Burning Spring, Lord Dufferin Isles, Canada
Attributed to J. Zybach and Company, Niagara Falls, Ontario Canadian
Not on view
The Burning Spring was the first of many tourist traps to appear around Niagara Falls in the early nineteenth century. Entrepreneurs transformed this reservoir of sulfurous gas into a popular attraction, containing its fumes with a barrel and pipe. Ushered into the dark
shed seen here, visitors could watch as the gas was uncorked and set aflame. One eyewitness recalled that, as the roiling fumes were lit, “The faces of those standing near looked like the ‘weird sisters’ of Macbeth around the cauldron.” The vapors illuminate this photograph with a similarly eerie glow.
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