PARK AND CEMETERY 
1 76 
jz ? ParK Notes 
The common council of Charlotte, Mich., has authorized a 
special committee to purchase the Gale woods, consisting of 
105 acres, which will be converted into a park. Battle Creek, 
which flows through the tract, will be dredged and an arti- 
ficial lake constructed. The tract is to cost about $10,000. 
* * v 
An elaborate entrance gate of Bedford limestone is now 
under construction at the Sherman-Heineman Park Woods in 
Mansfield, O. Eight Doric columns 22 feet high, surmounted 
by carved caps and balls, form the essential features of the 
gateway which is to cost about $2,000. E. M. Wolff & Co., 
of Mansfield, are the contractors for the work. 
* * * 
The Metropolitan Street Railway Company of Kansas City, 
Kas., has given $10,000 to that city for the improvement of 
the public park which the company recently deeded to the 
city. The company will give $10,000 more next year for the 
improvement of the tract, and $5,000 yearly thereafter as long 
as its street railway franchise is held. 
* * * 
The Grand Rapids, Mich., Park and Boulevard Association 
has decided to purchase the Indian Mounds and 18 acres of 
surrounding land in connection with the river boulevard to 
be built between that city and Grandville, a distance of six 
miles. The driveway will be 66 feet wide, and the work of 
construction will include grading, the building of culverts 
over the small streams, and the terracing of the river banks. 
* * * 
Much public agitation is being given to the plans of the 
South Park Board of Chicago for the acquiring of an outer 
belt line of great natural parks around that city. It is pointed 
out that while Chicago is the second city in the country in 
population, it ranks eighth in point of park acreage, and 
thirty-second in per capita park acreage, having only one 
acre of parks to every 789 inhabitants. 
* * * 
Superintendent of Public Grounds Doogue, of Boston, 
Mass., last spring planted Boston Common with grain for 
the purpose of strengthening the soil. Wheat, rye, buck- 
wheat, millet, Hungarian millet, and clover were used, and 
when the grain was about to ripen it was cut in order that the 
nutriment which would ordinarily go into the grain pod 
might remain in the roots. The stubble was recently turned 
with plows and grass seed will be sown in the spring 
* * * 
Hon. D. J. Pattee, of Perry, la., has offered to that city 
a twenty acre tract to be used as a public park on condition 
that $1,000 be raised for its improvement. A fund of $2,000 
has already been raised, and $1,000 more is in prospect. The 
tract lies in the center of the town, and has a spring-fed 
creek with high banks running through it, offering good op- 
portunity for effective landscape treatment. 
L. C. Brand, of Los Angeles, Cal., will present to Los An- 
geles County a tract of 640 acres for a public park. The land is 
picturesquely situated in the foothills near Glendale, com- 
manding a splendid view of the San Fernando valley. It 
includes a large canyon and about a quarter of a mile of 
sloping land approaching the canyon. In the main canyon and 
upon the hillsides are beautiful oaks, sycamores, bay trees and 
other trees and shrubbery native to the foothills of that sec- 
tion of the state. 
Macon, Ga., is to plant 1,000 trees in the parks and along 
the streets of that city. The trees include five varieties as 
follows : 600 coral poplars, and 100 each of the following : 
Silver maples, ash-leaved maples, American white ash, and 
tulip poplars. A planting day is to be designated and the 
work done under the direction of the park committee. Some 
years ago the Board of Aldermen of that city adopted an 
ordinance permitting any citizen to purchase a tree for pub- 
lic planting, which should be named after the donor. Many 
fine trees have been planted in this way and are now in 
charge of the parl^ committee. 
* * * 
The Fairmount Park Commission, of Philadelphia, has 
asked the City Council for an appropriation of $857,673 for 
maintaining Fairmount Park next year, which is $115,332.50 
more than was received for the current year. The chief items 
of the estimated expenditures are as follows : $128,000 for 
maintenance; music, $13,000; care of Horticultural Hall, 
$22,000; salaries and equipment of Park Guards, $118,492; 
improvements in Zoological Garden. $17,500; and comple- 
tion of Speedway and constructing drive from Greenland 
Drive, $60,000, and the following new items : Constructing 
approaches to Thirty-third street, from Girard avenue, $20,- 
000; tearing down buildings, etc., $20,000; to establish athletic 
grounds, West Park, $40,000; improvements on both sides 
of river at Falls of Schuylkill, $25,000; improvements in 
vicinity of Strawberry Mansion, $10,000, and constructing 
footways along the Wissahickon, from Ridge avenue to Her- 
mit lane, $10,000. 
* * * 
Additions made to the collections in the New York Botan- 
ical Garden, in Bronx Park, by the expeditions that have 
just returned from gathering material in the West Indies, 
Honduras and Bolivia, amount to more than 24,000 specimens 
of some 6,000 species, of which several hundred are new to 
science, says the New York Herald. The garden has a 
million specimens of plant life, as compared with 3 millions 
at Kew, 2 1 / millions at Berlin, and 2 millions at Paris. In 
the Bronx conservatory now there are 6,000 kinds of living 
plants, with many duplicates, and 4,000 other kinds grow- 
ing outdoors. D. O. Mills, president of the garden, has pur- 
chased and presented to the herbarium the greatest single 
collection of tropical American ferns in existence. It com- 
prises about 4,000 specimens of 1,000 species, collected by the 
late I..S. Jenman, director of the botanical garden at George- 
town, Demarara, British Guiana. 
NEW PARKS, ADDITIONS AND IMPROVEMENTS, 
The state of Illinois has purchased the site of the historic 
Fort Massac, near Metropolis, 111 ., and will improve and 
maintain it as a state park. Mrs. M. T. Scott, of Blooming- 
ton, is president of the commission in charge of the work. 
Citizens of Santa Barbara, Cal., are circulating a petition 
asking the city council to purchase a small tract west of the 
city, known as Oak Park, in order that a fine grove of trees 
may be saved from destruction. 
The boundary line of the Yellowstone National Park has 
recently been surveyed, and marked with granite posts at in- 
tervals of half a mile. 
An extension to Riverside Park, Winona, Minn., has re- 
cently been purchased and is now being improved. 
The contract has been let for the erection of a new pavilion 
in the park at Peoria, 111 . The structure will be of brick 
30x70 feet and will cost about $12,500. 
The town cf Stanhope, la., has completed arrangements 
for the purchase of the Kepler Grove property for a public 
park at a cost of $550. 
