We all know what happened to our beautiful Central Park fountain in 1938. The loss of that fountain and so many trees in that area decimated the landscape. There were no immediate plans to build a replica.

After the massive cleanup, all that remained of our famous fountain was the cement basin. Town officials, somewhere around 1939, decided to build an hour-glass shaped, cobblestone fountain in the original’s place.  Built during the WPA era, many locals called it the “cobblestone monstrosity” and it was a very poor replacement for the fountain that was originally gifted to the town by John R. Foster. 

That original fountain was a replica of the one featured at the 1876 Centennial Exposition, held in Philadelphia.

Within 10 years, the “new” fountain was falling apart.  The defective masonry allowed water to seep through the sides and ultimately loosened the cobblestones—some falling right out of the structure as children stood below!  It became a public eyesore and a source of embarrassment to Clintonians — so much so that in June of 1949, it was razed and replaced by a single iron standpipe, an overhead sprinkler of sorts for kids to stand under. 

At the time of its razing, town officials actually suggested in the Clinton Daily Item that “perhaps some local philanthropist or organized group should replace the original Foster fountain with a duplicate to serve as a feature of the park.”

Things sometimes move slowly here in Clinton and it was another 10 years before the Clinton Lions Club stepped up to erect another fountain.

In October 1959, the Clinton Board of Selectmen granted official permission to the Lions Club to erect a 12-foot fountain in Central Park.  Because permission was so late in the coming, it was decided to wait until the spring of 1960 to begin construction.

Vic Ciavola, the driving force behind the new fountain, presented plans to town officials and oversaw the work done.

The hand-cut granite for the new fountain was quarried in Salisbury, S.C., by the Comolli Granite Company of Georgia. It was steel finished with a mahogany hue. The cost to the Lions Club was $1,600.

There was general excitement in the air as plans and updates for the fountain were regularly published in the Item. 

The new fountain would arrive in five pieces. The second tier of the fountain would include two sitting lions and between those figures was a shower head through which water was sprayed over the basin below it. A special plastic glue was used to cement the five parts together and the actual construction of the fountain only took two days. 

Today that fountain can be seen at the entrance of Veteran’s Field, across from Clinton High School.

Today in Central Park we have an exact replica of our famous Foster fountain from the 1890s.  That fountain — built in more recent years by the very same company that built the original — stands proudly in one of our town’s most beautiful spots. May it last forever.

Terrance Ingano is a Clinton historian.