The History of Central Park New York
Written by Sarah Waxman
New York’s Central Park is the first urban landscaped park in the United States. Originally conceived in the salons of wealthy New Yorkers in the early 1850’s, the park project spanned more than a decade and cost the city ten million dollars. The purpose was to refute the European view that Americans lacked a sense of civic duty and appreciation for cultural refinement and instead possessed an unhealthy and individualistic materialism that precluded interest in the common good. The bruised egos of New York high society envisioned a sweeping pastoral landscape, among which the wealthy could parade in their carriages, socialize, and “be seen,“ and in which the poor could benefit from clean air and uplifting recreation without lifting the bottle.
The Creation of “a Central Park“
After years of debate over the location, the park’s construction finally began in 1857, based on the winner of a park design contest, the “Greensward Plan,“ of Frederick Law Olmsted, the park superintendent, and Calvert Vaux, an architect. Using the power of eminent domain, the city acquired 840 acres located in the center of Manhattan, spanning two and a half miles from 59th Street to 106th Street (in 1863 the park was extended north to 110th Street) and half a mile from Fifth Avenue to Eighth Avenue. In the process, a population of about 1,600 people who had been living in the rocky, swampy terrain--some as legitimate renters and others as squatters--were evicted; included in this sweep were a convent and school, bone-boiling plants, and the residents of Seneca Village, an African-American settlement of about 270 people which boasted a school and three churches. The members of AME Zion, Seneca Village’s most prominent church, were scattered throughout the city, their community destroyed. Though the city did compensate the landowners with an average of $700 per lot of land, many residents estimated this far below the value of their property, which, despite the (until then) undesirable topography, contained their homes, their history, and their livelihoods.
The Vision
Chosen by the city and the park planners because its terrain was unsuitable for commercial building, the site for the new park offered rocky vistas, swamps which would be converted into lakes, and the old city reservoir. These varied elements would be refined, enhanced, diminished, and eradicated to create a park in the style of European public grounds, with an uncorrupted countryside appearance. To this end, Olmsted and Vaux’s plan included four transverse roads to carry crosstown traffic below the park level. Architectural structures were to be kept to a minimum--only four buildings existed in the original plans for the park--and the design and building material of the bridges were chosen to assure that they were integrated as naturally as possible into their surrounding landscapes.
Building Central Park
Thousands of Irish, German, and New England-area laborers toiled ten-hour days under the direction of architect-in-chief and head foreman Olmsted for between a dollar and a dollar fifty per day. In the winter of 1858, the park’s first area was opened to the public; December of that same year saw New Yorker
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