102 FIRST COUNTY PARK SYSTEM 
as a nucleus. At that time the estimated cost of the land 
and buildings, between Fifth avenue and Orange street, 
above mentioned, was $361,685. It soon became apparent 
that a creditable “Central Park” for Newark and for the 
county could not be established within those lines. By 
January, 1896, the Sussex avenue extension and the block 
east of Clifton avenue, the Garside street addition had been 
included. The questions as to these additions were not long 
pending. 
BRANCH BROOK PARK EXTENDED. 
The extension from Park avenue to Bloomfield avenue 
was a more serious matter. A large acreage of city lot 
property was involved and the estimated cost was nearly 
$300,000. Such an expenditure, together with the cost of 
improvement, would make a heavy drain on the available 
funds, before the needs of the other portions of the county 
could be considered. The proposition was finally carried, 
however, and on January 9 that liberal extension through 
to Bloomfield avenue was also included in the Branch 
Brook Park. 
But the lines were not to stop there. Pressure had been 
brought upon the commission to carry the northern limits 
of the park still farther. North of Bloomfield avenue and 
east of the Morris Canal on the line of the park, the land 
was mostly low, swamp property, impossible of improve- 
ment without draining, and until thus improved, practi- 
cally worthless. In the springtime, or during a rainy sea- 
son, many acres there were practically as impassable to a 
person on foot as the jungles of Africa. In the spring of 
1896 the commission made two or three tours of inspection 
there, but no one would take the risk of sinking in the 
swale by attempting to explore the inner recesses of the 
waterlogged tangle of grassy bumps and hummocks, then 
known as the old Blue Jay Swamp. 
On December 4, 1896, this northern extension matter was 
the special order of business. Commissioner Murphy had 
offered a resolution the July previous that the northern 
