From centralpark.com by Elizabeth Blackmar and Roy Rosenzweig of “The Park and the People”

“Central Park was the first landscaped public park in the United States. Advocates of creating the park–primarily wealthy merchants and landowners–admired the public grounds of London and Paris and urged that New York needed a comparable facility to establish its international reputation. A public park, they argued, would offer their own families an attractive setting for carriage rides and provide working-class New Yorkers with a healthy alternative to the saloon. After three years of debate over the park site and cost, in 1853 the state legislature authorized the City of New York to use the power of eminent domain to acquire more than 700 acres of land in the center of Manhattan.”

155 years later, it is still a popular place for New Yorkers and tourists to relax and unwind! Just check out these photos I took of families and friends enjoying the summer scene in Central Park!

This entry was posted on Saturday, July 19th, 2008 at 12:29 pm and is filed under Must Visit, Fun!. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.