PARK AND CEMETERY. 
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LANDSCAPE DESIGN IN PUBLIC PARKS 
One of a series of lectures on '‘Landscape Gardening," at the University 
of Michigan, by O. C. Simonds, Landscape Gardener, of Chicago 
Up to the present time, parks are the most ambitious 
creations of the landscape gardener’s art. In making this 
statement I have in mind such parks as those about Chi- 
cago, Delaware Park at Buffalo, Central Park at New 
York, Prospect Park at Brooklyn, Franklin Park and 
the Metropolitan parks at Boston, the Bois de Boulogne, 
and the Bois cle Vincennes at Paris, and the other great 
parks associated with various American and European 
cities. A pretty clear idea of what a park should be may 
be gathered from some quotations which I will make 
from “Garden and Forest” — Frederick Law Olmsted and 
Charles Eliot: 
“We have always used the word (park) to indicate pri- 
marily a place where the mind and body are refreshed 
by rural scenery. Of course, a park will also furnish fresh 
air and sunshine, opportunities for bodily exercise and 
rest, but beyond these, and more important than these, 
is the refreshment of mind which comes from the influ- 
ence of beautiful natural scenery. The paths and roads 
are not, therefore, merely places to walk in or drive over; 
their fundamental use is to make the scenery of the park 
available to persons on foot, or in carriages, or on horse- 
back, so that they may find that relief and repose which 
natural beauty alone can bring to city-wearied senses. 
The value of a city park, therefore, for a city popula- 
tion, is greater or less according as the poetic charm of 
its scenery is preserved and developed.” 
“A landscape park requires, more than most works of 
men, continuity of management. Its perfecting is a slow 
process. Its directors must thoroughly apprehend the 
fact that the beauty of its landscape is all that justifies 
the existence of a large public open space in the midst, 
or even in the immediate borders, of a town, and they 
must see to it that each newly-appointed member of the 
governing body shall be grounded in this truth. Holding 
to the supreme value of fine scenery, they will take pains 
to subordinate every necessary construction, and to per- 
fect the essence of the park, which is its landscape, be- 
fore elaborating details or accessories.” 
“The type of scenery to be preserved or created ought 
to be that rvhich is developed naturally . from the local 
circumstances of each case. Rocky or steep slopes sug- 
gest tangled thickets or forests. Smooth hollows of good 
soil hint at open or ‘park-like’ scenery. Swamps and an 
abundant water-supply suggest ponds, pools or lagoons. 
If distant views or regions outside the park are likely to 
be permanently attractive, the beauty thereof may be 
enhanced by supplying stronger foregrounds; and, con- 
versely, all ugly or town-like surroundings ought, if pos- 
sible, to be ‘planted out.’ ” 
“Large public buildings, such as museums, concert- 
halls, schools and the like, may best find place in town 
streets or squares. They may wisely, perhaps, be placed 
near, or facing upon, the park; but to place them within 
it is simply to defeat the highest service which the park 
can render the community. Large and conspicuous build- 
ings, as well as statues and other monuments, are com- 
pletely subversive of that rural quality of landscape, the 
presentation and preservation of which is the one justi- 
fying purpose of the undertaking by a town of a large 
public park.” 
“Most men of specialized training, such as architects, 
engineers, and all grades of horticulturists, stand in need 
of an awakening before they are really competent to have 
to do with park work. Each has to learn that his build- 
ing, his bridge or road, his tree or flower, which he has 
been accustomed to think of as an end in itself, is, in 
the park, only a means auxiliary and contributive to a 
larger end — namely, the general landscape.” 
“In spite of a common popular prejudice to -the con- 
trary, it will generally be found that concave, rather than 
convex, portions of the earth’s surface are to be preferred 
for park sites.” 
“The element of interest which, beyond question, should 
be placed first, if possible, in the park of any great city is 
that of an antithesis to its bustling, paved, rectangular, 
walled-in streets — a requirement best met by a large 
meadowy ground of an open, free tranquil character.” 
“No urban park is safe until public sentiment is edu- 
cated up to a controlling belief that breathing space in 
a city is quite as essential to the mental, moral and physi- 
cal health of its people as building space, and that the 
very best use to which certain portions of its territory 
can be put, is to cover it with greensward, and keep 
buildings off of it.” 
“Sound art, high art, in our spacious parks means 
essentially the development of every possible poetic 
charm in their natural scenery and the exclusion of every 
element which conflicts with this purpose.” 
“It seems to be an admitted fact also that quiet, pas- 
toral effects have the greatest intrinsic value in enabling 
us to resist the wearing influence of city life, and recover 
wasted mental energy, and it therefore follows that the 
best work is not one in which the architectural features 
predominate, or in which the planting aims to be highly 
ornamental or decorative.” 
“Not only is beauty essential to a park, its whole value 
lies in beauty. But it must be that serene and enduring 
beauty which is embodied in its essential and permanent 
features, and not merely the transient and superficial 
beauty of floral embroidery. It must have dignity of 
expression, and not mere prettiness.” 
These quotations are from the greatest authorities we 
have and should be clearly understood, not only by all 
park commissioners, and those having some direct 
connection with the management of the parks, 
but by citizens generally, so that they will not 
demand any sites in parks for monuments, mu- 
seums and other structures which detract from park 
scenery. It was but little more than a generation ago 
when nearly every citizen of our country thought himself 
competent to be his own architect. Gradually we have 
come to realize that it is wise to have some one of skill 
and training design even the simplest structure. We are 
now very much in the same position with regard to land- 
scape gardening that our fathers were in regard to archi- 
tecture. Each one is apt to think that he knows intui- 
tively how to grade, plant and trim, or if he distrusts his 
own ability, he is willing to put his own grounds, or the 
grounds of his city, into the hands of a person who has 
a little specialized training in almost any direction. If a 
man has had some training in engineering, he is thought 
