108 
PARK AND CEMETERY. 
RECENT WORK IN ASSOCIATION PARKS. 
( Continued ■) 
In regard to the work done by the 
Department of Parks, Borough of the 
Bronx, for the past year or two, our con- 
struction work during the year 1913 has 
been very limited, owing to the fact that 
we have received almost no appropriations 
for construction work during the past year, 
but I shall be pleased to give you a sum- 
mary of what work has been done with 
the meager amount of funds available. 
In Bronx Park, a new shelter house 
was completed, and a stone wall sur- 
mounted by an iron fence was erected, 
also wing walls to the abutment at Bed- 
ford Park entrance, and a flight of granite 
steps. In the Zoological Park a new power 
plant and workshop building was erected, 
and an addition placed on the Rocking 
Stone Restaurant. We have now in course 
of construction there a fine building to be 
used as a public service and office build- 
ing, which will probably be completed very 
shortly ; also a new shelter pavilion is in 
course of construction in the Zoological 
Park. 
A new garden has been completed in 
Bronx Park, known as the Sunken Garden, 
which adds greatly to the attraction of the 
park. This covers two acres of ground, 
which was a low marsh land, used in years 
past for the dumping of refuse of all 
kinds. Sixteen thousand cubic yards of 
clean fill and 4,600 cubic yards of top soil 
brought this area up to a proper level. 
Ten bushels of grass and seed have been 
sown, flower beds have been laid, and 
27,000 plants of various species have been 
planted. The high banks surrounding the 
garden have been covered with rhododen- 
drons and azaleas, and some 400 feet of 
walks have been laid. 
In Pelham Bay Park a most necessary 
improvement was completed during the 
year, namely, the trenching and draining 
of the salt meadow lands in this park. 
The mosquito nuisance has been very ma- 
terially decreased, adding thereby much to 
the enjoyment of the large number of 
visitors to this section. 
At Orchard Beach, in this park, nearly 
300 tents covered some 1,200 health-seekers 
during the summer. Water service is now 
supplied to the camp at both the front 
and rear. These camp sites are reserved 
for the use of familiies, preference, if any, 
being given to families with small chil- 
dren. Camp sites for men have been re- 
served in another part of the beach. Last 
summer the Working Girls’ Association 
maintained two large tents for the use . of 
working girls over week-ends, and they 
were well patronized, discipline and order 
being noticeable all through the season. 
At the parade grounds, the six new base- 
ball fields opened up during the year were 
of material assistance in caring for the 
many baseball enthusiasts. 
Eighteen new greens were provided for 
the golf links in this park, and the links 
were used much more extensively than 
heretofore, it having been found neces- 
sary to put into use the register system 
in operation in Van Cortlandt Park on 
Saturdays, Sundays and holidays, in order 
to regulate the playing. 
In Van Cortlandt Park, the great athletic 
center of all the boroughs of Greater New 
York, a cross-country course has been laid 
out, on which, during the season, a num- 
ber of important events, including the 
college national championship, have been 
run. During the summer, 28 baseball dia- 
monds were occupied from early Satur- 
day morning to late Sunday night, and 
by no means neglected during the other 
days of the week. A number of cricket 
grounds have been provided by the de- 
partment, and used by those who play this 
game. During the season polo games were 
played on the parade grounds, where also 
various bodies of the National Guard car- 
ried on their drills and manoeuvers. The 
golf links in this park were so largely 
patronized as to be congested on Satur- 
days and Sundays, suggesting the desira- 
bility of opening up another course as soon 
as the city’s finances will permit. 
During the fail and winter the baseball 
fields were used for football, and the lake 
offered skating facilities to thousands dur- 
ing the winter. In the Colonial Garden, 
120,000 plants of various kinds were 
planted during the season. In the nursery, 
some 18,000 evergreen and deciduous trees 
have been propagated, and seed has been 
sown providing for some 20,000 trees and 
shrubs, and some 200,000 herbaceous 
plants. For the different parks in the sys- 
tem. 1.034 trees and 15,000 evergreen seed- 
lings have been supplied. 
During the year the Mason & Hanger 
Company, which has been excavating for 
the new aqueduct, has filled uo some 10 
acres of swamp lands in this park, and the 
work of reclaiming the swamp lands be- 
tween the railroad tracks and Broadway 
will probably be begun shortly, as we have 
received an appropriation of $25,000 for 
this purpose. To complete this work, it 
would require $100,000, but the $25 000 
available will enable us to at least start 
the improvement. 
To commemorate the original commis- 
sion appointed in 1883, for the purpose of 
selecting grounds for the parks in The 
Bronx, the Bronx Society of Arts and 
Sciences presented to the city six bronze 
tablets, which were placed in the different 
parks, and were unveiled, with appropriate 
ceremonies, on April 19, 1913. 
During the year the Poe cottage, the 
home of the poet, Edgar Allen Poe, was 
purchased bv the city, and removed to 
Poe Park. Tt has been entirely renovated, 
and was formally opened to the public, 
as a sort of museum containing relics and 
objects of interest in connection with the 
life of the poet, on November 15, 1913. 
It may, perhaps, be of interest to your 
readers to note the following statistics 
showing the vast number of people from 
all of the boroughs of Greater New York, 
accommodated with recreation facilities in 
the parks of this borough during the 
summer : 
PERMITS ISSUED DURING 1913. 
Tennis, 5,850. 
Baseball, 671. (Each used on an aver- 
age ten times, 18 players being engaged 
each time, making an average of 120,780 
players accommodated.) 
May parties, June walks and outings of 
all kinds, 353. (Averaging 82 persons to 
each permit, a total of 28,946 persons.) 
Football, 69; camping, 285; cricket, 31; 
miscellaneous, 103. Total, 7,362. 
Total number of persons using permits 
during the summer season, 178,556. 
The above, of course, is only a state- 
ment of the number of persons using per- 
mits for recreations. The fact that the 
natural beauties of our parks are fully 
appreciated by the people of Greater New 
York, is evidenced by the vast number who 
visit them during the summer season, 
especially on Sundays and holidays, when 
at least 150,000 persons visit them in one 
day. a great majority of whom are from 
boroughs outside of The Bronx. 
The actual area of park lands in The 
Bronx is 4,141 acres, as against 3,054 
acres for all the other boroughs com- 
bined. Martin Schenck, 
Chief Engineer, Park Dept. 
Borough of The Bronx, New York. 
* * * 
In reply to your letter re progress of 
Park Departments, during the last year 
or two, may say that we have been making 
fair headway along lines which are prob- 
ably not new, but simply the provision 
and development of parks, for a new and 
rapidly growing prairie city of 200,000 in- 
habitants, along lines which are necessarily 
conservative by reason of financial con- 
siderations. 
The physical and climatic conditions ex- 
isting here make the cost of paving, sew- 
erage, etc., very heavy, and the annual out- 
lay on these matters is so large as to 
make it very difficult to obtain money for 
capital expenditure on parks. 
Our revenue for maintenance is fixed at 
one-half mill on the total assessment of 
the city, and as it is expanding annually, 
is ample for the purpose. 
We have recently improved a number 
of neighborhood parks, ranging in size 
from two to seven acres, and these im- 
provements are very comprehensive, as the 
foundation for these small parks is sim- 
ply bare prairie, with an underlying gumbo 
soil of the most tenacious and unkindly 
nature of any soil in the world. 
We are working out the plans on two 
large suburban parks, and have already 
provided them with facilities for recrea- 
tion, music, refreshments, etc. We built 
