CENTRAL PARK

Designed to bring pleasure and social unity to the City, Central Park has been called "the most important work of American art of the nineteenth century."  One of the park's designers, Frederick Law Olmsted, was described by the Flatiron Building's architect as an artist who "paints with lakes and wooded slopes, with lawns and banks and forest-covered hills; with mountain sides and ocean views." 

The concept of a "park for all people" was first proposed by William Cullen Bryant in 1844 and conceived and designed by Frederick Law Olmsted and London architect Calvert Vaux.  The park is New York City's most popular and is visited by over 25 million people every year.  Central Park was constructed in what had once been the community of Seneca Village where freed blacks lived in shacks and caves.  Native Americans, Irish and German immigrants also became a part of this community which consisted of three churches, a school for "colored" children and two cemeteries.  Seneca Village existed from 1825 through 1857 and was located on the West Side of Manhattan between 82nd & 89th Streets and Seventh & Eighth Avenues.

The creation of Central Park’s took 16 years.  Construction stopped during the Civil War and a special military hospital was set up in the park.  The park covers 843 acres and stretches 51-city-blocks beginning at 59th Street (between Fifth Avenue and Columbus Circle) and ending at 110th Street.  

Hundreds of movies and television series including Breakfast at Tiffanys, Angels in America, and Elf, have featured the park as a backdrop or an outdoor set.  In the movie of the Broadway musical, Hair (1979), a group of hippies dance around the park singing the "Age of Aquarius" in one of the most beautiful scenes even filmed in the park.  There is even a Central Park Movie Sites Walking Tour.

The first area of the park to open to the public was the skating rink, which was lit by calcium lights and opened on December 11, 1858.  In those days, horse carriages could be rented for one or two dollars per hour (now they're $120 per carriage for 30 minutes).  New Yorkers could enjoy walking and biking through the park or boating on the pond.  

Central Park has approximately 26,000 trees (including 1700 American Elms), 36 bridges and arches, 21 playgrounds, a lake and boathouse, a skating rink, a carousal, a castle, the Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis Reservoir, a Conservatory, and over 29 statues including ones of literary figures (at Literary Walk), a sled dog (Balto), the Angel of the Waters, and Alice in Wonderland surrounded by the Mad Hatter, the White Rabbit, and the Cheshire Cat.  The only statue depicting real women is one honoring women right's pioneers, Sojourner Truth, Susan B. Anthony, and Elizabeth Cady Stanton.  The newest statue, sculptured by Meredith Bergmann, was installed in 2020.

Belvedere Castle, a Victorian castle, also designed by Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux, was built on Vista Rock Central Park's highest point.  In 1920, it became a weather bureau and is now the Henry Luce Nature Observatory.  From the castle there is a panoramic view of the Park’s Great Lawn, Turtle Pond, and the outdoor theater, the Delacorte, where free productions of Shakespeare in the Park are performed in the summer.  The Delacorte was a gift from George T. Delacorte, publisher of Dell paperback book. 

Strawberry Fields is a Garden of Peace tribute to singer John Lennon with a mosaic and the world "Imagine" in its center constructed of marble donated by Italy and rocks donated by 150 nations.  Lennon lived near Central Park at the Dakota apartment building on W. 71st Street where he was murdered in 1980. 

Many of Central Park's bridges were built in the 1860s.  Pictured above is the Gapstow Bridge surrounded by The Gates, saffron colored fabric panels, a “temporary work of art” by Christo and Jeanne-Claude in 2005.  There were 7,503 gates, 16 feet tall and 5 feet, 6 inches to 18 feet in width, covered 23 miles of Central Park walkways.  The event attracted millions of happy faces. 

The Pine Treet Bank Bridge, near Central Park's West Side entrance at Columbus Circle, was constructed in 1861 and designed by J.B. and W.W. Cornell Ironworks.  It is the only remaining one of three cast iron bridges that once covered a bridle path (the two others were destroyed).  Constructed of cast iron, wood and steel, the bridge has an ornate cast iron handrail with elegant latticework of a Gothic-inspired style. 

At one time there was a casino (meaning “little house” not a gambling establishment) was located at the site where the Summer Stage now stands.  Designed in 1864 as the Ladies’ Refreshment Salon, a restaurant for “women without male escorts,” the place near Fifth Avenue and 72nd Street was conceived as an exhibition and music hall.  In the 1920’s the casino became a popular nightclub with a ballroom designed by the Metropolitan Opera and stage designer, Josef Urban.  It was a hangout for Mayor Jimmy Walter and his mistress and later wife, stage actress Betty Compton who was a performer in the Ziegfeld Follies.  The casino was demolished in 1935 by Robert Moses, NYC Parks Commissioner, who did not believe a casino “belonged in a public park.”    

Central Park is an important migration route in the spring and fall from over 280 different species of birds including the Northern cardinal, gray catbird, barn swallows, Cedar wax-wings, and South American cerulean warbler songbirds.  Very special animal guests in recent years have been a snowy owl and a very colorful mandarin duck.  Squirrels, nine species of bats, Monarch butterflies and the turtles in Turtle Pond are also residents in the park.