296 PARK AND CEMETERY. 
A. J. DOWNING, PIONEER LANDSCAPE ARCHITECT 
An address before the New York Convention of the American Association of Park Superintend- 
ents, by Frank A. Waugh, Professor of Landscape Gardening, Massachusetts Agricultural College. 
Newburgh has fine parks. It is surround- 
ed by the most beautiful natural landscape. 
In the foreground flows one of the noblest 
and most beautiful of all the rivers of the 
world. Yet for none of these has this 
body of men come here today. This great 
international association meets here, drawn 
by the memory of one eminent name — the 
name of a man whose genius stands out 
like the steadfast beacon light through the 
darkness of three-quarters of a century of 
crowded American history. 
Andrew Jackson Downing was born in 
this town of Newburgh on October 30, 1815, 
and here he lived the whole of that short 
and wonderful life which until this day 
breathes its inspiration upon us. He was 
the youngest of his family, the child of his 
parents’ age, physically weak and slender, 
but mentally precocious. His parents were 
poor, and Andrew was reared on the great 
American diet of plain living and hard 
work. He had little schooling, the prin- 
cipal feature of his school training being 
an attendance of a few months at the 
academy in the neighboring town of 
Montgomery. But he did have the large 
benefit of work in his father’s nursery and 
of quiet association with this rich and no- 
ble landscape — two things which left a 
marked impress upon his character and 
showed their influence conspicuously in his 
life’s work. 
When he was about sixteen years old, 
and his school days ended, he had the good 
fortune to form a warm personal friend- 
ship with Baron von Liderer, then the 
Austrian consul-general in America, who 
had a summer home here in Newburgh. 
This acquaintance led to others, and intro- 
duced the rapidly developing boy to the 
company of refined and talented men and 
women who were to be, aside from this 
ever-blessed landscape, his principal source 
of education. 
During these years of early manhood he 
worked hard in the nursery, but harder 
still upon his studies, scientific, literary and 
artistic. He was already forming those 
high ambitions and noble dreams which 
made him the first of our American land- 
scape gardeners — for us the discoverer of 
a new art and the founder of a new pro- 
fession. His first work — and said by com- 
petent witnesses to be his greatest — was 
the building of his own house and the de- 
velopment of his own grounds. According 
to all accounts, this must have been most 
consummately done. He then began to 
develop the general practice of the land- 
scape gardener in much the same form as 
it is now followed by leading men in the 
profession. His work was largely on pri- 
vate places in the neighborhood of New 
York and Newport, his most famous public 
project having been the grounds in Wash- 
ington about the capitol, the White House 
and the Smithsonian Institution. In the 
summer of 1850, while on a most inspiring 
visit to England, he found a young archi- 
tect by the name of Calvery Vaux — a name 
afterward famous in America — whom he 
brought home with him to be his partner 
in this professional practice. 
For us today it is impossible to forget 
that he was one of the first and ablest ad- 
vocates of the public park, an institution 
then almost unknown and unheard of in 
America. He aided powerfully with tongue 
and pen in the strenuous fight to establish 
Central Park, New York, an institution 
which has had an incalculable influence in 
shaping American park plans and policies 
ever since. 
Parallel with his development as a land- 
scape gardener ran his equally notable de- 
velopment as a man of letters. He quickly 
became known as the greatest American 
writer in the field of rural affairs and as a 
literary artist of genuine talent. His first 
and most unqualified success was his book 
on “Landscape Gardening," which was pub- 
lished in 1841, when he was 26 years old, a 
book which stands today as a classic and a 
masterpiece. The following year saw the 
publication of his “Cottage Residences.” In 
1845, when he was 30 years old, he gave 
the world “The Fruits and Fruit Trees of 
America,” another epoch-making work in a 
totally different field. In 1846 he became 
the editor of the “Horticulturist,” and in 
this office did the most notable literary 
work of his whole career. In 1850 he put 
out his “Architecture of Country Houses.” 
In 1852 he edited the American edition of 
Mrs. Loudon’s “Gardening for Ladies.” In 
the meantime his other works had sold so 
freely that he had been obliged to prepare 
several new editions, each one a great ad- 
vance upon its predecessor. 
Then, on July 28, 1852, came his tragic 
and untimely death. When we think of all 
that he might have accomplished with a 
few more years of life in this period of 
bis capable maturity we are compelled for 
ourselves to share the grief of these friends 
of 1852 who were never able sufficiently to 
mourn his loss. 
These rough outlines of a great and 
many-sided life must serve our present 
needs. Tt is not for me at this late day to 
add anything to the memorial prepared by 
his own intimate friends, nor could I pre- 
sume to revise the estimate of his character 
given by such competent authority as his 
distinguished literary biographer, George 
William Curtis. It does seem fair, how- 
ever, for us in our day to try once more 
the measure of his genius — to endeavor to 
count what portions of his work have lived 
to help us. This at least his sorrowing 
friends could not do in 1852. 
Andrew Jackson Downing must be re- 
membered to us first of all as a nursery- 
man. It was in this field that his life be- 
gan. In this field he learned great lessons, 
which yielded him the most substantial and 
obvious help in other lines of work. More- 
over, it was through his nursery work that 
he reached and profoundly influenced hun- 
dreds of men in other parts of the country. 
It is probably true that Downing's staunch- 
est personal disciples were the men who> 
formed their attachment to him at this 
point. 
His architectural work was of very con- 
siderable consequence. While undoubtedly 
it represents that part of his thought which 
has proved of least worth to us in our 
generation, yet it was credited in its time 
with far-reaching influence for good. In 
any study of his intellect and character it 
is obligatory to take into the account the 
wide, serious and fruitful study which he 
gave to this subject. 
We are to remember him also as a writer. 
There are those who believe that his great- 
est achievements were in the field of litera- 
ture. This was obviously the opinion of 
his biographer, George William Curtis. It 
is easy to join in this opinion when we 
view those numerous books of his in their 
several fields and in their several editions; 
when we consider especially those masterful 
essays contributed to the “Horticulturist” ; 
and still more when we look at all these 
achievements in the light of the later de- 
velopment of a whole realm of country life 
literature, now an enormous, but then an 
untouched, field. 
His literary fame rests upon a most sub- 
stantial basis, seeing his product had both 
matter and style. He had real first-hand 
information to communicate. Much more 
than that, he had sound personal opinions, 
the product of careful study by a most ex- 
traordinary mind. This information and 
these opinions were offered to the world in 
the best literary dress of the times — in a 
style clear, finished, distinguished. 
Yet it seems to me that we in this day 
are most of all indebted to Downing for 
his achievements in the field of landscape 
architecture. There have been many ca- 
pable nurserymen in America, hundreds of 
other writers of ability, other architects of 
greater influence, but Downing w r as with- 
out a question the founder of American 
landscape gardening. It is here that his 
work is still the freshest and most vital. 
As I look over the work of our great 
leader in the field of landscape gardening 
I see three different aspects of it, in each 
of which his powerful character has im- 
pressed itself on following generations. 
First, and probably least, was the profes- . 
sional work in the design of private and 
public grounds. At the present time none 
. 
