Ireland Park

Five bronze figures stand along the limestone edge of Bathurst Quay, staring toward the dark water of Lake Ontario. These sculptures represent Irish immigrants arriving in Toronto during the summer of eighteen forty-seven. They escaped a catastrophic famine, yet many carried typhus into the city. A local doctor named George Gullen stayed behind to treat them while the rest of the city locked its gates. The statues mark the exact place where these survivors finally reached the shore, exhausted and alone.