Best military experience for toddlers

It's pretty strange, the sight of children frolicking on playground equipment in the shadow of a heavily armored vintage combat vehicle. But here in the hometown of General George Patton of World War II fame, the military Goliath's very own tank has pride of place in Hamilton's aptly named Patton Park. The tank's most stressful moment occurred in the early 1970s, when a band of high-schoolers attempted to blow up the wartime symbol as an act of protest against the Vietnam conflict. (Amusingly, this effort is said to have been spearheaded by then-teenage David Morse, who went on to thespian fame on TV's St. Elsewhere and more recently won an Obie for his off-Broadway turn in the Pulitzer Prize-winning How I Learned to Drive.) Local lore has it that the tank, as a result of the bouquets of explosives tossed therein, turned white-hot but failed to destruct. Since then, it's been hermetically sealed, so youngsters can hardly turn it into the military equivalent of Pee-wee's Playhouse. Still, the tank's very presence has to be an inspiration to patriotic kiddies -- not to mention a reminder that George C. Scott could doubtless kick the stuffing out of Mr. Rogers.

Patton Park, Asbury Street and Bay Road, Hamilton.