THE HEART OF THE CITY

NANCY CAMPBELL

63 King Street EastIMAGE: Nancy Campbell (portrait) (12217 bytes)

IMAGE: button(490 bytes)CURRENT STATUS (1999)
Present Owner: 98519 Canada Ltd.
Present Use:  Vacant
Heritage Status:  Listed (not as a heritage building; only as a component of the Gore heritage streetscape)
Locally Significant Date:  N/A

IMAGE: button(490 bytes)BUILDING INFORMATION
Date Built: 1948
Original Owner: Singer Sewing Company
Original Use: Singer Sewing machine sales and service (1949-1980)
Subsequent Uses: Palace Billiards and amusement arcade and Cinesex
Previous Building on Site: Five-storey, late 19th century commercial building

IMAGE: button(490 bytes)ARCHITECTURE
Size: Three-storeys
Design and Style: Early Modern 
Architect, Builder: N.A. Armstrong (architect); Cooper Construction Co.
Construction Materials: Facade: artificial stone
Architectural Integrity: Moderate (upper facade largely intact; concrete facing now covered around second floor window)
Architectural Features: Austere treatment of facade with its row of three single casement windows above one large multi-paned window on the second storey. 

Nancy Campbell as a ballerina (8027 bytes)Nancy Campbell was born in England in 1904, and at a young age emigrated to Canada with her parents. She studied piano and planned to follow a career in music until seeing her first ballet at the age of ten. It was at that moment that she changed her career goals and took up dance lessons. At the age of 18, Campbell travelled to New York where she worked under the choreographer Michael Fokine, who was an important figure in the Russian Imperial Ballet school and the Maryinsky Theatre in St. Petersburg. Campbell studied various forms of dance, which included ballet, tap, acrobatics, and modern dance.

In 1926, she returned to Hamilton where she taught for the Howard Studio. Three years later Campbell opened her own studio at 63 King Street East. For performances, she designed the costumes herself. Many of Campbell’s pupils went on to dance professionally for such organizations as the National Ballet in Toronto and Radio City Music Hall in New York. Two of her students even went on to become established teachers in England. She taught right up until her death in the 1980s.

Nancy Campbell was a founding member of the Four Arts Club, the Pen and Brush Club, and the Contemporary Artists of Hamilton. She also played an instrumental role in founding both the Hamilton and Dundas Bahai Spiritual Assemblies and a Hamilton ballet group.


REFERENCES:
Clipping File – Biography – Nancy Campbell. Special Collections, HPL.
Hamilton News Scrapbook, Vol. VW2. Special Collections, HPL.
Hamilton Panorama of our Past. Special Collections, HPL. p. 186.
LACAC Research File.  Planning Department, City Hall.

IMAGE: Home, listing of buildings, clickable map, email links(9468 bytes)