SSP:Local Hamilton Recommended Reading List
 

I thought it'd be a good to have a thread where we list books or documents we think are relevant to the our discussions on this forum. Urban studies, history, anything local, and anything else that might be relevant.

Forgive me if this has been done already. If it has, could someone point me in right direction?

The document: Hamilton's Heritage Volume 5 - Reasons for Designation under Part IV of the Ontario Heritage Act
available at: http://www.myhamilton.ca/NR/rdonlyre...ageVolume5.pdf

What else should be on the list?

Here are the books we have listed so far:

Footsteps in Time Volume 1 Bill Manson
Footsteps in Time Volume 2 (North End) Bill Manson
Hamilton. an Illustrated History John C. Weaver
Housing the North American City Michael J. Doucet & John C Weaver
Their Town: The Mafia, the Media and the Party Machine Marsha Hewitt (Editor), Bill Freeman (Editor)
County of Wentworth 1853-1973 Olive Newcombe and Frank Woods
Around and About Hamilton 1785-1985 Head-of-the-Lake Historical Society
Up and Down Locke St. South Bill Manson
People, Space and Time: Landscape Change in Hamilton's Durand Neighbourhood, 1946-1994 Walter G. Peace
From Mountain to Lake: The Red Hill Creek Valley Walter G. Peace
The Grand Old Buildings of Hamilton Brian Henley
Steel City: Hamilton and Region Dear, Drake and Reeds
Hamilton Canada, its history, commerce, industries, resources Herbert Lister
The Story of Hamilton Mabel Burkholder
Heritage Treasures Susan Evans Shaw
A Heritage of Stone Nina Chapple
Victorian Architecture in Hamilton Alexander Gordon McKay
Vanished Hamilton Volumes 1-3 Edited by Margaret Houghton
The Hamiltonians Edited by Margaret Houghton
Hamilton Street Names Edited by Margaret Houghton
Pardon My Lunch Bucket David Proulx / City of Hamilton
Dictionary of Hamilton Biography v 1-4 T. M. Bailey (Editor)
Hamilton Book of Everything Kim Arnott, Marvin Ross and Cheryl MacDonald.
Mountain and a City: the Story of Hamilton Marjorie Freeman Campbell
Downtown Hamilton: The Heart of it All Foreword by John C. Weaver, chapters by Margaret Houghton, Dennis Missett, Walter Peace, Carolyn Gray, David Cuming.
By Design: The Role of the Engineer in the History of the Hamilton-Burlington Area By Jerry Disher, P.Eng., and Ted Smith, Ph.D.
The Dundas Valley: Visions of Beauty By Richard and Eleanor Kosydar (Tiercereon Press)
Greater Hamilton: From The Heart By Mark Zelinski(From The Heart Publishing)
The Niagara Escarpment: A Photographic Journey from Niagara Falls to Tobermory by Sandy Bell , Vic MacBournie and John MacRae (Lorimer)
Birds of Hamilton and Surrounding Area By Robert Curry (Hamilton Naturalists' Club)
Hamilton's Hockey Tigers By David Wesley & Sam Wesley; Foreword by Don Cherry (Lorimer)
Torso By Marjorie Freeman Campbell (Macmillan, 1974)
King of the Mob: Rocco Perri and the Women Who Ran His Rackets By James Dubro with Robin F. Rowland (Penguin 1987)
Mob Mistress By James Dubro (Macmillan 1988)
The Enforcer: Johnny Pops Papalia, A Life and Death in the Mafia By Adrian Humphreys (Harper Collins, 1999)
Rocco Perri: The Story of Canada's Most Notorious Bootlegger By Antonio Nicaso (John Wiley & Sons, 2004)
Fallen Angel: The Unlikely Rise of Walter Stadnick and the Canadian Hells Angels By Jerry Langton (John Wiley & Sons, 2006)
Craft Capitalism - Craftworkers and Early Industrialization in Hamilton, Ontario 1840-1872 by Robert Kristofferson
Nobody's Baby: A Survival Guide to Politics By Sheila Copps (Deneau & Greenberg, 1985)
Worth Fighting For By Sheila Copps (McClelland & Stewart, 2004)
Go to School, You're a Little Black Boy By The Honourable Lincoln M. Alexander (Dundurn Press, 2006)

Less directly related:
Growing Up Absurd Paul Goodman
The Death and Life of Great American Cities Jane Jacobs
The Rise of the Creative Class: And How It's Transforming Work, Leisure, Community and Everyday Life Richard Florida
Who's Your City?: How the Creative Economy Is Making Where to Live the Most Important Decision of Your Life Richard Florida
The Danger Tree by David MacFarlane
The Life: The Seductive Call of Politics By Steve Paikin (Viking Canada, 2001)
The Dark Side: The Personal Price of a Political Life By Steve Paikin (Viking Canada, 2003)
Above the Law By Paul Palango (McClelland & Stewart, 1994)
The Last Guardians: The Crisis In The RCMP - And Canada By Paul Palango (McClelland & Stewart, 1998)
Dispersing the Fog: Inside the Secret World of Ottawa and the RCMP By Paul Palango (Key Porter, 2008)

Fiction:
So Few are Awesome Mike Long
A Golden Knife in My Back Mike Long
Life in the 20th Century Mike Long

Their Town

Housing the North American City, also by John Weaver

That's just off the top of my head. Will get back to you with more.

I have a copy of "County of Wentworth 1853-1973" By Olive Newcombe and Frank Woods
http://www.russellbooks.com/si/036009.html

I'm into waterfalls so I also have a copy of "Waterfalls The Niagara Escarpment" by Jerry Lawton


And I have a copy of "Around and About Hamilton 1785-1985"
http://ohip.hpl.ca/ipac20/ipac.jsp?s...nu=search&ri=1

And I have "Hamilton an Illustrated History" By John C. Weaver
http://www.biblio.com/details.php?dcx=105346769&aid=frg

Mixed Media is getting more of these in stock soon!

There are literally hundreds of academic articles and books about Hamilton, mostly social history in the areas of industrialization, labour, class and ethnicity.

I've read a whole bunch of books on Hamilton. Here are a few (in addition to the good recommendations already) that I can think of at the moment that might be of interest to forumers here:

Bill Manson
Up and Down Locke St. South

Walter George Peace
People, space and time : landscape change in Hamilton's Durand Neighbourhood, 1946-1994

Brian Henley
The grand old buildings of Hamilton

Dear, Drake and Reeds
Steel City: Hamilton and Region

Herbert Lister
Hamilton Canada, its history, commerce, industries, resources

Mabel Burkholder
The story of Hamilton

Susan Evans Shaw
Heritage Treasures

Nina Chapple
A heritage of Stone

Alexander Gordon McKay
Victorian architecture in Hamilton

Susan Evans Shaw
Heritage Treasures

Nina Chapple
A heritage of Stone

I think I have these 2 as well somewhere.

theres a few listed ones that I really love, notably: Around and About Hamilton, Housing the North American City,

some more from my collection:

From Mountain to Lake: The Red Hill Creek Valley
Walter G. Peace

Footsteps in Time Volume 2 (North End)
Bill Manson

Vanished Hamilton 1-3
Edited by Margaret Houghton

The Hamiltonians
Edited by Margaret Houghton

Hamilton Street Names
Edited by Margaret Houghton

Pardon My Lunch Bucket
David Proulx / City of Hamilton

I think my father had Pardon my Lunch Bucket but I have no idea where that one went.

Dictionary of Hamilton Biography v 1-4
T. M. Bailey, ed.

Richard Florida and Jane Jacob books? I actually haven't read them, but they are ones I've been meaning to check out. Anyone have any comments on these?

Death and Life is essential reading for anyone with even a passing interest in cities. It's where it all began.

When I was in Hamilton last, Dave at Mixed Media recommended a great little book which helped me pass the time on the flight back to London:

Hamilton Book of Everything
Kim Arnott, Marvin Ross and Cheryl MacDonald.

An easy and informative read.

Mountain and a City: the Story of Hamilton
Marjorie Freeman Campbell

Downtown Hamilton: The Heart of it All
Seldon Printing Ltd./The Fountain Foundation
Foreword by John C. Weaver, chapters by Margaret Houghton, Dennis Missett, Walter Peace, Carolyn Gray, David Cuming. Contains fire insurance floorplans of the commercial core and Market Square (dating from 1911, 1947 and 1964).

I know this might be a little be tedious for the topic starter, but perhaps if you have a moment Astroblaster - could you collate the book list into the first posting?

Also, does anyone know if any of these are in the Hamilton library? I would quite like to read some of these books :)

There are a lot in the Hamilton Library, some can't be taken out of the library but you can look at them in the local history and archives room. McMaster's Library (Mills) has some that the public library doesn't have, and also a bunch more that can't be taken out of the library. Actually if you search for subject: Hamilton at the McMaster Library, about 1600 items come up, so you have to narrow it down. But any information you could possibly want is out there.

i need this one!

I was planning on doing this.. I'll get around to it shortly.

also, you can check the library catalog online: http://ohip.hpl.ca/ipac20/ipac.jsp?profile=web

I went to the Mac library at some point late last year and saw some very cool and useful stuff. I've got to go back there soon. Especially this very cool, detailed study of St. Clair Boulevard.

Possibly related: Paul Goodman’s Growing Up Absurd, which was inspired by a conversation on Van Wagner's Beach some 50 years ago.