We live among unheard Niagaras.
The force that pushes up the meadow grass,
That swells to ampler roundness ripening fruit,
That lifts the brier rose, were it not mute,
Would thunder o’er the green earth’s sunlit tracts
More loudly than a myriad cataracts.
Source: Wetherald, A. Ethelwyn. Lyrics and Sonnets, Complete Edition. Toronto: Thomas Nelson & Sons, 1931
Read about Agnes Ethelwyn Wetherald on the Brock University Archives site. Wetherald lived her later years in Pelham, a few miles from Niagara Falls.
William “Red” Hill Jr and “The Thing” in which he went over the Horseshoe Falls to his death. Photo by Ron Roels. Used by permission of Niagara Falls Public Library
Rapids rage, in furrows to their end and fall, Off the edge, as if dropping off the face of the earth And thunder resonates, as foam and mist rise, Into nature’s cauldron, that churns and abounds.
A family possessed with this mighty river,
Gain fame meeting its constant challenge
Traversing the worst of treacherous rapids
Yet needing to conquer the Cataracts alone.
Their barrels, carrying father and son,
Each defied those waters several times,
Passing through the swirling whirlpool,
Wallowing in the cheers of their success.
Immersed in steel barrels, over they rolled
The tumultuous waves bob them like cork
Captive prisoners’ to nature’s full wrath,
Death looms in those currents…beware!
Father dies and son now takes the torch,
Family honor means pay forward the promise.
The ultimate challenge of Niagara looms,
Over the falls is his next ride to glory.
His commitment made, one year hence
Work starts on his device to conquer.
Inner tubes netted securely with rope,
Named “The Thing”, standing beside it proud.
The August day comes, glory will now, be his.
His crew readies him for his timely journey.
One last wave he enters his creation.
Capped, the darkness opens his mind.
Visions of glory mask the fear he felt.
His vessel rides the rapids, weaving waves,
He rides the path, to the brink, of his desire.
Soon the deafening thunder; he knows he’s close!
A sudden surge and he vanishes in white
His stomach drops with a deadly plunge
And darkened silence brings the end,
To a promise, broken, by a son who dared.
A mother’s cry on the quiet shore of rock
“Where’s my boy what’s happened?”
Brothers scramble to find their daring sibling,
In the waters, churning cold, before them.
Remnants of rubber and frayed broken rope
Leave no doubt as the fate of Red Hill Jr.
Swallowed by a watery tomb, his nemesis.
A day later he is washed to familiar arms.
What tragic price this thing we call honor.
The need to challenge what nature creates.
A family possessed by a river so cruel
Close, but never fulfilling their ultimate goal.
Rapids rage in furrows to their end and fall, Off the edge as if dropping off the face of the earth And thunder resonates, as foam and mist rise, Into nature’s cauldron, that churns and abounds.
A note from Bill Hamilton:
In 1951 Wm. Red Hill Jr. created a barrel-like vessel using large inner tubes surrounded by canvas and secured by netting. He named this contraption “The Thing”. His mission, honor a Hill family promise, to ride this device over Niagara Falls. On August 5th he climbed into his creation and was released to his fate. Needless to say, his plight ended in tragedy. The loss of a son and brother to the Thunderous Cataracts of Niagara!
I own the Red Hill Estate including the 3 Hill daredevil barrels currently on display at the IMAX theatre.
Biography of Bill Hamilton:
My interest in writing started in University at Waterloo. Reactivated by the NOTL Writer’s Circle I have had several of my works published. Poetry is my main passion and my poem “Angel’s Ghost” hangs in Ontario’s oldest tavern the “Angel Inn” in Niagara on the Lake. I am currently working on an anthology of poetry for publication.
My poem “The Thing” was a topic of interest, as I own the Red Hill estate barrels on display at the IMAX Theatre here in Niagara. I grew up with stories of the many Daredevils of Niagara, which inspired this poem.
Because I taste limestone on my eyes’ parched lips and swim with carelessness in her urgency in constant motion
Because she is felt on the back of dawn
And not popping within of free fireworks, as she holds a much deeper secret
Her body, decaying with duplicitous effigies of her story, a story of erosion, of two bodies of water, meeting
A story lost without capture, lost outside the frame
Dipping my toes in such honeymoon
Of past loves
More luxurious than any fiberglass tub dripping with scarlet passion
And more than his thick hands on the steel beams hoistening up more divide, parking meters
She is beneath me, underneath those man-made islands
And searchingly, meandering to lower ground,
And its because her sound reverberates on the other side of the world
She sits still, in her royally crescent moon as time flowing through her like silk, changes her
Until, high beams flash in my rearview mirror
Telling me to move along
I have been staring at her for far too long
Source: Amanda Leonard, 2020
Amanda Leonard is an English/Visual Arts teacher who enjoys writing and sketching. She was born and raised in Niagara Falls, but has been nomadic for the last decade. She is currently writing a novel that is set in modern day Niagara Falls.
Rendezvous Motel & Restaurant, 3611 Lundy’s Lane, Highway 3a & 20, Niagara Falls, Canada. Image courtesy of Niagara Falls Public Library
In the town where I was born, we’d walk up Lundy’s Lane And talk about the dreams we had. Life was a glass of ginger ale and a juke box serenade, And we never thought of growing old. Yes, I know those days have come and gone Still I think about my old home town.
At a place called the Rendezvous, we’d congregate at eight And talk about the baseball game. Lights flashing on the window pane, watching cars go up the lane, We’d wait for friends and lovers. Yes, I know those days have come and gone Still I think about my old home town.
Lavender mist makes a foggy night haze While the falls come crashing ahead. And I lean on the rail feel the damp cooling spray Watching the foam turn a luminous maze.
And as I drive towards the town, the neon signs flash on And thoughts begin to fill my head. Oh the happiness I found, in my family’s old home town Where nothing seemed to ever change. Life was very simple, way back then And we thought that it would never end.
When our dreams of long ago were scattered on the way And our childish hopes departed. Life went on but not the same, we grew up, we’re not to blame, And those magic times forgotten. Life was very simple, way back then And we thought that it would never end.
Source: Niagara Falls (Ontario). Coronation Centre Newsletter, 1974
Apple, a memoir in verse and pictures by Eric Gansworth is an important addition to the literature of Niagara. Gansworth, who was raised on the Tuscarora Indian Reservation in Niagara County, New York, just outside Niagara Falls, still resides in the area and teaches in Buffalo, NY. The book has been longlisted for the 2020 National Book Award and is a Junior Library Guild selection.
Publisher supplied book information:
How about a book that makes you barge into your boss’s office to read a page of poetry from? That you dream of? That every movie, song, book, moment that follows continues to evoke in some way?
The term “Apple” is a slur in Native communities across the country. It’s for someone supposedly “red on the outside, white on the inside.”
Eric Gansworth is telling his story in Apple: Skin to the Core. The story of his family, of Onondaga among Tuscaroras, of Native folks everywhere. From the horrible legacy of the government boarding schools, to a boy watching his siblings leave and return and leave again, to a young man fighting to be an artist who balances multiple worlds.
Eric shatters that slur and reclaims it in verse and prose and imagery that truly lives up to the word heartbreaking.
Run to your nearest library or book store to read this remarkable collection by Eric Gansworth.
