Neon: Restoring the Sam the Record Man sign

by all | 5 April 2018 12:04 pm

By Peter Saunders
One of Canada’s longest-awaited sign projects finally reached its completion recently when the ‘spinning’ neon records of Toronto’s defunct flagship Sam the Record Man music store were relit in a new location atop a building next to Yonge-Dundas Square. While the project always enjoyed broad public support, there were a number of challenges that hampered its progress along the way.

Origins of an icon
The flagship ‘Sam’s’ store, named after owner Sam Sniderman, originally opened at 347 Yonge Street, just north of Dundas Street, in 1961 and remained in business until 2007. The first of its neon signs included a thermometer, a triangle indicating weather conditions and the address in large numbers, ‘347.’

In 1971, Sniderman commissioned local signmakers Sam and Jack Markle to add a new sign to the façade. Their colleague Jack Derraugh sketched a giant neon spinning record. Sniderman loved the idea and convinced record companies to help fund it by offering them advertising space in the centre of the sign.

White neon tubes were arranged in circular rows in an 8-m (25-ft) wide square metal sign box to represent the grooves of a record. To produce the illusion of spinning, different sections flashed at different times. It was the first large neon sign of its kind to light up Toronto’s downtown core.

After Sniderman acquired and expanded into the building next door, he hired another company, Claude Neon, to produce and install a replica of the neon record right next to it in 1987. The two records became iconic elements of Toronto’s streetscape over the years, appearing in many photos and movies.

Heritage designation
Facing strong competition, initially from international retailers and then from online music downloading and sharing, Sam the Record Man filed for bankruptcy in 2001. Corporate stores closed first, followed by franchises, but the flagship location managed to reopen and remain in business until 2007.

Toronto’s city council granted heritage designation to the famous signage. This designation was intended to ensure the giant records would remain at 347 and 349 Yonge Street indefinitely, but the specific details of how this would be accomplished were unknown, since the matter of preserving the signage would be up to the future owners of the property.

The issue of ownership was resolved in 2008. Nearby Ryerson University acquired the site with plans to construct a new mixed-use facility.

Sheldon Levy, then-president of Ryerson, assured the public he was committed to remounting and displaying the giant records in a new permanent home on the campus, to
be determined. In the meantime, they would need to be removed before the empty building supporting them was demolished.

Gregory Signs & Engraving, based in Vaughan, Ont., was commissioned for this task, which involved removing, tagging and crating each tube, bolt, wire and section of sheet metal. This process took more than two weeks. Ryerson had the components placed into long-term storage at Gregory Signs’ facility, pending the construction of the new building.

A long wait
In 2011, Ryerson unveiled the architectural designs for the new eight-storey student learning centre (SLC) that would replace the defunct music store, with construction scheduled for completion by late 2014. While this building would clearly offer academic spaces for students, faculty and staff, however, it was less clear where the Sam’s signage would be displayed, despite the university’s legal requirement to do so. There was still no answer when Sniderman passed away in late 2012 at the age of 92.

In 2014, as construction of the SLC neared completion and it was clear Ryerson had no intention of integrating the neon records after all, Toronto’s city council supported a new proposal to reinstall the signage atop 277 Victoria Street, home to Toronto Public Health’s offices and also next to Yonge-Dundas Square. Ryerson would still cover all restoration, installation and ongoing maintenance costs, but no timeline was set for the sign’s return to public view.

Finally, in 2017, two years after the opening of the SLC and one year after issuing a request for proposals (RFP), Ryerson commissioned Hamilton-based Sunset Neon to handle the work. David Carley, Sunset’s owner and president, says his company won the job based on its experience in and reputation for in-house glass bending (it still has a neon department, unlike most sign shops), innovative ideas and dedicated project management.

“It was also important we had a facility that could handle the magnitude of the project,” he says. “This sign is huge!”

Account manager Tony Bianchi, who had already done work for Ryerson and had written up a feasibility report, was selected to oversee the project.

Reuse or replace?
The first challenge was to determine which of the components—in commercial storage by this point—could be reused and which would need to be replaced, keeping in mind Sniderman’s family had insisted on continuing to illuminate the spinning discs with neon, rather than switching to light-emitting diodes (LEDs) or another technology.

“We had to pull everything out and look it over,” says Bianchi. “It was amazing to discover just how well some of the original components had aged.”

The two sets of letters spelling out ‘Sam’ above the records were reusable, but only after they were repainted and the original wiring and sockets, both neon and incandescent, were removed and replaced with LEDs.

The records’ centre spindles, the older of which turned out to be a 3.8-L (1-gal) paint can, were also salvageable, as was about 80 per cent of the red neon glass tubing for the message ‘That’s Entertainment’ (which had replaced the record companies’ ads since 1987).

The white neon lighting for the spinning records, however, needed to be remade for the new structure, as the old glass tubes contained lead and would no longer have shone brightly.

“We had a hard time finding new neon components in this day and age,” says Bianchi. “In the end, our supplier had to source them from the U.S.”

Given this dearth of availability, new glass was also blown for replacement parts, to be used 10 or 20 years in the future.

“We created spare components and transformers that are housed on-site in a penthouse-level cabinet, so when the time comes for servicing, they can all be easily accessed,” says Carley.

“I can ride the subway there with just a tool belt and I’ll be able to fix that sign,” says Bianchi. “There’s already a swing stage mounted in place for doing repairs.”

Meanwhile, The Brothers Markle, who still operate their business in Toronto, updated the electronic light-flasher units that make the records appear to rotate. Indeed, they had invented this technology, which was used to upgrade the sign from mechanical flashers back in 1998.

“Sam Markle himself has provided replacement flashers that match the same sequence,” says Carley.

The backlit signboxes below the records had to be completely rebuilt using aluminum frames, LED modules and power packs.

“The old ones, which were acrylic, had pretty much disintegrated,” says Bianchi.

A different setting
Another major challenge was re-engineeringthe sign for its new location. Instead of being mounted flush to a street-level façade, after all, it would now be installed atop the roof of an 11-storey building.

“The building is 80 years old and started out with four storeys before another seven were added in the 1980s,” Carley explains, “so we were very restricted in terms of the weight load we would be adding.”

For this reason, the backlit signboxes were wall-mounted just below the roofline, with their drivers installed on the other side of the wall, so they could be accessed from the roof.

“The signboxes might appear a bit off-centre from some angles,” Bianchi explains, “as the structure holding the records is actually set up about 1.8 m (6 ft) back from the edge of the roof.”

Wind load regulations, meanwhile, required 67 per cent of the main sign background to be open, so as to allow moving air to pass directly through them.

“I worked with engineers to develop a new louvred system,” says Bianchi. “The background of the sign would look like a solid panel, but would actually be slotted, like a set of Venetian window blinds.”

The concept won approval, albeit not without compromise. Bianchi wanted the louvres to sit at a 45-degree angle, for example, to allow optimal viewing from the street below the building, but this configuration would not have adequately dealt with the horizontal wind load, so it was rejected.

Another issue was snow loading. Sunset had to add a heating system to melt any ice and snow that might collect on the louvres. This system is activated by temperature sensors, which are both connected to a standard electrical supply and hooked up to a generator for backup power in case of a wintertime blackout.

The system’s warmth, in turn, created another issue by attracting pigeons to roost. So, wire barriers were added in front of and behind the louvres to keep the birds away.

Back in the public eye
The processes for the engineering drawings, determining all logistics, applying for permits and installing the signage at night all stretched out the timeline. Completion had been anticipated for mid-2017, but the installation was pushed back into the fall and the lighting ceremony was delayed until early January.

“There was a countdown event with a big red button,” says Bianchi. “The mayor of Toronto, John Tory, attended the event, as did Sniderman’s son Bobby, who was quite emotional. Tory mentioned us in his speech and we were interviewed on TV. This was definitely the best thing I’ve worked on in my 40 years in the sign industry. The logistics were challenging, but there was a lot of co-operation across the board, from City Hall to Ryerson. Everybody supported this project 100 per cent.”

With files from Sunset Neon. For more information, visit www.sunsetneon.com[7].

Source URL: https://www.signmedia.ca/neon-restoring-the-sam-the-record-man-sign/

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