After the Civil War, when towns all over the country were petitioning Congress for old cannons to decorate their town squares, Mansfield was given four huge cast iron beauties that weighed 8,500 pounds apiece designed for coastal defense.
They stood guard on the Square for about 70 years, but when the city decided to cut Central Park in half the cannon were in the way.
So in 1959 they were redeployed to Lexington-Ontario Road where they stood in defense of the Mansfield Police Pistol Range.
Eventually Mansfield’s public cannon found their way back downtown where they resumed duty on the courthouse lawn.
