Dave Grant organized the annual Ottawa Christmas Dinner once again, which he founded in 2008. It has gradually changed into the enjoyable, relaxing evening that we locals have come to know. In the early times, we didn't have it every year, and it was only six people or so around a single table. Now, we number into the teens every year, and we take a long table. There are about six different conversations happening at once, and after dinner when we get out of our seats to trade, we get to chat with people on the other end of the table. It's a completely different vibe from your typical swap meet.
I sat across from Brian Woodard, who brought some interesting show-and-tell items. He enjoys cleaning and de-denting plates, rather than trying to restore them. Sometimes he takes artistic licence, like he did with his pair of 1940 motorcycle plates. They used to be fastened back-to-back with metal grommets, so he found grommets of the correct size and re-mated them. That's his 1943 Ontario commercial overstamp above, and his 1927 Yukon. There are a few mint examples of these in the hobby, all in the mid-two-hundreds.
Brian also brought a porcelain King's Highway 16 sign for show-and-tell. Highway 16 used to run from Ottawa to Prescott, a distance of about 50 miles. It still exists today, but only a half-mile's worth, running south from the 401 to the shore of the St. Lawrence. Brian's sign is the only survivor of which we know.
Soon we had more show-and-tell, courtesy of Liam Kivits who passed his Papal and IACP plates along the table. His Papal plate includes the event certificate.
Speaking of event plates, Eric brought his top find of 2024: A 2010 G20 summit plate. This makes three that are known to be in collections (Jim Becksted and I also have one). Perhaps, like other event plates, more will come out of the woodwork over time?
Here's a shot of the east end of the table. Alan Bones is holding his photo album, which contains pretty much every plate from his various runs. He's talking to Jim Becksted on the right. At centre, Dave Grant shows a visiting Joe Sallmen some plates.
Here's the west end of the table. On the left, Mike DeVouge regales Liam Kivits, Frank Crooks, Eric Vettoretti, and Dave Steckley with a plate-related tale. Dave made the trip from Acton to Ottawa with his wife, Evelyn, who is just out-of-frame.
John Hayes has a knack for finding stuff. He made a side-trip to pick up a batch of plates, before coming to the restaurant. He's holding three related vanity plates: FOLEY 2, FOLEY 3, and FOLEY 4. It must be a family name. Plate number two had a bit of faded magic marker on the face. It looked like someone had cleaned off most of it, but couldn't get the last traces. The table conensus was to try acetone. John tried it the following day, and —poof— the marker was gone!
Another one from Liam-- This is a 1967 plate that someone monkeyed with to avoid paying their 1968 fees.
After dinner, plate professors Frank Crooks and Mike DeVouge discuss how to tell a 1917 Quebec fibre plate apart from a 1919. There are no consistent idiosyncrasies between either plate, so they have long been a mystery to tell apart. Both years have variations in paint colour, the printing of the province name, and board thickness.
The most reliable way to ID an 1917 is if the matching dashboard plaque comes with it. Otherwise, the second-best way to tell the difference involves damaging the plate, but only slightly. By flipping the plate over to the rear side, one can use a blade to scrape away a small amount of light paint. If the fibre of the board is a red colour, then the plate is generally a 1919. If not, it's a 1917. To verify this further, the hobby would have to find more 1917 plates with dash plaques intact, and then do the scrape test to see if they are made of something other than red board. But finding enough of those to establish a pattern may be a pipe dream.
Here's a closer look at the 1917 and 1919 Quebec plates, belonging to Mike DeVouge and Frank Crooks.
Liam Kivits shows his annotated binder of plate documentation to Jim Becksted. Liam collects paper permits and stickers in addition to the tin that we know and love.
Young Liam Kivits, with his interesting collection of paper items, plus one of his favourite finds of 2024: 1922 Ontario plate number 27. It's been cleaned and coated in cadmium. Liam is still deciding if and how to have it restored.
After Mike was finished poring over the fine details of 1917 and 1919 Quebec plates, he discussed the rarity of early Prince Edward Island plates. On the table are an orange 1917 plate made of fibreboard, and a 1918 wire-rimmed tin plate made by the Macdonald Manufacturing Company.
A close-up of Mike's 1918 Prince Edward Island plate, made by the Macdonald Manufacturing Company of Toronto (which also produced Ontario plates from 1912 to 1916). This plate is actually a trader, but only for other similar PEI items! If you have any other rare PEI stuff, let me know and I'll put you in touch with Mike!
Eric Vettoretti and Alan Bones catch up after dinner. Alan brought a pair of super-rare Ontario Senator plates. Not graphics to promote the hockey team, though-- Alan brought an actual set of plates from the SEN series. These have been issued very slowly since the 1970s, and even now there have only been between 100 and 200 ever issued.
Alan's pair of Senator plates. I photographed them here as a show-and-tell item, not expecting that opportunity was knocking. Alan intended to keep the rear stickered plate, but offered the front one to me, much to my surprise. All I'll say is that I quickly made myself ready for the transaction, and I was giddy to go home with a Senator plate. Just to give you an idea of how few have been issued, below is a tiny picture-of-a-photograph (which I shot sometime between 2001 and 2003 when I was still living downtown).
Joe Sallmen and Dave Grant finalize a trade they had arranged for some American graphic plates.
All in all, it was a great evening of plate collecting. The folks at Boston Pizza are content to let us wander around and paw through trade boxes after dinner, but the restaurant is typically very quiet in the days after Christmas. The IIHF World Juniors were on TV, but on this night, Canada was beaten by Latvia in a long tiebreaking shootout. At least the collecting community came out as winners!
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