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Our old photo this week looks down from the west end of the Burgoyne Bridge onto the huge open space that had once been Lewis Shickluna’s shipyard, the source of scores of ships that plied the Great Lakes during the second half of the 19th century. All remnants of the shipyard had long ago been cleared away by this time — Oct. 26, 1941.

The space was being dedicated on that day as Kinavy Park — a name reflecting both the Royal Canadian Navy and the Kinsmen Club, the new sponsor of the local Sea Cadet unit. At the far end of the park can be seen a long, low building that was to be the new barracks for the cadets. If you look closely you can see that the building has been fancifully painted and otherwise designed to look like a ship of the Royal Canadian Navy — the kind of ship on which the young cadets might dream of someday serving.



St. Catharines Fire Services has a training tower on the site of what was formerly Lewis Shickluna’s shipyard and later Kinavy Park, home of the Royal Canadian Sea Cadets. The origin of the Sea Cadets can be traced back to 1895 and the formation in England of the Navy League, intended to promote interest in the problems of maritime trade and defence.

Local branches were established in the U.K. and elsewhere in the British Empire.

The Canadian branches of the League supported a cadet program called the Boys’ Naval Brigades, renamed the Navy League Sea Cadets following the formation of the Canadian Naval Service in May 1910, and renamed .

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