Miss Sama - 1893

During the month of December, 1893, a lady reporter for the Toronto Globe was sent to Toronto’s great rival city, Hamilton.

          Despite the fact that the reporter, known only to the readers of the Globe as Miss Sama, was telephoned bright and early to remind her of the assignment, she still suffered through what she later described as “a hurried toilet and a still more hurried breakfast. A feeling of certainty that I would miss my train did not tend to amiability or peace of mind, more especially when I refused a second transfer in the street cars to which I knew I was entitled.”

          Street cars were still on Miss Sama’s mind when she arrived at Hamilton’s Grand Trunk Railway station. She told her friend who met her on arrival that Toronto’s station was much better than Hamilton’s because the street car lines were closer to the passenger platform.

          “Yes,” her companion agreed, “but we have cushions on our seats.” These “cushions’ were later by Miss Sama as ‘the strip of carpet which was the substitute for the same in that particular car.”

          Reaching the downtown core, Miss Sama’s companion excitedly pointed out the recently unveiled statue of Sir John A. Macdonald at the corner of King and John streets. Hamiltonians were very proud of the fact that the statue was the first in the Dominion to be erected to the memory of the late prime minister who had died just a few months before. In her opinion, Miss Sama felt that “the figure is a fine work of art, and the likeness is good, but not by any means flattering.”

          A major point of interest during Miss Sama’s tour of Hamilton was the newly opened Home for the Incurables. A charitable institution founded by Anglican minister, Father Thomas Geoghegan, the institution would later evolve into St. Peter’s Hospital.

          Miss Sama was particularly sympathetic to the plight of the elderly who were cared for at the home:

          “Surely it is well that the last years of their lives should be brightened as far as possible by kindness and pleasant surroundings. Cranks ? Yes, many of them, I have no doubt, might be found there. I know that if I were old and poor and friendless and suffering, I should be a crank of the first order, and so would you, probably.”

          After touring the Home for Incurables, Miss Sama was a luncheon guest at the home of one of Hamilton’s younger aldermen. After the meal, the party proceeded to engage in the traditional Hamilton and Toronto exchange of civic boasting.

          Street railway systems still uppermost in her priorities for a modern city, Miss Sama declared : “We have spring seats in our cars – most of them.”

          “We don’t need them here,” replied the alderman, “our cars run smoothly.”

          “Did you ever go up Shelbourne street in one of their trolleys?” asked a bright young Hamilton matron.

          “No, indeed,” answered the alderman sarcastically, “I never ventured, because I could not get an accident policy to cover the trip.”

          “You are fortunate,” she said, “for I am told people suffer as much from sea sickness there as they do when crossing the ocean.”

          Every visitor to Hamilton is soon treated to a panoramic view of the city from the Niagara Escarpment. In 1893, the most convenient way to ascend Hamilton’s ‘mountain’ was by means of the incline railway at the head of James Street South.

          The ascending car had an enclosed area with provision for seating. However, on the day of Miss Sama’s visit to Hamilton, the weather was fair and she was able to ride up outside on the open platform which was generally used for horses and carriages :

          “Standing there the view before me is indeed beautiful. Right at one’s feet lies the city, with its many handsome buildings, pretty gardens and fine shade trees and beyond that is the bay, encircled to the north and east by the continuous range of high hills, (I beg their pardon, mountains) while away off to the north is the long flat line of Burlington Beach. The air was somewhat hazy, or else we shown have seen the towers and spires of Toronto, my companion said.”

          Last on the day’s schedule was an appointment with librarian Richard T. Lancefield and a tour of the new Hamilton Public Library building, located on Main street west, beside the Centenary church.

          Miss Sama called the building “a handsome one, finished inside in light hardwood, which gives it a bright and cheerful appearance.”

          In describing the lay out of the library, Miss Sama noted that “the arrangement of the reading rooms is somewhat as it used to be in Toronto library before men were given the best quarters, upstairs.”

          A portion of the reading room was separated from the public area by light iron railings, entrance permitted only to ticket holders. In this area, low shelving contained encyclopedias, dictionaries, directories, etc. During her visit, Miss Sama observed that “several young school girls were seated at the tables, taking advantage of the privilege of using works that would probably have been quite beyond their means of purchase.”

          Miss Sama asked Librarian Lancefield about the Hamilton Public Library’s regulations regarding the presence of children in the library because once, when she had allowed a little girl to sit beside her and look at the pictures in a magazine she was reading, a library staff member had told her to ‘take the child out!’

          “Well, our rule is to exclude children under twelve years of age,” was Lancefield’s answer, “but if a child comes with an adult and behaves quietly, we never interfere.”

          In the reference section, there was a notice on a blackboard directing patrons to inquire at the information desk if they had any problems locating material on subjects of interest to them. The notice read, “If you are not quite certain where you will find any particular subject, do not mind hunting in the catalogue for it, but inquire at the desk, where any information will be given you cheerfully. Do not be afraid of giving trouble for the staff are here to be of service to those who need them.”

          The main part of the book collection was shelved on racks in an area which the public were allowed to enter only upon application to the staff member on duty:

          “It is only necessary to say so at the desk to obtain permission to go behind to the racks and handle the books at will, a privilege which I know be valued highly by one newspaper woman at least.”

          “But do you never lose books in that way?,” Miss Sama asked Librarian Lancefield.

          “Seldom, if ever,” replied the librarian, “and even if a book or two should be stolen in the year, what is that compared to the convenience which this plan affords to the hundreds of readers? We consider that the books are bought for the people and therefore we desire to make it as easy and attractive to people to make use of them.”

          After the library tour, Miss Sama headed back to the downtown business section to await her street car connection to the Grand Trunk Railway station to catch the next train for the journey back to Toronto.

          While in downtown Hamilton she noted that “if Hamiltonians are not punctual people it is not for the lack of clocks to remind them of the time of day, for as I stood at the corner of James and King streets waiting for a car, I counted no less than four (each with as many faces, I think) on public buildings.”

          Also noted by Miss Sama was Hamilton’s downtown oasis, Gore Park:

          “As I waited there, I also looked with admiring, and I fear, covetous eyes at the pretty little park which forms the Gore, and I tried to picture myself what it would be if we had a similar breathing space at the corner of King and Young streets.”

          Miss Sama observed that the fashions worn by Hamilton women were little different from their Toronto counterparts:

          “Very much pinched-up hats, butterfly capes, or ‘animated pen wipes’ as I heard an unappreciative man called them once, leg-of-mutton sleeves, Empire skirts, and the rest of it.”

Miss Sama’s trip to Hamilton was relatively uneventful, but her descriptions of the city and the places she visited wonderfully captured the feel of the city in 1893 for her readers in the Toronto Globe.