterior photos of the house)

August 1971

“Out West” (August 1971)

October 1972

August 1973

August 1977

This was the home of Dr. Edward Disenhaus and his wife Renee. Dr. Edward graduated from the University of Toronto in 1955. He worked as a doctor until around May of 2002 when he let his membership expire. Renee worked as an operating room nurse in her earlier years.

Their home was built in 1969. It appears that they may have inherited it in 1975 from family. Dr. Ed passed away in January of 2016. Renee passed away in November of 2020 and the estate sold the property for $2,500,000 in 2022.

The house is no longer vacant.

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