While I teased the city of Hamilton at the end of last year, I never went into detail about the city’s history as a whole, mainly because I only sometimes visit the historic centre of Hamilton regularly. But having some time off, I headed back into the downtown to capture the rich architecture of the city centre that has seen a great deal of change throughout recent history and has gone from a city with a lot of blight to something restored and looking far better than when I was visiting regularly.
The one thing that makes Hamilton unique is that its success and position within Canadian history is entirely manufactured through the maneuvering of several leading members of the city, and mostly thanks to the position of the city as the center piece of the Great Western Railway. The archeological record shows that humans first settled in the region back 11,000 years ago, these indigenous peoples were drawn to the rich forests that filled in Southern Ontario and the rich running waters and resources supplied from the Niagara Escarpment. The first known people to settle the region were the Attawondonak who were driven out by the Haudenosaunee and in turn the Anishinaabe. It was the Anishinaabe that would negotiate with the British colonial authorities to cede the territory under Treaty 3 in 1792. The first colonists that would settle in the area were Empire Loyalists fleeing the American Revolution. These early settlers would farm the land, setup industry and commercial centers, with Ancaster and Dundas being the first villages in the region. Where Hamilton sits today was a large area of farm land surrounding the natural harbour onto Lake Ontario. British forces fleeing the occupying American forces following the capture of Fort George in May 1813 would setup a defensive point above the harbor on Burlington Heights. The Heights provided a jumping off point for the British force that defeated the Americans at the Battle of Stoney Creek and provided artillery cover for the Lake Ontario Squadron of Commodore James Yao that same year. Following the war, the modern city began to take form, three men, George Hamilton, James Durrand and Nathaniel Hughson started the process to redraw the map and establish a new townsite. Hamilton, who purchased Durrand’s farm, then both Durrand and Hughson using their influence in the Provincial Parliament established the new District of Gore, with the counties of Halton and Wentworth, the townsite took on the name Hamilton and was quickly named not only the county seat but also the district seat despite the fact there was nothing but farms in 1816. Hamilton was small compared to both Ancaster and Dundas which both were older and had well established economies. Hamilton remained small until 1832, when things started to take off, a channel was cut allowing year-round access between the harbour and Lake Ontario, a jail and courthouse were completed and on Burlington Heights, Sir Allan MacNab purchased the old British fort to construct his grand new home, Dundurn Castle. Hamilton would be named a village in 1833 with defined limits. From there Hamilton skyrocketed, industry was quickly attracted to the city with textiles and glass being the earliest industries to setup shop, the promise of a railway also began to attract a growing population. Hamilton was incorporated as a city in 1846. By the mid-century, the Great Western Railway setup their main yards and headquarters on land sold by MacNab, connecting the city with the United States at Sarnia and a new suspension bridge across Niagara Falls. Then eventually completing a line out to Toronto, it was the railway that kickstarted the steel industry in Hamilton. The move to replace the iron rails with steel created some of the first foundries and steel mills in the city starting in 1860. Local business owner, Isaac Bucannan would sponsor and raise a volunteer infantry unit, the XIIIth Battalion Volunteer Militia with both an infantry wing and a small artillery battery building a proper drill shed downtown. The remainder of the century brought a public transit system, public library, and electrification. Hamilton’s population doubled in the first decade of the 20th Century, which also saw the formation of the Steel Company of Canada (Stelco) and Dominion Foundries and Steel (Dofasco) two iconic Hamilton steel plants. And Hamilton’s industry only grew larger during World War One, but failure to improve working conditions and pay resulted in a massive strike by workers in 1916. And it wasn’t only steel, Procter & Gamble, Beech-Nut Packing and Firestone all setup factories in Hamilton through the 1910s and 1920s. And while the city suffered slightly during the economic depression in 1929, the large manufacturing base saw the city maintain a good standard of living and even the construction of the city’s first high-rise, the Pigott Building. The depression also saw the construction of two new railway stations, Canadian National building a beaux-arts style station in the city’s north-end, while Toronto, Hamilton & Buffalo created their art-deco master piece in the city’s core A university, McMaster, moved from Toronto to Hamilton setting up shop in 1930. Canadian Tire setup their second store in 1934, an airport providing training for pilots opened in 1940. The automotive industry arrived in 1948 with Studebaker opening an assembly line. The city’s fortunes continued to rise high through the 1950s and 1960s. The opening of the James N Allan Skyway carried the Queen Elizabeth Way over the Burlington channel in 1958 clearing up traffic snarls on the busy highway and Tim Horton’s opened their first store in 1964. But the economic slump that hit North American in the 1970s and 1980s would start to spell disaster for the heavy industry. Studebaker was the first to close in 1966, Firestone in the 1986, the 1990s proved exceptionally hard for Hamilton with large sections of the city falling into disrepair as the worldwide recession hit the city’s manufacturing industry hard, with Dofasco laying off hundreds of workers and divesting in mines in the north. Further closures would come through the early 2000s with Stelco being acquired by US Steel which started to shut down Canadian plants. In 2001, the new City of Hamilton formed out of the remaining communities of Wentworth County, Dundas, Flamborough, Glanbrook and Stoney Creek, balloning the population to half a million. Today while there are still sections of the city that are in decline, the downtown has been slowing improving and even restoring many of the iconic buildings which now have a new lease on life.
The trouble with visiting Hamilton so often is that I have this hit list of what I want to include. Like other entries in the FFP with a written historical narrative, I wanted to include many locations that are sometimes more challenging or quickly accessed. I had a great plan all laid out on how to approach this roll, but you know what they say about best laid plans. I had a beautiful route all laid out, checked things out on Google Maps. I wanted a skyline shot of the steel mills from the other side of the harbour, but there was no safe place for me to park the car and get the shot, so I drove on. Then while driving past the next stop, National Steel Car, there were a lot more security around than I expected. I wanted to get a nice shot of the art deco styled entry way onto the property. I found myself being stared at by a guard, so I left the camera in the bag, admired the gate and gave a wave before walking back to my car. I didn’t even bother at Stelco and Dofasco. I parked my car on off Mulberry, and headed out on foot. First going along James Street into the core, wandering around there just having some fun in the downtown. I found a great mural on the Courthouse that outlined the city’s history and industry to use as my cover shot, got some iconic buildings before heading back towards the harbour on James Street. After polishing off the first twenty, I went back to my car and stopped in at Dundurn Castle to include several shots from that property. While not what I envisioned, I still feel I managed to get a cohesive body of work to show off the city.
For May I again went with the kit 28-80mm lens, despite its flaws, this little lens is a perfect match for the EOS 3000 and feels more at home on the 3000 than it does on my Elan 7. I went with shooting the roll at ASA-160, giving it a bit of over-exposure and added a yellow filter for an extra pop of contrast and this time adjusting the development time slightly to compensate. The reason for this is that I developed the roll in Ilford Perceptol using a 1+1 dilution. Through my time using Perceptol I have found that the developer is a low contrast developer and often works better with over-exposed film than film shot at the box speed. And I like the results, the 1+1 times does give a good level of sharpness with an increase in the visible grain. Plus being a low contrast developer did help knock back the high-contrast light I had on the day. The real difficulty was trying to compose the shots with the sun behind many of hte buildings that I wanted to include. But I see it as good practice for knowing which side of the street to work with for the upcoming Hamilton TFS walk.
Hamilton has a rich architectural heritage that is well preserved despite having lost a lot of heritage buildings in the past. You can always see where there used to be a building, and there is a strong chance that the property is now a parking lot. Hamilton is a city where I started to get the hang of photography, especially with exposure and being able to meter and adjust to get the image looking how I wanted. It’s primarily thanks to my time exploring the wealth of abandoned buildings the city once offered. Will this be the last time Hamilton appears in the project? Hamilton, like Toronto, has a lot of areas to explore, including different neighbourhoods and former towns and villages that now make up the modern city. Next month, I’ll head to another favourite historical city in Ontario, the Royal City of Guelph.