“As a layman missionary about to travel long distances to various parts of the world. Mr. R.J. Buchanan prepared a limelight presentation about Canada. He was sure to include material specifically about his home city, Hamilton Ontario Canada.
From the Hamilton Times, June 11, 1907:
"In preparing material for an illustrated lecture which Mr. R.J. Buchanan proposes giving while abroad with the laymen’s missionary body, he has, as might be expected, not overlooked his native city, and has incorporated in it some matter, which, with the views to be shown, will do much to bring this city’s advantages before great crowds of people. Mr. Buchanan, in his remarks, will say:
“On our way westward, we cross the Welland Canal, the connecting waterway between Lake Erie and Lake Ontario; for the ordinary tourist there is nothing of special interest to distinguish this canal from any other; its importance to the commerce of Canada, however, is very great, and an immense annual tonnage passes through its locks.
“Crossing a flat, and rather uninteresting farming country, we pass over the edge of the mountain, and down into the smiling, happy valley, where we get our first glimpse of the beautiful city of Hamilton, Ontario.
“The Hamilton valley is noted for its fertile fruit farms. Vineyards and fruit trees abound everywhere. Apples, pears, peaches, plums, cherries and the smaller fruits grow in great profusion, making this the garden spot of Canada.
“For a brief season, in early spring, this district is beautiful with pink blossoms, later, the bridal robes of spotless white, in the blossoms of the pear, plum and cherry trees; thereafter the gorgeous combined effects of pink and white apple blossoms; with an added touch of royal purple, in the lilac bloom. No one in Canada need cross an ocean to the Orient to find the great loveliness of blossom beauty. This luxuriance of bloom foretells the ripened fruitage of a plentiful harvest later on.
“The vernal tints of spring foliage alnoe are noteworthy – all shades of warm green, toned up into pronounced reds, with a variety, and boldness of execution, that would eclipse the palette of the most impressionist of artists. Nature is no niggard, when she dashes her colors upon the landscapes of early spring, and the rich red-brown earth beneath makes a fine setting for this grand display. The brilliant dandelions, looking like discs of gold, shine forth from the green sward at our feet. All of nature is rejoicing in this, her annual renaissance of joyous life.
“Passing the ethereal loveliness of these fruit farms, we enter the busy city of Hamilton, a thriving manufacturing city of about seventy thousand inhabitants.
“By common consent, the point of vantage in Hamilton is its beautiful ‘Mountain,” which a joker has called ‘a kind of a bluff,” but to the Hamilton people it will always remain “the Mountain,” just the same. The glorious panorama, as seen from its brow, is most charming with its combined variety of hills and valleys. To our left, we see the Desjardins Canal and the marsh, while beyond that, Flamboro Heights arise. Near the marsh one might visit the old earthworks on Burlington Heights, now in Hamilton Cemetery, and the old block house, near the quaint archway at Dundurn Park; in Hamilton, we are on historic ground. The charming Hamilton Bay lies north of the city, and in pleasant days its grey-blue waters are dotted with the white sails of pleasure boats, and its surface ruffled by the busy steamers which ply upon its bosom. The picturesque Hamilton Beach, about five miles distant to the east, separates Hamilton Bay from Lake Ontario, through which we can see a canal has been cut to unite these bodies of water, and two lofty iron towers of the Toronto & Niagara Power Co. have been erected, one on each side, to convey the wires across, without interference with the navigation. Beyond this scene of beauty, we see the azure blue waters of Lake Ontario, about five miles distant, and, across them, in the dim distance, we can see on a clear day the heights of Scarborough, beyond Toronto, about forty-five miles away. At our feet, in the foreground, as we stand upon the mountain brow, lies the beautiful and thriving city of Hamilton, spread out with its innumerable attractions, all resplendent in a great semicircular amphitheater of a majestic but verdant escarpment, making a scene of peaceful loveliness difficult to realize, and impossible to overestimate.
“Hamilton is one of the greatest manufacturing centres in Canada. Here are located the International Harvester Works, which occupy a large area, and employ several thousand people. Here are manufactured all kinds of agricultural implements, which find a ready market throughout the British Empire; The Canadian Westinghouse Company also has works here, and manufactures all kinds of electrical appliances for the Empire; it has fewer employees than the Harvester Works, but these are a high class of workmen, and this company has the largest payroll in the city. There are also the Bridge Works, Iron and Steel Smelter, and many other manufactories, which pour forth their smoke- a black incense to Mammon.
“Hamilton has marvelous natural advantages as a manufacturing city, due to the cheap electric power, transmitted from the neighboring DeCew Falls.
“In addition to all the foregoing advantages natural gas is found in great quantities, about twenty-five miles to the south of Hamilton, and while just at the threshold of its introduction into the city, the consumption has reached the incredible amount of about two million cubic feet per day.
“Hamilton has one of the finest, if not the best, farmer’s markets in Canada, and this, of itself, is of incalculable advantage to the citizens and to the farmers.
“Hamilton has recently acquired world-wide renown as the birthplace of William J. Sherring, who, in May, 1906, won the great Marathon foot race at Athens in Greece.
“One great trouble in Hamilton is the muck rake of materialism; too many of her citizens fall to see the golden crown of her manifest destiny, and just as long as this is true, she will be shut out from the just rewards of such a location.”
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