The Gore, the triangle, the delta and change
What’s in a name?
I don’t know about you, but the first thought when I hear the word “gore” is not a park. It’s more like a Freddiewhat’s-his-name-and-the-nightmareon-Elm-Street kind of thing. Gives me the willies. Something for a pathologist. (I tried pathology as a career for a couple of years. My hat goes off to them.) If you mention Gore Park, though, my imagination offers up an entirely different picture: it’s trees and a sheltered space, a potentially beautiful addition to an urban environment. And, as it turns out, the word provides us with a unique Hamilton story.
The name Gore Park always made me wonder, “Who the heck is Gore?” Growing up, I imagined some waistcoated guy with sideburns and a pocket watch, maybe Horatio T. Gore, a wealthy Welsh landowner. An immigrant from a town with a name as long as your arm and pretty much unpronounceable. The town, not Mr. Gore.
I decided to check out the question of naming the park and learned I was wrong about Mr. Gore. My wife suggests that being wrong is not unusual.
When in doubt about Hamilton’s history, you’re never far off the mark if you search the Hamilton Public Library website. I learned that Gore Park, or the “Gore on King Street” as it was called during the early years of its existence, is over 200 years old. It was part of the original Crown grant made to John Askin on July 10, 1801. He sold the lot to Nathaniel Hughson, Sr., who transferred ownership to James Durand around 1806. Ten years later, Durand and his wife sold their land to George Hamilton and promptly left town (makes you wonder if there’s a story there). Lovely people all of them, I’m sure, but not a Gore, Al or otherwise, among them.
So, if there’s no Mr. Gore here, where does the name come from?
Leaving the internet for a minute, I turned to the Oxford Dictionary. (It’s a book; you remember books I’m sure.) Gore Park, it turns out, is not named for a person (even old Horatio, who doesn’t actually exist to my knowledge). Instead, the dictionary offers that gore is a noun, “a triangular piece of land, usually located between larger land divisions.” A gore can also be (if you really want to succeed on Jeopardy, or zip through a New York Times crossword) a triangular piece of cloth used in making skirts. So, the park downtown is a gore. And boy, does it have a history. Novels could be written about this little triangle of land. We’ll return to the triangly thing in a minute.
Gore Park, bless its heart, has raised strong opinions among Hamiltonians since the beginning of the 19th century. The history makes great reading. You can check it out for yourself: http://www.hpl.ca/articles/history-gore-park.
Almost sequentially, there have been attempts to sabotage it as green space and turn it into developed land. This was followed by attempts to fence it in so the riff-raff wouldn’t, you know, destroy it. The fencers lost. Then there was the installation of washrooms (causing quite a fight and which, you can bet your bottom dollar, holds an interesting chapter just by itself ). Then there was what you might call the planting-of-trees movement followed closely by the tearingout-of-trees movement. There could be a chapter just titled “Debates about statues.” Statues to Sir John A., to Queen Victoria. None to a Mr. Gore, though. Or Mrs.
There’s something about the Gore Park story that’s appealing and strangely, even uniquely, Hamilton. The dynamic arguments that arise around issues of its development, usually captured as quarrelsome council discussions. Votes for a plan, followed closely by votes against. Reversing votes, making Brexit look like a smooth operation. The attempts to remake it so that it’s just right. The efforts to fill it with building developments (all thankfully defeated). The gardening movement — what trees? What flowers? What plants? The attempts to use the space to memorialize those who have fallen in wartime, now thankfully celebrated and remembered. Ultimately, underlying all the effort, the attempt to get it just right — because, you know, Hamiltonians care. Maybe our council’s heated discussions just reflect that concern.
There’s something else about the piece of land, too, though, the triangular piece; I want to leave you with it. A triangle, you see, is not just a musical instrument or a bit of geometry, something we learned about (or didn’t) in a Grade 10 Westdale, Delta or Hill Park high school class. A triangle is a delta, a three-sided figure. Delta, the Greek letter, represents change.
Do you get where I’m going with this? There couldn’t be, in my opinion at least, a better way to represent Hamilton: a gore, a triangle, a delta. Change.
What’s in a name? A lot, apparently.
Dave Davis, MD, is a husband, father and grandfather, a retired family doc and medical educator. His first novel, “A Potter’s Tale,” published by Story Merchant Books, Los Angeles, is available on Amazon in Canada, the U.S. and the U.K. You can visit him at www.drdavedavis.com or follow him @drauthor24.