page_title: Regina's historic buildings and precincts
section_title: Victoria Park and surrounding buildings
hierarchical_section_title: Regina's historic buildings and precincts / Education and culture / Victoria Park and surrounding buildings
caption_attribution_description: English: The cenotaph in the centre of Victoria Park, Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada.
context_page_description: Many historically significant buildings in Regina, Saskatchewan were lost during the period 1945 through approximately 1970 when the urge to "modernize" overtook developers' and city planners' sense of history and heritage. The old warehouse district to the north of the old CPR tracks was Regina's original commercial raison d'être once Lieutenant-Governor Edgar Dewdney had established the site of his considerable landholdings as the Territorial Capital. With the significant conversion of shipping of commercial goods from train to truck and cancellation of passenger service on the railway, the Warehouse District immediately adjacent to the train line has ceased to be exclusively industrial in character. Some areas of the Warehouse District have been transformed into a shopping, entertainment and residential precinct.
context_section_description: At "the start of the twentieth century [a] much more attractive park [than Victoria Park was] the CPR Gardens, commonly referred to as Stanley Park. This plot of land boasted trees, shrubs and flowers: from its beginning there was difficulty establishing parklands and recreational areas in Regina, it lacking natural rolling land, trees, shrubs and apart from the spring run-off Wascana Creek and even smaller and shorter creeks, natural flowing water. The little park beautified the land right next to the CPR's main depot in Regina, Union Station. (Today, this site is ... the parking lot of Casino Regina.)"
  Victoria Park quickly became the location of surrounding facilities and attractions: the First Baptist Church; Metropolitan Methodist; the YWCA; Carnegie Library, built as in many cities of North America and the United Kingdom with a grant from the Carnegie Foundation; the McCallum Hill Building, an early office building of downtown Regina; the Capitol Theatre; the Hotel Saskatchewan. First Baptist, Metropolitan Methodist, Carnegie Library, Knox Presbyterian and the YMCA were all destroyed in the 1912 Regina "Cyclone" but quickly rebuilt — the Library with the help of a further Carnegie grant. It was demolished and replaced in 1962 by an impressively large though architecturally undistinguished building on the same site at Lorne Street and 12th Avenue which, like the Court of Appeal and Queens Bench building on Victoria Avenue, preserves remnants of its predecessor in its forecourt. The institution of amply endowed public libraries became well established in Regina and Regina burgesses quickly became inured to the idea of such facilities being worthwhile public facilities and worthy of substantial public endowment. Latterly the Regina City Council has sought to cut costs by proposing to close neighbourhood libraries, including the Connaught Library in the West End (latterly dubbed the "Cathedral Area"), to general public condemnation.
  The McCallum Hill Building was constructed in 1913 on the north side of the street from the northeast corner of the park. For many years it was the largest private office building in the city and the tallest building in Saskatchewan at ten storeys high, of course only rivaled in height and conspicuousness within the province by the Hotel Saskatchewan in Regina and Saskatoon’s Bessborough Hotel. Real estate developers E.A. McCallum, E. M. McCallum and Walter H.A. Hill began construction of the McCallum-Hill office building in 1912.
  The McCallum-Hill Building was imploded in six seconds with 200 pounds of explosives in 1982 and replaced by the 22-storey McCallum Hill Centre Tower I and Tower II, both on Scarth Street. Knox Presbyterian, Metropolitan Methodist and First Baptist were also across the street from Victoria Park, the latter two still standing (see below), as is the Hotel Saskatchewan. Completed in 1927, the Hotel Saskatchewan was in part constructed from building materials of the never-completed Chateau Qu'Appelle at the corner of Albert Street and 16th Avenue (later renamed College Avenue) on what became the grounds of the Royal Saskatchewan Museum. Besides use for accommodation, dining, entertainment and facilities for wedding receptions and other such functions, it immediately replaced use of Government House for accommodating official visitors including political leaders and royalty: George VI and Queen Elizabeth, for example, stayed there rather than in Government House when they were in Regina during their six-week tour across Canada and back again by train. Also on the opposite sides of streets from Victoria Park were the now long-demolished Capitol Theatre (opened in 1921: photos above in theatre section) and the first YMCA and YWCA. Originally owned by the CPR, though now part of the Radisson Hotels chain, it was much simpler in style and less expensive to build than famous earlier-built CPR and CNR hotels but also than Saskatoon's Bessborough Hotel, built from 1928 to 1932. Nevertheless, it was and remains a luxury hotel, since its 1927 a preferred accommodation for promi
caption: Victoria Park Cenotaph.
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