1782 LANDSCAPE GARDENING 



LANDSCAPE GARDENING 



2070. A commanding object in the oSscape. 



l)lanto(l l:imisc;ipe. His iiloas and his tsistos were eotn- 

 niunicaliHl to liis friend atul neisilihor, Henry Winthrop 

 Sarsenl. who transmit teii tliein to anollu'r f^i'iirratloii, 

 and some of the most inteivstin;; and beautiful country 

 places made in America in tlie hist sixty years owe tlieir 

 existence to Downing's influence. It was this infhience 



which lia.s made 

 the Arnold Ar- 

 boretum what it. 

 is, a n a t u r a 1 

 Harden of great 

 beauty and not 

 a mere collection 

 of trees and 

 shrubs. It must 

 lie remembered, 

 also, that when 

 Downing died 

 the only pul)lic 

 grounils in the United States which could in any sense 

 be called a park was Boston Common, and that it was 

 through his knowledge and influence that Central Park 

 in Xew York w;i6 established in 1S5'2; and it was Cen- 

 tral Park that led to the establishment of public parks 

 and playgrounds in every American city. 



The artistic values in some of the old jilaces, and the 

 reasons for them, are discussed by Warren II. Manning, 

 in the remainder of this introductory article. 



"The principal lesson to be learned from a study of 

 liistoric jirivate estates in America is the fact that 

 our system of land tenure does not lead, iis does the 

 English method of entailment, to the holding by a 

 family of such estates for centuries. While there are 

 many houses and some large property holdings in the 

 older parts of this country that have remained in one 

 family for man\ generations, even back to the jieriod 

 of the original grant or purchase, they are usually 

 not notably fine estates. There are very few, if any, of 

 such estates iijion which the first acreage or the original 

 design and intent of the founder have been continue<l 

 in all es.sen1ial details for three or four generations. 



" Mount Vernon, under the ownershij) of an associa- 

 tion, ha-s been maintained much as it was designed by 

 General Wiushington, although the original acreage of 

 the property has been much curtailed since Washing- 

 ton's day, and the planting is now being restored. 

 Such associations as the Virginia and Massachusetts 

 societies for the preservation of antiquities, and the 

 several colonial societies have rescued, restored an<l 

 are maintaining many old homes with but a fragment 

 of the original estate attached. Some cities are main- 

 taining historic homesteads as public museums or in 

 public parks, as New York holds the Van Cortlandt 

 homestead in Van Cortlandt Park, which includes 

 parts of the old estate diverted to other than its origi- 

 nal uses. 



"Family associations have been formed to hold the 

 ancestral homes with a small part of the original farm 

 holilings, such as the Fairbanks, Wyman, and Manning 

 a.s.sociations in Massachu.setts. The United States 

 Government holds Arlington, tlx' home of Robert E. 

 Lee, with most of the land diverted to other than the 

 original use. The Pendleton house in Providence, 

 Khode Island, and the Swett house in Portland, Maine, 

 are held as typical furnished hom(w of their day in asso- 

 ciation with art museums through the bequest of the 

 last owners. 



"This brief review indicates that it is the historical 

 antecedence, not the beauty of landscape and gardens, 

 that is responsible for the preservation of most of the 

 ancient homes and estates, notwithstanchng that the 

 b<!auty of landscape determined the location and first 

 design of manj' of the early homes and the grounds 

 about them. 



"There are two broad distinctions to be made between 

 the notable properties of the North and of the South. 



In the South, the great estates included acres by the 

 thousands with the exten.sive cultivation of great fields, 

 while in the North th(> acres seldom ran into the hun- 

 <lrcds, and the cultivation was usually more intensive. 

 In the South, there was a comparatively small |)ropor- 

 tion of the property set aside about the mansion for 

 lawnis, gardens and other ornamental purposes, as 

 compared with the homes of the North. In the South, 

 the home buildings were usually broadly siiread out, 

 with synunclrical wings on each side of a main central 

 structure. In this central .structure, the use of the tall 

 eolunms of the classic order, with either a projecting 

 or a recessed portico or porch, was almost universal. 

 However, there was a marked individuality in most of 

 the buildings and a fairly well-marked distinction 

 between two types of design that have been referred 

 to as the Georgia-Colonial and the Virginia-Colonial, 

 the distinction of the latter style being due chiefly to 

 the work of Thonnis Jefferson which was typified by 

 his own home, Monticello, and by his University of 

 Virginia. 



"In the North, the mansions were usuaUy carried a 

 .story or more higher than in the South. They were more 

 compact and restrained, for pilast<'rs were used verj' 

 largely in the place of columns. Instead of the balance 

 of wings on cither side of the main structure, the wing 

 was usually added at one side or at the rear, and 

 extended to include the various outbuildings and shops 

 with stables forming the terminus of the group, or 

 being rather closely associated with the house in a 

 group near at hand; wlicreas in the South the workers' 

 houses, the ]ilantation barn, and the shop for the wheel- 

 WTight, blacksmitli, the cotton press, and sheds for the 

 drying of tobacco, were in separate groups at some dis- 

 tance from the mansion. 



"Before the Revolutionary period, and for a quarter 

 of a century afterward, the English influences in the 

 design of estates, both North and South, were very 

 marked. Within this period Thomas Jefferson's 

 influence, not only in the design of buildings but also 

 in the design of grounds, was powerful in the South, 

 and especially in Virginia. At the end of this period 

 Andre Parmentier exerted an important influence in 

 the North, especially about New York. 



"In this colonial period and subsequent to it, there 

 was an exchange of native and exotic plant material, 

 through such men as John Bartram, Peter Collinson, 

 Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, and others, 



supplemented 

 by such agen- 

 c i e s as the 

 Prince's Nurs- 

 eries at Flush- 

 ing, Long Lsland, 

 ami the Winship 

 Nurseries at 

 Boston. This 

 interest was re- 

 flected in the 

 writings of A. 

 J. Downing, the 

 first notable 

 writer and prac- 

 titioner in the 

 designing of 

 landscapes, 

 whose successor, 

 Frederick Law 

 Olmsted, initi- 

 ated .systems of 

 parks that pre- 

 ceded the city- 

 plan movement 

 of tod.ay. This 

 2071. A good background for a landscape period of testing 

 garden. P.igo 17S0. exotic plants and 



