Branch Brook Park Historical Context

Frederick Law Olmsted, the famed landscape architect and designer of Central Park in New York, visited Newark and Essex County and recommended a site encompassing what is now Branch Brook Park. Olmsted and his partner, Calvert Vaux, envisioned Branch Brook Park to be a "grand central park" for the City of Newark.

The initial park was only 60 acres (24 ha) in size but grew in the 1920s through private donations from prominent Newark families, such as the Ballantines, eventually reaching the city limit with Belleville and becoming one of the largest urban parks in the United States. The Morris Canal originally ran on the park's west side, until its old bed was turned into the Newark City Subway, providing access to the park from Downtown Newark.

• The first designs of the park, based largely on romantic garden themes, were proposed in 1895 and 1898, after the Parks Commission hired several architectural firms to plan the park. In 1900, the commission hired the Olmsted Brothers firm to redesign the park. The result was the park's current naturalistic look and feel, with acres of meadows and forests, in a manner similar to their father's earlier designs of Central Park and Prospect Park

• The park is home too many architecturally significant structures, including bridges, buildings, gates, and sculptures. Many of these were designed by the beaux-arts architectural firm of Carrère and Hastings headed by John Merven Carrère and Thomas Hastings. The pair designed two Subway Bridges now referred to as Subway 1, East and Subway 2, West.[5]

The park was used as an army training ground for soldiers during the Civil War, as well as farms for agriculture still present today from over 100 years ago. As mentioned earlier, it is the first county park to be opened for public use in America; Largest developed park in the countyThe water system around the park, and the water system near or site will be ideal to use for the fountain.

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(The information below is from Branch Brook Park Alliance and in no shape or form is our work but rather direct quotations of the Park's history and timeline).

1862 The land we now know as Branch Brook Park was then the property of the Newark Aqueduct Board. Much of that land was commandeered in July of 1862, at the outbreak of the Civil War; known as Camp Frelinghuysen, it was used as a training ground for New Jersey volunteers. Between 1862 and 1864, six regiments encamped there before fighting in every important battle from Antietam to Appomatox.

1867 The New Jersey State Legislature authorized a Newark Park Commission, with a mandate to locate grounds for a municipal park. Frederick Law Olmsted, the famed landscape architect and designer of Central Park in New York, visited Newark and Essex County and recommended a site encompassing what is now Branch Brook Park. Olmsted and his partner, Calvert Vaux, envisioned Branch Brook Park to be a "grand central park" for the City of Newark. They understood that American cities of the 19th century were growing quickly and changing rapidly. The parks they designed embodied their view that all people, regardless of their position in society, were entitled to fresh air, quiet places and the beauty that only nature can provide.

1889 The Newark Common Council donated 60 acres of the Aqueduct Board property surrounding the circular holding reservoir to "park use." Known as Reservoir Park, the land was left undeveloped. Much of the surrounding neighborhoods were crowded with bleak, unhealthy tenements. To the north lay a dismal marsh known as Old Blue Jay Swamp.

1895 The Essex County Park Commission was formed to enable the creation of a county-wide park system, the first in the nation. The City of Newark transferred Reservoir Park which would become the nucleus of Branch Brook Park to the Commission at a cost of $350,687. The surrounding properties were acquired by the County while donations of land from prominent Newark families extend the park northward. The Ballantine Family donated 32 acres of their property and another 50 acres were given by Z.M. Keene, William A. Righter and the Messrs. Heller. John Bogart and Nathan Barrett were chosen to provide plans and advise on the development of the park. Their design was gardenesque in style, dominated by the geometrically patterned gardens and numerous architectural elements including arbors, viaducts, gazebos and shelters that shaped the park's Southern Division.

1896 Demolition and grading began following Bogart and Barrett's plans.

1898 Dissatisfied with Bogart and Barrett's work, the Commission hired the Olmsted Brothers firm; John Charles Olmsted and Frederick Law Olmsted Jr. were Frederick Law Olmsted Sr.'s nephew/stepson and son. While their work continued that naturalistic style of landscape design championed by their father, in Branch Brook Park they were required to incorporate the elements of Bogart and Barrett's plan that had already been constructed. This led to the Olmsted firm's design concept consisting of three divisions: the Southern, from Sussex Avenue to Park Avenue, incorporating the elaborate "gardenesque" elements from Bogart and Barrett' the Middle, from Park Avenue to Bloomfield Avenue, which would be a transitional zone, mixing the exotic with the indigenous; and, as the culmination, the Northern Division, the largest and most naturalistic area of the park.

1900 The first Chrysanthemum Show was held in the newly constructed greenhouse in the Northern Division. This annual event brought thousands to the park every fall until 1969.

1903 The United Singing Societies donated the bust of composer Felix Mendelssohn they won in Baltimore, MD, at that year's "saengerfest," the annual, nationwide German singing competition that generated excitement comparable to today's Super Bowl.

1906 The grand boathouse, designed by the firm of Rossiter and Wright, was added to the southern end of the lake, replacing an earlier structure.

1916 The Essex County Park System built its Administration Building on the parkland that had been set aside to provide a view from Councourse Hill. Designed by New Jersey native Harold Van Buren Magonigle, the exterior has eight different shades of coarse-textured terra brick and expensive terra cotta reliefs especially notable around the main entrance. Under the wide overhang of the tile roof are colorful, allegorical decorations executed by Mrs. Edith Magonigle.

1924 Industrialist and philanthropist Harmon W. Hendricks, owner of a copper rolling mill on the Second River, donated his family home and the adjoining 23 acres to the north of Branch Brook Park. An additional 94 acres were acquired by the county to link Hendricks Field Golf Course and Bellville Park in an unbroken swath of green. This land included what was the first landing site for the U.S. Postal Service where bi-winged airplances landed on a short field with bales of hay rimming the end of the runway to prevent accidents.

1927Caroline Bamberger Fuld donates 2,000 Japanese flowering cherry trees to a display in Newark that would rival that in Washington, D.C. The Olmsted Brothers' firm laid out the trees naturalistically on the tiered slopes along the narrow valley of the Second River, evoking the way the trees would be seen in Japan and distinguishing Branch Brook Park's display from all others. Eventually the collection would grow to more than 3,000 trees.

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