PARK AND CEMETERY. 
97 
PARK NOTES. 
The proposed commission to look into the inartistic abuses 
in Central Park, New York City, is creating anxiety in many 
quarters, as it is expected that an examination will be made 
into all the improvements, landscape and monumental, which 
have been made in the city parks in the last ten j-ears. 
» « * 
A park commission has recently been organized at Dayton, 
O., under special Act of Legislature. The cit}' has no large 
parks, but several small ones and some 15 miles of levees, all of 
which will be under the care of the commission. Heretofore 
the Board of City Affairs has had charge of this work. 
* » * 
The Civic Federation of Chicago is working with zeal to 
frame a scheme of legislation to present to the legislature of 
Illinois next winter, looking to the consolidation of park inter- 
ests. There are now three systems, two of which, the west and 
north side systems, have, with their large interests, become so 
much the playthings of politics. 
» * » 
Speaking of the Grant tomb and its location on the River- 
side drive in New York City, a writer in a New York paper 
says: “There is no such place from which to watch the full 
moon rising in the east as the porch of the Grant tomb. The 
ra3’S streaming from column to column invest the memorial 
temple with a grandeur and melancholy that seem more con- 
sonant with the old world than with the new. There is some- 
thing worth the journey to be seen in the tomb when the moon 
at the full is rising. 
* » » 
The Spencer County Council, Indiana, has voted an appro- 
priation of |8oo to buy the tract of land surrounding the grave 
of Nancy Hanks Lincoln, at Lincoln City, in that county. The 
property to be bought is a beau iful natural park of sixteen 
acres. The grave is near the summit of a large hill, almost in 
the centre of a wood, and at present is marked only bj- a gran- 
ite headstone enclosed within an iron fence. The park will be 
under the direct care and management of Nancy Hanks Lincoln 
Memorial Association . 
» * ■» 
As evidence of the growth of the idea that through the 
children a large niea,sure of home improvement ma\- be en- 
couraged, a committee of the Oranges and Montclair, N. J., 
distributed many thousands of chrysanthemums and other 
plants last month among the public school children of those 
towns. With the gifts were also distributed neat pamphlets 
containing instructions in the care of the plants, and some 
primary hints on improving the city door yards. The plants 
were the gifts of a number of the leading florists of the localitj’. 
* « » 
The Appalachian Mountain Club of Massachusetts has 
petitioned Congress in support of the National Appalachian 
Park of the South. The petition closes with these words: 
“We believe the movement is inaugurated at a most opportune 
time, being w’ell aware of the increased difflcultv that will 
attend the securing of suitable land for this purpose at a later 
date, when land values increase and timber and land intere.sts 
combine against such a movement; that we are deeply inter- 
ested in this movement, which, we believe, if carried out, will 
result in untold health and recreation to future generations. ” 
.\ccording to the latest report of the park commissioners of 
Haverhill, Mass., the acquisition of small park areas and the 
annual appropriations granted bj'the city council do not march 
in step. That is to say, that while the park area increases the 
annual appropriation remains stationary. This is the complaint 
from many quarters of the country and must be due to a lack 
of appreciation on the part of the city fathers of the many sided 
value of public parks. The condition of the park question is 
such now, that there is no excuse for niggardl}- economy in 
their maintenance. They have been proved of immense ad- 
vantage wherever established, and a monej’ saver in manj’ ways 
to municipal corporations. 
* ^ -X- 
Among the prominent improvements carried out by the 
Northfield Improvement Association of Northfield, Minn., is 
that connectad with “Sanitary Improvements and River Banks,” 
in which some $500 were expended, 75 per cent, of which was 
provided by private donations. The report of Prof. Magnus on 
the subject showed a large amount of useful work accomplished, 
including building and repairing of retaining wall, construct- 
ing shore drivewaj', cleaning out and widening river, as well as 
as actual work on sewers and culverts. Prof. Magnus stated 
that an encouraging feature in the undertaking was the interest 
taken by the mill owners. The fact that such work can be car- 
ried out by improvement associations in small cities, and with 
the successful results obtained here, should certainly encourage 
public spirited citizens everywhere to engage in such efforts. 
* * * 
A remarkable interest in roadside tree preservation has 
been observed in certain localities in Massachusetts this year, 
and more or less throughout the state. The last legislature 
enacted a law creating the office of tree-warden in everj- town, 
and this has given an impetus to the work undoubtedl}’. The 
law became operative at the town elections this past spring and 
it was noted that the citizens recognized the importance of the 
work and elected good men. It is an important office and the 
trees under the Warden’s care will verj-soon attest his capacit}’. 
In the region of Methuen, Mass , Mr. E. F. Searles, who is 
himself a deputj' warden, has planted out about his many prop- 
erties some 3,000 trees this season, for the most part along the 
highways, and presuming other property owners are proportion- 
ate!}' broadminded, the highways of Massachusetts will have an 
added charm. 
* * * 
The 25th annual report of theboaid of commissioners of the 
Boston Parks is full of interesting matter relating to the devel. 
opment of the magnificent park system of that city. Moreover 
the commissioners present their views on the general subject of 
parks, which afford abundant food for thought and suggestions 
in other localities. They say: “The commission believes that 
the greatest enjoyment by the greatest number of persons will 
be obtained by retaining, as far as it is practicable to do so, a 
natural and rural character to o r parks especially in the larger 
parks like Leverett, Jamaica and P'ranklin. Such parks are val. 
uable in proportion as they are capable of bringing the country 
into the city, and in furnishing to the crowded dwellers of the 
tenement districts an opportunity, unobtainable for them in any 
other way, to enjoy real rural and sylvan sights. To accomplish 
this all evidence of the surrounding city must be shut out as far 
as practicable from the inside of the park, and it cannot be too 
often repeated that parks are for the benefit of the many that use 
them, and not especially for the benefit of the comparatively few 
who live on their borders and desire to look into them. The com- 
mission believes that the rural character of the parks can only be 
obtained by protecting their boundaries with continuous masses 
of foliage, and that its first duty is to protect all such border plan- 
tations and encourage their growth in every practical way.” 
