Canton’s First Golf Course

That on this site in the early 1890s was Canton’s first golf course and next to it toward the pond was a rifle range which was a pit dug out of the hillside, directly under the Canton High School.  The golf course was started by a group of men from Collinsville who enjoyed it for several years. The land then was owned by William E. & Sara Jane (Mills) Simonds, and in the pond alongside the athletic field Mr. Simonds planted cranberries some years earlier, but the venture was not successful. 

Also, the pond was known as the ice pond where ice was harvested until refrigerators came on the market. There was also an ice house in the wooded area to the right of the pond.

Kathleen R. Woolam is curator at Canton Historical Museum.