Armour Heights

Armour Heights is a neighbourhood in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, in the district of North York. It is bounded by Wilson Avenue to the south, Bathurst Street to the west, and the west branch of the Don River to the north and east. Highway 401 cuts through the centre of the neighbourhood.Armour Heights is not considered a neighbourhood by the City of Toronto. Instead, it and nearby Lansing are grouped into one neighbourhood called Lansing-Westgate. However, the areas are colloquially referred to as Lansing and Armour Heights.HistoryThe area is named after John Armour, a farmer who was granted a concession to the area sometime before 1837. He sold the eastern part of his land to the Hogg brothers in the middle of the nineteenth century, and it later became Hogg's Hollow. The rest of his property remained in the Armour family until just before the First World War, when it was purchased by developer and speculator Colonel Frederick Burton Robins. Robins built a large estate for himself named Strathrobyn, but his development plans were put on hold by the war. He decided to loan out the lands to the military, and an air training facility was established. It mostly trained American pilots and among other figures saw Amelia Earhart work there.After the war, the airfield became the base for Bishop-Barker Aeroplanes Limited, operated by war heroes Billy Bishop and William George Barker. It was at this site that Bishop had one of the most dangerous crashes of his career. The company folded in 1921 and the airfield was abandoned. Some development occurred during the 1920s, but the area was still too far from the centre of the city to attract many buyers.