PARK AND CEMETERY. 
TOWER AT HUBBARD PARK, MERIDEN, CONN. 
A warm, pleasant October afternoon, and a 
most delightful host made the opening to the pub- 
lic of the tower just completed in Hubbard Park, 
on Castle Craig of the Hanging Hills of Meriden, 
Conn., an entirely successful affair. The host was 
the Park Commissioners. The guests were the 
entire city government and prominent citizens. 
The tower was Mr. Walter Hubbard’s latest gift to 
the park. The entertainment was a most bounti- 
ful oyster roast with all its fi.xings. The result was 
a most royal good lime and three hundred men 
prouder than ever of the hills of their beloved city 
and of the tower which crowns next to the highest 
The tower itself is round, thirty-si.x feet in 
height and eighteen feet in diameter, built of stone 
found on the spot and reared near the edge of the 
precipice. It overlooks the city of Meriden and 
the wide, beautiful Southington valley. From its 
top is one of the finest panoramic views in the 
world; Long Island Sound with vessels passing lo 
and fro may be seen in the south, while at the 
north Mt. Tom and the Holyoke range of moun- 
tains in Massachusetts, and the Bolton and Berk- 
shire Hills on the west and east. P'ully one-half 
of the state with its cities, villages and farms are 
in view. The gilded dome of the beautiful capitol 
of Hanford is set like a gem in the Northern land- 
TOWER ox C.\STEE CRAIG, IIUBRARD P.VRK, MERIDEN, CONN. 
of them. But proudest of all of their fellow citi- 
zen, whose energy and generosity has made these 
grand and beautiful, but heretofore inaccessible 
heights, now practical to ascend by easy foot paths 
and an easier carriage road. 
Of these Hanging Hills, over a thousand feet 
in height, only one, the West Peak, has been com- 
paratively accessible, but Castle Craig broader, 
more picturesque and only a yard or so less in 
height than is its rival, the West Peak, seamed 
with the deepest of gorges, with a precipitous face 
of several hundred feet, was inaccessible except to 
the strongest and most experienced mountain 
climbers. But now all this is changed, tor within 
its dark ravines winding paths lead up to the top, 
and by beginning back a mile or so a circuitous 
but easy carriage way was found. 
scape. The outlook is one which takes hours to 
comprehend while more than one visit is needed to 
drink in its glories. 
These hills are the highest land on the Atlantic 
.^eaboard within fifty miles of the coast from Maine 
to I'lorida. They are higher than Mt. Royal 
park at Montreal, Blue Hills near Boston, East 
Rock in New Haven, or Eagle Rock of the Essex 
County parks. New Jersey. These five are the 
mountain parks of the eastern coast. All have 
rich beauty and magnificent views of their own. 
Plach differs so much from the other that compari- 
sons arc not desired, but of this I am sure, let a 
person journey ever so far, he will never regret a 
visit to the tower on Castle Craig in Hubbard park, 
Meriden, Connecticut. 
G. A. Parker, 
