PARK AND CEMETERY 
AND LANDSCAPE GARDENING 
Vol. XX. Chicago, October, 1910 No-. 8 
Parks as Aids to Our Public Schools 
Educators who, in the broadening out of their ideas are 
nOM' looking to use the parks as an aid to the work of 
the schools, are beginning to find out that so far as Bot- 
any is concerned, which would be a branch most directly 
affected, our parks have not been laid out, planned or man- 
aged in such a manner as to be of any particular service 
in this direction in the great majority of instances. Con- 
sidering that this feature of park making has been urged 
at all times in these columns, and also by the few authori- 
ties thoroughly qualified to discuss it, the neglect of it is 
to be greatly deplored. Park making, to the extent prac- 
ticed to-dajq has only been a matter of a few years, and it 
may be said that most of them have been cut out of the 
rough, thus affording the best of opportunities to make 
our parks very decided and positive helps in the practical 
part of impressing knowledge upon students, both young 
and old, in certain lines of education, as they are at present 
developing. Having realized these conditions, we can 
scarcely dissent from a correspondent’s opinion, that “the 
parks and gardens of the country, which have- only lately 
grown up from the bare ground, would have been infinitely 
better if pictorially and systematically planted:” and that 
there are comparatively very few men in the profession 
or practice of park making who have displayed the proper 
quality of knowledge to enable them to create a park that 
shall combine th.e features of both a school of botany, 
recreation and playgrounds. The working of the park 
systems in connection with the public school systems is 
now coming to the front as a municipal question, and the 
failure to design and plant our parks from an educational 
^'iewpoint will be more or less seriously felt. 
N? Ng 
Walking Clubs 
The Saturday afternoon excursions of the Walking Club 
of Chicago, in which many members of other associations 
participate, have been a source of enjoyment and healthy 
exercise, as well as educational, in a sense that the excur- 
sionists become acquainted with the environs of the city, 
as well as the parks and beauty spots met in their ram- 
blings. It has also afforded them an opportunity to know 
the territory of the proposed outer belt of parks, which 
will be before the public again for consideration at the 
proper time. These excursions have been pronounced 
most enjoyable and healthful, and, moreover, there are 
always in the party members who act as guides and in- 
structors, and fhus the trips are made useful as well. Cer- 
tain of the older Eastern cities, notalfiy Boston, have had 
such walking clubs for some time past, and now we learn 
that Cleveland has inaugurated a plan of Sunday afternoon 
walks, under the guidance of the city landscape architect, 
Mr. George Rettig. The first was enjoyed on October 2, 
when about one hundred, young and old, formed the party, 
and it covered a stretch of ground which is to be used as 
a boulevard to connect two of ihc I're trips wil' 
in all probability be continued through the winter and all 
the parks will be visited. The idea is to educate the peo- 
ple to enjoy the parks understandingly ; no better way is 
at present apparent to encourage the use of the parks by 
the people, for whom they were established, and with the 
assistance of a competent leader good results may surely 
be expected. 
The Chattanooga Convention of the A. A. C. S. 
The long-heralded Chattanooga convention of the Asso- 
ciation of American Cemetery Superintendents has come 
and gone, and in other columns will be found an account 
of the proceedings, which will be read with interest by all 
readers in sympathy with the cause of beautiful resting 
places for the dead. We have been struck with certain 
])oints in the address of the president. Air. John Reid, of 
Detroit, which should be editorially emphasized. He re- 
fers to the association as being an educational body and 
its conventions as schools, not only for those present at 
the meetings, hut for those “with whom we have to deal, 
such as lot owners, boards of trustees, managers.” etc., and 
that the annual outing is not really a pleasure but a busi- 
ness trip for the superintendent, in which the incidents of 
inspecting cemeteries, viewing beauty spots, parks and 
public grounds are involved in the educational outlook. 
-Another fact pointed out by him was that horticulture,, 
being one of the most important and extensive subjects 
entering into the studies of the cemetery superintendent, 
it does not receive the attention it deserves, and that 
there is quite a necessity to plant more trees and shrubs. 
The stone-yard criticism would not be so often applicable 
if more attention were given to interplanting with orna- 
mentals, trees and shrubs, judiciously placed. This is 
entirely within the scope of the superintendent. Discus- 
sing the question of more instructive papers being pre- 
sented, he concluded that the perpetuation of the associa- 
tion largely depended upon the information to be obtained 
in attending its conventions. 
vg 
Berlin as a Model for American Cities 
A Chicago pastor. Rev. .A. E. Bartlett, recently returned 
from a summer trip to Europe, declares that Berlin is 
rapidly outstripping other continental cities in municipal 
beautification and improvement, and is certainly a model 
for Chicago, and that of course implies American cities 
in general. For with all due deference to our own stren- 
uous efforts, the great majority of our cities woefully 
lack in many of the essential features of public comfort, 
convenience and pleasure that the older civilizations have 
long considered necessaries. The pastor says: “Berlin 
is a more beautiful city than Chicago, and has a more 
intelligent conception of beauty as developed in a civic 
center,” and that she realizes that extensive beauty is 
necessary, such as lawns and flowers, statuary and foun- 
tains, scattered lavishly throughout the city. She under- 
stands that a beautiful city is one in which all sections fit 
harmoniously into one perfect whole. In the matter of 
public comfort stations, a necessity that the cities of the 
United States, it may almost be said, entirely lack. Air. 
Bartlett says that from Southern Italy to Sweden he vis- 
ited cities in six different countries, and failed to find a 
single city so poorly provided with comfort stations as 
Chicago. This is a municipal matter of very high im- 
portance that should be forced to an issue. In other par- 
ticulars Chicago was contrasted with Berlin to the for- 
mer’s discredit, but there are other cities to which these 
criticisms should make an immediate appeal, because this 
metropolis of the middle West cannot do everything at 
once, and its marvelous development clearly promises 
that in due time it may possibly, and probably will, head 
the procession, unless a great awakening suddenly devel- 
ops in other places. 
