Old story, new teaching tool

There was once an Eiffel Tower on the land where campus is today.

Well, sort of.

It was a knock-off, akin to today’s much bigger one at Kings Dominion amusement park just north of Richmond. The earlier tower was an attraction of Westhampton Park, which operated for a few years in the early 20th century, shortly before the university bought the land and started building today’s campus. It sat on what would become the Richmond College side of the lake.

Back then, the land was the terminus of a new street car line. The street car company created the amusement park to entice passengers to ride the length of the route. They disembarked near where Boatwright Memorial Library is today.

In addition to the mini Eiffel Tower, the park had a performance pavilion, zoo, and café. At one point, a canvas was draped near the lake for people to enjoy a new entertainment technology: moving pictures.

The park opened in May 1902 but by August, it was struggling. It held on through intermittent closings over the next several years, launching new attractions (like the makeshift movie screen) to boost visitation. In 1907, the morning trolleys to Westhampton Park stopped running, sealing its fate. The university bought the land in 1910.

The story of the park has cropped up over the years since, including in the pages of this magazine. It got renewed academic attention in fall 2019 when university landscapers discovered shards of pottery while planting azaleas outside Maryland Hall. They halted work immediately out of concern there might be a connection to a nearby antebellum burying ground for enslaved workers. The latter area is currently being developed, in cooperation with descendants, into a memorial site. 

Professor Elizabeth Baughan, coordinator of the archaeology minor, led an excavation of the pottery shards as part of an Introduction to Archaeology course. The class, other students, and volunteers uncovered, analyzed, and cataloged more than 1,000 artifacts. They determined that the ceramics and glass were generally pieces of plates, tumblers, condiment bottles, and other items discarded from the park’s café.

The park’s existence was a short-lived moment in the long history of the land where UR is today. Baughan’s project is one example of how the campus’s physical infrastructure often becomes a learning lab for students in a variety of disciplines.