326 APPENDIX 



missioners was pledged to the reformation of abuses and the 

 restoration of the park. Our success depended upon securing 

 a man eminently qualified to be superintendent. He was to 

 take the place once filled so ably by Mr. Pettigrew, who now 

 has charge of the model park system of this country. We 

 were deluged with letters recommending for superintendent a 

 very estimable gentleman, a retired quartermaster of the United 

 States army, who had every qualification for the office except 

 one ; he knew nothing of the making and care of parks ; noth- 

 ing of soils and fertilizers ; of artistic grading ; of planting and 

 pruning ; of the maintenance of lawns ; of the nature and habits 

 of trees and shrubs, or the effect of time on their form and color 

 in masses ; in short, he had no knowledge of even the rudi- 

 mentary principles of landscape-gardening. The letters of 

 recommendation came from presidents of railways and of banks, 

 and leading men of affairs and in the learned professions ; and 

 in all these letters there was not one word about landscape- 

 gardening or a suggestion that any knowledge of it is a requisite 

 in the management of parks. 



It was this that surprised and shocked me. 



The writers of them are fairly representative of the country 

 at large, since it is well known that few men of middle age in 

 Chicago were born or brought up there. Let us consider for a 

 moment what a park should be. 



The true function of a park is to afford a refuge to the dwellers 

 in cities where they may escape from the sights and sounds 

 and associations of the city ; where the eye may feast on the 

 beauties of nature, and where the body and mind may relax 

 and find repose. Therefore, beware of the engineer, the archi- 

 tect and the sculptor, lest their work usurp undue prominence 

 and interfere with the true function of the park. 



To erect in a park buildings, bridges, or other structures which 

 are not absolutely essential, or to make them more conspicuous 



