248 
THE GARDENERS' CHRONICLE OF AMERICA. 
expenditure and the party in whose favor the warrants were 
drawn. 
Newton, Mass. 
The annual report of the Forest Commissioners records the 
average cost of trees planted, a total of 632, was $1.03 for each 
tree and guard and $1.19 for planting, or a total of $2.22 com- 
plete in place. I,fi00 trees distributed on streets and highways 
of a small city like Newton is quite a creditable showing. To 
devise a means of determining the value of shade trees, in 
order to use it in controversies between individuals and corpora- 
tions injuring or killing trees, a formula of easily and quickly 
establishing the value has been prepared. Tables have been pre- 
pared and are now on file in the office, whereby the approximate 
value of a tree of any size and species can be obtained. Presum- 
ably the table is acceptable to both contestants and it is to be 
hoped that a complete description of the method will be given in 
a later issue. Though it cannot in the very nature of the case 
establish the aesthetic or peculiar personal value of a tree, it 
would serve as a basis of arriving at a value likely to have 
great weight before a court. Gauged by the standard evolved, 
the estimated value of the street trees of Newton is given at 
over a million and a half dollars. 
New Orleans, La. 
The report of the New Orleans City Park Improvement Associa- 
tion, composed of thirty-three officers, shows the disbursements 
for last year to be about $60,000. It "ill be both interesting and 
instructive to visit the convention city and make observations 
relative to its parks. The city offers varied and convincing illus- 
trations of many phases of park work and is an excellent field for 
study. 
New Bedford, Conn. 
The twenty-first annual report gives considerable space to the 
exercises attendant upon the erection of a statue in Buttonwood 
Park. A St. Louis capitalist in memory of his boyhood days in 
New Bedford, presented the city with a work by George Julian 
Zolney, of St. Louis. 
National Parks. 
Franklin K. Lane, Secretary of the Interior, in a report on 
national parks states: In easting up the assets of the States as 
a landed proposition, I have made no mention of one of the most 
delightful of our national enterprises. To build a railroad, re- 
claim lands, give new impulse to enterprise and offer new doors 
to ambitious capital, these are phases of the ever widening life 
and activity of this nation. 
The United States does more — it furnishes playgrounds to the 
people which are, we may modestly state, without any rivals in 
the world. Just as the cities know the wisdom and necessity of 
open spaces for the children, so with a very large view the nation 
lias been saving from its domain the rarest places of grandeur 
and beauty for the enjoyment of the world. And this fact has 
been discovered by many only within the last year. Having an 
incentive in the expositions on the Pacific Coast and Europe being 
closed, thousands have for the first time crossed the continent 
and see one or more of the national parks. That such mountains 
and glaciers, lakes and canyons, forests and waterfalls, were to 
be seen in this country, was a revelation to many who had heard, 
but had not believed. It would appear from the experience of 
this year that the real awakening as to the value of these parks 
lias at last been realized and that those who have hitherto found 
themselves enticed by the beauty of the Alps and the Rhine and 
the soft loveliness of the valleys of France, may find equal, if 
not more stimulating satisfaction in the mountains, rivers and 
valleys which this government has set aside for them and for all 
others. 
Hartford, Conn. 
The 1915 annual report is particularly interesting by reason of 
Superintendent Parker's report. He attributes the origin of the 
play movement to 1893 (some call Boston's Charlesbank the 
beginning), that it took more definite form about ten years ago. 
Eight years earlier the playground attendance in Hartford was 
about fifty thousand visits, while last year there were 1,800,000, 
being an increase of 700,000 over the previous year. It is esti- 
mated that this year the attendance will be over two million. 
In cost the change has been from $500 eight years ago to $1,000 
last year and it is still mounting. 
Mr. Parker's discussion of recreation is made the theme of very 
pertinent announcements. A close observer with a philosophical 
bent and broad sympathies with society, he endeavors to stand- 
ardize the practice of serving the public on public property : he 
speculates on the governing principles and freely intersperses 
comment with reasoned deductions. 
''While I have not enough data or knowledge of conditions to 
formulate with any degree of accuracy, the needs and purposes 
of recreation in Hartford, or to tabulate or classify their devel- 
opment or purposes for age or other conditions, yet the principle 
underlying it seems to be, so far as public recreation is concerned, 
that every individual should have a fair opportunity to develop 
and maintain their muscular and other functions of the body in 
accordance with their sex and age; that no one should be com- 
pelled to learn evil or to live in its midst unless they prefer to 
do so." 
Classifying the different ages as they group themselves, he 
outlines them thus: (1) Under one year; (2) between one and 
four years; (3) between four and eight years; (4) between eight 
and twelve years; (5) between twelve and sixteen years; (6) be- 
tween sixteen and twenty-one years; (7) between twenty-one 
and twenty-eight years. Providing for both sexes in this large 
subdivision would be formidable task. Ordinarily the grouping 
is children with individual proclivities, adolescents and adults, 
which, when doubled for both sexes, means six areas, or where 
grouped it requires an area for each sex of adolescent age, a 
children's compartment and an adults' field, four in all. 
We would be prone to consider the proposal too theoretical and 
too impractical to tell off hand the necessary areas implied, but 
Mr. Parker evidently has full appreciation of that trouble and 
states: "While I speak of separate provision, I do not mean 
necessarily that they shall be in separate fields or areas, for 
usually there is no objection to their being together on the same 
playground, providing each group finds its own wants supplied." 
He strikes a note that reverberates wherever students of munic- 
ipal park affairs are active, when he states that "the part a city 
should have in the recreation of its people, is still problematical." 
Advertising the parks by paid advertisements in the daily press 
is suggested as a legitimate idea and who could refute it? But 
better still, why not induce the publishers to assign reporters 
especially to parks and write informative articles which are bet- 
ter than routine advertisements. Rochester and Boston seem to 
have the knack of doing that very well. 
Administering the unemployed situation featured a novel 
method. Seemingly, park work was provided for some with an 
inferred understanding that payment would be returned by the 
recipient — work being only a medium to relieve the transaction 
from charity or any warranted feeling of accepting it. Consider- 
able of the moneey so expended has been returned, and is, on oc- 
casion, to be used as. a revolving fund until it is exhausted. 
Its merit consists in enabling prompt relief to be offered and 
is made without security or promise to return; it is left entirely 
optional with the receiver whether or not to return any or all 
of it. Mr. Parker declares that the plan lias worked well. 
AMONG THE GARDENERS. 
(Continued from page 24(i.i 
Harry Junes, until recently gardener on Dr. J. t. Ayer's Estate, 
Glen Cove. N. V., lias secured a similar position on the R. A. 
Strung Estate, Quaker Ridge, Portchester, X. Y. 
Peter G. Brough, formerly gardener on the H. Fiske Estate, 
Bernardsville, X. J., has taken a similar position on the "Wenga 
Estate." Arnionk. X. Y. 
Maurice J. Collings, formerly of the Billings Estate, Curies 
Neck, Richmond, Ya.. is now gardener on the B. S. Clark Estate, 
Litchfield. Conn. 
David Hothersall, recently resigned as superintendent on the 
George Bullock Estate, "Yeadoii." Oyster Bay, N. Y., to accept a 
similar position at "Xamour," Wilmington, Del., the estate of 
Alfred I. du Pont. 
H. Taylor, formerly at Eastover Farm, Oyster Bay, N. Y., has 
succeeded David Hothersall as superintendent at "Yeadon," 
Oyster Bay, N. Y. 
William Ford, formerly on the Stuart Blackton Estate, Oyster 
Bay, X T . Y., secured the appointment of superintendent of the A. E 
Smith Estate, Centre Island, Oyster Hay. N. Y. 
Alexander Robertson, formerly on the D. G. Dery Estate, Cata- 
sauqua, Pa., has secured the position of superintendent on the 
estate of Mrs. A. S. Alexander. Roslyn, X. Y. 
Andrew P. Clarkson, formerly of Dedham. Mass.. has secured 
the position of gardener to Mrs. August R. Meyer, Kansas City, 
Mo. 
Peter Morrison, formerly gardener to E. C. Henderson. Cold 
Spring Habor, X". Y., is now gardener to Mrs. 0. H. P. Belmont, 
Great Xeek, X. Y. 
David Ridpath, after a record of nine years as assistant and 
foreman on the Constable Estate, Mamaroneck, N. Y., under 
James Stuart, gardener, lias accepted a position as head gardener 
to J. W. Johnson, New Brunswick, X*. Y. On April 18 he was 
married to Miss Anna Aitchison at the home of her brother, 
Thomas Aitchison, gardener to Nathan Strauss, Mamaroneck, X. Y. 
