History
The area was part of Ottawa's downtown for many years, the site of businesses related to the nearby Rideau Canal, such as Dey's Boat Works. The location was the site of The Arena from 1908 to 1927, where the original Ottawa Senators ice hockey team played. The land bordering the canal was cleared in 1927, including the demolition of the arena. The land was used to build "The Driveway" roadway along the canal, as a scenic improvement of the capital.
Along Elgin Street, the location was occupied by the Roxborough Apartments, a luxury apartment complex that had once been home to many Ottawa elites, such as Prime Ministers William Lyon Mackenzie King and Louis St. Laurent. As part of the 1949 Greber Plan, the site was to be cleared for a "Confederation Park" along the Canal from Laurier Avenue to Wellington Street surrounded by public buildings. The apartments and a number of buildings were expropriated and demolished by the federal government to build a "National Museum of Science" in 1965. The area north of the Mackenzie King bridge had already been cleared as part of the building of Confederation Square. That section was ultimately used for the construction of the National Arts Centre. In 1967, the Museum site was converted to parkland, to commemorate the Canadian Centennial (the 100th anniversary of Canadian Confederation).
From 1971 to 1993, the park was home to Ed Zelenak's massive sculpture, "Traffic." The controversial work was a large brown tube of fiberglass that was compared to a large worm or piece of dung, and led to much debate over modern art in Ottawa. It was later relocated to a more obscure location by the National Gallery.
Read more about this topic: Confederation Park
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“It would be naive to think that peace and justice can be achieved easily. No set of rules or study of history will automatically resolve the problems.... However, with faith and perseverance,... complex problems in the past have been resolved in our search for justice and peace. They can be resolved in the future, provided, of course, that we can think of five new ways to measure the height of a tall building by using a barometer.”
—Jimmy Carter (James Earl Carter, Jr.)
“As I am, so shall I associate, and so shall I act; Caesar’s history will paint out Caesar.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“To care for the quarrels of the past, to identify oneself passionately with a cause that became, politically speaking, a losing cause with the birth of the modern world, is to experience a kind of straining against reality, a rebellious nonconformity that, again, is rare in America, where children are instructed in the virtues of the system they live under, as though history had achieved a happy ending in American civics.”
—Mary McCarthy (1912–1989)