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IT HAPPENED IN NEW YORK!
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Photo: Corbis
1858: Central Park Opens
In 1844, newspaper editor William Cullen Bryant proposed a large public park in New York City. Between 1853 and 1856, city commissioners purchased more than 700 acres from 59th Street to 106th Street between Fifth and Eighth Avenues to create Central Park, the nation’s first public park as well as its first landscaped park. In 1857, the commissioners held a design competition, choosing the "Greensward Plan" submitted by landscape architects Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux. While sections of Central Park were opened to the public in 1858, it was nearly 20 years before the park was completed. Half a million cubic feet of topsoil were transported from New Jersey, 4 million trees and shrubs were planted, four bodies of water were created, 36 bridges and archways were built and miles of pathways and roads were constructed. Today, approximately 20 million people visit Central Park annually. An 1858 view of the park is shown here. –Cynthia Blair |
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