Southam Park

Southam Park

Fountain

Southam Park Fountain

History:	This park area of three acres at Upper James Street and Claremont Drive on the Mountain was once the site of the Mountain View Hotel, patronized in the early part of the last century by many citizens of Hamilton and Toronto. Picnics, baseball games, pony rides, and a merry-go-round flourished in the area behind the hotel, while the roller-skating rink, complete with bar and mechanical music, was a popular attraction. The roller-rink, converted to a horse show ring, was destroyed in a spectacular fire, and the stone hotel was pulled down in the early 1940s. The property was given to the Parks Board by the Southam family to be used in perpetuity as a recreational park. It affords a fine view of the expanding city below. The drinking fountain, originally placed near the top of Beckett's Drive, was a memorial to [Major] Gordon Southam, killed in World War I. (Excerpted from an address by T.J. Newlands, 14 Feb 1964 to the Head-of-the-Lake Historical Society.) Here is a link to Major Southam's Virtual War Memorial. The fountain is now in disrepair.

Location:	Southam Park Hamilton, ON

GPS:	43.244789, -79.875244