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Heritage

Toronto Travel Advantage — Danny Ry

Travel agency · Toronto · Greater Toronto Area

The society's news archive preserves the scene: a community charity evening, a 'lucky draw' of prizes donated by Macedonian businesses, and the grand prize — a trip for two to Fort Lauderdale — given by Danny Ry and Toronto Travel Advantage. The community's travel agents booked the diaspora's flights home for decades; this entry keeps one of their names.

Sources (1)

  1. https://macedonianhistory.ca/news/macedonian-kolede-costume-ball Society news archive — the Kolede ball, whose grand prize Danny Ry and Toronto Travel Advantage donated

  • The Java Shoppe

    Coffee shops · North York (Toronto)

    Closed 1960s (absorbed into later ventures)

    A fourteen-stool coffee counter opened by a teenaged John Bitove Sr. — with Dotsa beside him — became five locations by 1962 and the seed of the largest private...

    Macedonian connection: The fourteen-stool coffee shop where the Bitove empire began; John Sr. was the Toronto-born son of immigrants from Gabresh.

    Sources: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Bitove_Sr.

  • The Toronto Raptors — the Bitove founding

    Professional basketball · Toronto

    Closed Bitove sold his stake in 1996–97

    On 30 September 1993 the NBA awarded Toronto its expansion franchise to a bid led by 33-year-old John Bitove Jr., who named the team the Raptors, served as its...

    Macedonian connection: The NBA came to Canada because John Bitove Jr. — grandson of Gabresh immigrants — won the expansion bid.

    Sources: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Bitove

  • York County Quality Foods

    Institutional catering · Toronto (Pearson Airport)

    Closed merged into Bitove Corporation 1989

    In 1983 John Bitove Sr.'s York County Quality Foods took the ten-year food-and-beverage contract at Toronto Pearson away from the incumbent giant — the win that...

    Macedonian connection: The Bitove vehicle that beat the incumbent for Toronto Pearson's food-and-beverage contract.

    Sources: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Bitove_Sr.

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