With hockey season just nicely getting going, director-curator Karen Bachmann of the Timmins Museum is turning her attention to indoor rinks, for her weekly feature on local history.
She begins with the Timmins Rink on Balsam at Second, where the post office is now.
It was built by the Hollinger Mine in 1914, when people had only lived here for five years, and the town had been incorporated for two.
Bachmann says the rink was state of the art.
“They had a huge organ in there, she notes. “They had a sound system, so that you could provide music for when people were out there skating, and that became the area in town where everything happened. So if it was a big deal and the theatre wasn’t big enough, you did it at the rink.”
“So that rink lasted until 1947, when there was a huge fire,” she continues. “A couple of mischievous young people got in there with a couple of matches and fooling around and they burned the thing to the ground.”
Next week: The mighty Mac.
