For anyone who has lived their entire lives in Ottawa, Lansdowne will always be Lansdowne.

Sell the naming rights, rebuild the site and turn the historical land into a bustling entertainment hub, it will still be Lansdowne Park, football will be played at Frank Clair Stadium and hockey out of the Civic Centre.

"It's not that people don't understand the point of naming rights and all that money-making stuff, most people are realistic," points out local history buff Gary MacDonald, a man who was born in Ottawa and has lived here ­-- on and off, he says -- for most of his life. "But Lansdowne is an important part of local history and people have an attachment to it, for one reason or another."

Many saw their first Ottawa Senators games at the Civic Centre. Before that, the Ottawa Rough Riders played their glory years -- and later, less glory-filled years -- at Frank Clair.

"I remember the Senators fan carnivals," said 26-year-old Jordan Sheen, who still has his autographed Alexi Yashin rookie card from the event.

Lansdowne has a rich history of sport that has been part of many a fond memory for Ottawans. But the site's history goes back much further than the Senators or the CFL It's more than just where football and hockey teams have platyed. There are heritage buildings, green space, and for decades, thousands of teens and families flocked to the annual Ex each summer.

"It has a fascinating history, an important one and one I don't think many people know about anymore, especially not young people," MacDonald says.

The "amateur historian," at 83, had no problem with the plan to redevelop the site into an entertainment hub, though he admits some friends in the nearby retirement residence weren't entirely thrilled with living near a construction zone.

"It draws attention back to the Lansdowne story," he says.

"People ask why they put all the effort into moving the Aberdeen (Pavillion) and they learn why that was important."

The Lansdowne story, starting when the Ottawa Agriculture Society bought 19 acres of land "east of Bank Street adjacent to the canal" in 1868, is a long one with the newest chapter in its history about to begin. Here are a few highlights of how the site has evolved over the years.

The first exhibitions

Lansdowne has never been a stranger to exhibitions. In fact, that was the site's first use and the first exhibition was held in 1875, six years after the first agriculture fair was held there. The event in 1875, held a year after the site was expanded by an additional 24.5 acres, wasn't exactly the cotton candy and spinning ride fest of SuperEx -- which was held at Lansdowne in later years -- but it was one of the first of many big events to come.

In 1879, the crowd at the provincial exhibition at Lansdowne saw the first Canadian demonstration of the telephone.

For those first 13 years of exhibitions, from 1875-88, Lansdowne was "accessed from the foot of Elgin Street and Bank Street," according to a history of the city compiled by the City of Ottawa.

"Wharfs were located on the south and east sides of the site where paddle-wheel steamers dropped people off to the exhibition grounds.-

Following the incorporation of the Central Canada Exhibition Association in 1887 -- which followed the City purchasing Lansdowne Park and buildings on the site for $25,000 in 1883 -- the site hosted the traveling provincial exhibition.

In 1888, the first of what would be an annual exhibition and fair was held at Lansdowne.

Turn of the century

Just before the 1900s began, a piece of Lansdowne history most are familiar with appeared when the Aberdeen Pavilion was built for the 10th annual Central Canada Exhibition.

The pavilion's opening "marked the progression of the site into a significant national and international venue for the display of advancements in agriculture, livestock and the burgeoning realm of manufactured goods," states the city's Lansdowne history.

As the government vowed to clean up the Rideau Canal in 1899 -- and after Lord Strathcona's troops were encamped at the exhibition grounds during the Boer War -- Lansdowne began what would become a long hockey history as the Ottawa Senators won three consecutive Stanley Cups playing out of the Aberdeen Pavilion between 1902-1905.

Actually, the turn of the century marked a major beginning for sports out of Lansdowne: in 1903, the Ottawa Football Club leased the land that would begin a long and storied history of the sport in Ottawa.

That year, in 1903, the Coliseum was built as a fat stock and poultry show venue. In 1909, a 10,000-seat steel and concrete grandstand was built to reflect the "growing commitment to developing year round sports facilities on the site."

Curling would be played out of the site for the first time in 1914.

Wars and the Great Depression

Lansdowne served as a training ground for Canadian troops before being deployed overseas during the First World War. The Press and Machinery buildings were built in 1920, the same year a crowd was sitting in the grandstand hearing the first radio broadcast, and extensive renovations were undertaken to the Coliseum, but little would be done to Lansdowne during the Great Depression and Second World War. In 1939, the Ottawa Rough Riders captured the Grey Cup at Lansdowne.

The 50s and 60s

Though a new livestock building pavilion opened in 1950, the following years at Lansdowne were all about sports. During the 1960s, a number of buildings at the site were converted to accommodate curling, including the General Purpose building (seven sheets of ice), the McElroy Building (eight sheets) and the Horticulture Building (five sheets). The Rough Riders would win Grey Cups at Lansdowne again in 1951 and 1960, while professional baseball -- including the New York Giants and Philadelphia A's farm teams -- played at the site in the 1950s. The National Liberal Convention was held at the Lansdowne Coliseum to succeed Mackenzie King as party leader, with Louis St. Laurent being selected.

Modern day Lansdowne

Frank Clair Stadium, home of the Ottawa Rough Riders and then, briefly, the Renegades, of the CFL, was built in 1966 and was the last step in a major transformation of the site, which included the demolition of the grandstand built in 1909. The City of Ottawa, having taken over control once again of the site' administration, tore down and rebuilt the south stands in 1975.

The significance of the Aberdeen Pavilion was underscored in 1982 as Ottawa designated it under the Ontario Heritage Act. A year later, the Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada designated the Aberdeen Pavilion a national historic site.

The building was restored in 1989 with renovations of the historical building coming with a $9.6 million pricetag.

The Horticulture Building would be carefully moved in a painstakingly slow process as part of the most recent Lansdowne redevelopment.

For any football fan in the city, this period was the heyday for Rough Riders football, one many believed would never be revisited when the team folded in 1996. For a few years before the Riders pulled the plug and the Senators moved to Kanata, Lansdowne hosted both teams as well as the Ottawa 67's, which began play in, well, 1967.

The Civic Centre was the first home for the modern day Ottawa Senators and the team played its first few, mostly loss-filled seasons at Lansdowne until the team's permanent arena, then called the Palladium, opened in Kanata in 1996.

For the first time in years, the Ottawa 67's -- returning from a two-year stint in Kanata -- will once again play alongside a CFL franchise in their respective side-by-side facilities in 2014.

With the re-opening of Lansdowne this summer, MacDonald is hopeful the site is returning to the bustling gathering place it once was. He says he'll be happy as people who visit Lansdowne for the first time in its newest incarnation.

"You can trace a lot of Canada's history through who and what came through Lansdowne over the years," MacDonald says.

Chris.hofley@sunmedia.ca

Twitter: @chrishofley