In the mid-1800’s Portsmouth Park was a busy limestone quarry worked by inmates from Kingston Penitentiary. Decades later, the City of Kingston brought new life to the park with popular summer park programs. For years it was home to fastball’s finest, playing in the Circle Fastball League. The Church Athletic League’s Harold Harvey Arena was built next door, and there was even a large goldfish pond.

For generations of Portsmouth kids, Garrigan Park – near Yonge & Union Streets – was much more than just a park. It was a gathering place, a playground and the backdrop for countless winter nights and summer days. In the mid-1960’s under the direction of Doug Fluhrer at Parks & Recreation, the city ran summer programs at 18 parks across Kingston. High school students were hired as counsellors, they created drop-in day camps where kids could enjoy arts & crafts, games and outdoor fun. Older teens competed in organized sports like softball and track & field.

Howard Pearce, who served as Assistant Director of Recreation in the early years, remembers the program fondly, “I was especially proud of the day camp we ran at Belle Park. We bused kids in from across the city, giving them a day camp experience many families could not otherwise provide. The programs created great opportunities for kids, it was a shame when it eventually ended.” 

Sy Golosky, a longtime teacher at LCVI who is now in his 90’s, supervised the programs for 15 years. Golosky recalled the excitement of the annual end of summer wrap-up event at Lake Ontario Park, “It was always something special, we had big crowds as many as 650 kids and their parents, handed out awards and it was a great way to close out the summer.” 

During those years, the city also staffed lifeguards at local beaches, including Lake Ontario Park and Richardson Beach. “Our lifeguards were also instructors,” Golosky noted. “They created a safe space for kids to swim. Like the parks program, it eventually ended around 1984.”

In 1969, as many as 1,500 kids took part in the organized sports program. A group of Portsmouth teens helped Garrigan Park capture the city parks softball title. The team included Rod Leeder, Mark Teepell, John Fairman, Joe Granger, John Wallace, Roy McKeown, Larry Murphy, David Burns, Stanley Smith, and Robert Wallace.

The girls’ team from Garrigan Park claimed the city track & field championship, with Sandra Rogers, Kathy Curtis, Wendy Woodman, Pam Bauder, Margo O’Shea, Janice Cox, and Marg Woodman leading the way.

Rodden Park, located in Calvin Park, won the boy’s title, featuring a young Ken Linseman – who would go on to an NHL career and score a Stanley Cup winning goal. Other teammates included Paul Kealey, Peter Bernhardt, Kevin Stephen, Rick Adam, and Richard Hutchison. The city parks also crowned champions in horseshoes and checkers.

Dick Cherry, a professional hockey player and teacher, supervised the summer parks program in the early years. Cherry hired park counsellors like Anne (Smith) Carty, who spent four summers working at Kingscourt and Shannon Park in Rideau Heights. Anne remembers the lively scenes at Shannon Park, neighbourhood kids gathering around a single picnic table under a tin roof, eager for arts & crafts, games, and anything to fill their summer days.

Anne also recalled the kindness of local businessman Len Dover, owner of Dover’s Men’s Wear. “A couple times each week, Mr. Dover would send a truck over from Brookside Price’s Dairy to give out ice cream in a dixie cup. It was a real treat – a big thrill for the kids. He was such a kind, generous man.” The Dover family lived near Garrigan Park in the historic ‘Hazeldell’ limestone home at 235 Mowat Avenue, with ties to Sir John A. Macdonald.

Anne (Smith) Carty eventually became supervisor of the parks program and would regularly visit Garrigan Park. The city also introduced a teen drop-in program at Harold Harvey Arena where Anne spent a of couple days a week. Many Portsmouth kids went to Calvin Park Public School for grades seven & eight; Anne started her teaching career there in 1967 and taught many kids from the Garrigan Park / Harold Harvey days. Her future husband, Tom Carty – a well-known Kingston athlete – also worked as counsellor before beginning his own teaching career.   

For me, Garrigan Park was a big part of growing up in Portsmouth. One of my first broadcasting experiences at age 12 or 13 was as the PA announcer for the Circle Fastball League games. Armed with a megaphone, I would introduce the batters and read the line scores. I managed to turn that into a 40-year broadcasting career.

Winter brought its own traditions to Garrigan, kids played shinny at the outdoor rink – dimly lit but always busy – families with young kids skated on a smaller oval nearby. In the 1960’s there was a small, heated shed that offered a welcome place to heat up cold hands and feet. When we weren’t skating, the hill at Garrigan was perfect for sledding and tobogganing – before the ballpark fence went up. And in the summer the park became a hangout for local teens, where after dusk there may have been a first beer or cigarette involved and maybe a few ‘Night Moves’ with Bob Seger playing in the background on a small transistor radio.

The history of Portsmouth Park runs deep, from 1858 to 1945 inmates from Kingston Penititentiary worked the large limestone quarry. The limestone from the quarry helped build landmark buildings across the region, including the K.P. Warden’s residence, Prison for Women, Rockwood Asylum, Church of The Good Thief and the MacKenzie Block of RMC. The prisoners marched through the village in pairs on their way to the quarry, escorted by guards on horseback.

There were many smaller quarries in the area, longtime Portsmouth resident Les Meers remembers hearing of Redden’s Quarry, where Hatter Street is now located. There were several other smaller quarries nearby on the K.P. prison farm property, where today you find Richardson Stadium and McArthur Hall – Queen’s Faculty of Education. Local architectural historian and longtime Portsmouth resident, Jennifer McKendry, authored a book in 2021, “Kingston, The Limestone City: Stone Buildings in the Kingston Region,” it takes a much deeper dive into the fascinating stories of Kingston quarries during that era.

The park was also once home to a remarkable goldfish pond from the late 1930’s to the mid-1940’s. Susan (Carscallen) Billings remembers stories told by her father, Mac Carscallen, and her Grampa Campbell about visiting the pond that became a local attraction. It was seven feet deep, filled with hundreds of goldfish that survived year-round.

Jennifer McKendry shared an 1869 map of Portsmouth Village showing a stream (the blue line) running through the park to Portsmouth harbour, passing by St. John’s Anglican Church. According to newspaper reports uncovered by McKendry, the pond was located just north of the church.

A Portsmouth resident, A.W. Sirett, told the Whig Standard it was his son, John, who started the goldfish pond around 1939. John went overseas with the Royal Canadian Navy during World War II, but he had relocated a few fish from the family home before joining the navy. Hundreds of goldfish that grew to 12-to-18 inches and survived the winter.

Village kids skated on the pond and ultimately in 1945, K.P. Warden R.M. Allan citing safety concerns, had the pond drained and eventually filled in. When I was a kid, fresh spring water flowed from the quarry wall in the park’s northwest corner. On hot days, many of us drank from it without a second thought, we would do the same thing from our backyard water hose.

The name of the park has its own story. Originally Portsmouth Park, it was renamed in 1965 along with several other Kingston park’s. Garrigan Park honours Frank Garrigan, a longtime Kingston Alderman who served from 1939 to 1948 as Alderman for St. Lawrence Ward and later Ontario Ward. Though his direct connection to Portsmouth is unclear, he was a respected civic figure, chairing the Separate School Board and serving as a Grand Knight with the Knights of Columbus.

In May of 1965 newly named Garrigan Park hosted the opening night of the Circle Fastball League season, McBride’s Foods beat Barr Construction 9-8, with Alderman Dave Travers throwing the ceremonial first pitch to Alderman George Webb. Dick Cherry had a double and a triple for McBride’s and Doug Fluhrer threw six strong innings in relief. Later that summer, Frank Garrigan threw out the first pitch at the park named in his honour, as the Circle League playoffs began.

Garrigan spent 52 years working as a typesetter at the Kingston Whig Standard, retiring in 1968. A year earlier he and colleague Wilfrid ‘Staff’ Hammond were honoured for 50 years of service with the International Typographical Union. Garrigan spoke warmly about the camaraderie among his co-workers, calling them, “the greatest group of individuals a man could ever hope to work with.” Hammond became a beloved figure in Kingston baseball over six decades as a longtime coach and organizer.

The Harold Harvey Arena is another part of the story. Adjacent to Garrigan Park, the Church Athletic League was founded by local construction company owner Harold Harvey, “to keep kids off the streets,” the arena opened in 1961 as an open-air rink where snow flurries were always a problem. Eventually they put a roof on it, the sides went up in 1968 and Prime Minster Pierre Trudeau was there for the official opening of the newly enclosed rink.

Today, the old quarry looks a lot different than it did in the 1850’s. The quarry walls are hidden behind overgrown trees, with a six-foot chain link fence all along the northwest wall of the park. The quarry stairs to Mowat Avenue are still there, as solid as ever. I walked the stairs recently, bringing back memories of hauling my hockey bag to 6am practices at Harold Harvey Arena.

Some things have not changed, on most summer nights you can still find a softball game underway at the park, a living reminder of its long history and of Frank Garrigan – who passed away in July 1978 at age 83.

Longtime Kingston broadcaster and author Mark Potter spent much of his childhood around Garrigan Park and the Harold Harvey Arena in Portsmouth. Mark is an honoured member of the Kingston & District Sports Hall of Fame.