158 MASSACHUSETTS HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



I had the honor to advocate, among the subjects that demanded 

 treatment under some form of meti'opolitau administration — as 

 the only method suited to the circumstances — the establishment 

 of a system of metropolitan parks. 



It was in response to this suggestion that the Trustees of Public 

 Reservations took the first definite step which resulted finally ia 

 the creation of the Metropolitan Park Commission. A very 

 important advance was that made in the incorporation of the 

 Trustees of Public Reservations. This was brought about through 

 the Appalachian Mountain Club, which, in April, 1890, called a 

 conference of persons interested in the preservation of scenery 

 and historical sites in Massachusetts. This conference Avas held 

 in Boston, at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, on May 

 24th. In consequence, the legislature of 1891 passed an act 

 incorporating the Trustees of Public Reservations. The purpose 

 of this Board was to hold in trust such beautiful and historic places, 

 and tracts of land withiu the Commonwealth as might be given 

 into its care. 



The leading spirit in this movement was Mr. Charles Eliot, the 

 landscape architect; the most brilliant pupil of Mr. Olmsted, and 

 now his associate in the firm of Olmsted, Olmsted, & Eliot. Mr. 

 Eliot was made the Secretary of this Board, whose first annual 

 report demonstrated its great usefulness. The charming tract of 

 wild woodland in the Middlesex Fells known as the Virginia 

 Wood was intrusted to the keeping of the Board by the late Mrs. 

 Fannie H. Tudor, of Stoneham, in memory of her daughter, whose 

 name it bears. 



But the Board was made aware of the insufficiency of its powers 

 for realizing the ends desired, in consequence of its lack of 

 authority to acquire land by any other means than that of volun- 

 tary effort. The necessity for some method by which lands 

 needed for public uses could be taken for the purpose by authori- 

 tative action became apparent. A meeting of the Park Commis- 

 sions of Boston and of the various cities and towns in the 

 immediate neighborhood, together with otlier persons interested, 

 was therefore called by the Trustees of Public Reservations. 



This meeting was held on December 16, 1891, and it was the 

 unanimous sentiment that in order to secure for the country 

 around Boston the Ijenellt of the important open spaces whose 

 peculiar suitability for public use was manifest, some form of 



