Washington Park in Albany, New York is the city's premier park and the site of many festivals and gatherings. As public property it dates back to the city charter in 1686, and has seen many uses including that of gunpowder storage, square/parade grounds, and cemetery. The park is often mistaken as being designed by Frederick Law Olmsted, as it incorporates many of the philosophical ideals used by Olmsted when he designed Central Park in Manhattan. The park is about in size with the Washington Park Lake, a roughly and lake, in the southwestern corner.
Not only is the park historic, but so is the mostly residential surrounding neighborhood. Many architectural works line the streets facing the park, designed by some of the most famous architects of the late 19th century, including Henry Hobson Richardson. At least two governors of New York lived in buildings facing Washington Park outside of their term in office. Due to the historical and architectural significance of the park and neighborhood both were included in 1972 as the Washington Park Historic District; () and in 1998 the park was named one of the nation's 100 most important parks by the American Association of Architects. In 2008 Boston-based composer Peter Child wrote an orchestral piece inspired by the park, entitled Washington Park.
History
Cemetery and parade grounds
Washington Park has been public property since the Dongan Charter was granted to Albany incorporating it as a city. The charter specified that all land not privately owned at the time became property of the Mayor, Aldermen, and Commonalty of the city of Albany, including the land that would become the site of Washington Park. A portion of the land was set aside for a structure built to house gunpowder in 1802, and in 1806 the areas between Willett and Knox streets, and between State Street and Madison Avenue, became the Middle Public Square. In 1800, the land west of Knox Street to Robin Street and south from State Street to Hudson Avenue was taken for a cemetery, which was apportioned into sections for each of Albany's churches. There were separate sections for African Americans and for strangers. West of the cemetery was the alms-house farm and the penitentiary grounds. In 1809 the Middle Public Square was renamed Washington Square, and later the Washington Parade Ground. In 1868 the remains and headstones in the cemetery were removed and reinterred, most to Albany Rural Cemetery, and some to the cemeteries of other churches.
For years leading up to the creation of the park, the leading citizens and newspapers in Albany had pushed for a grand public park. Frederick Law Olmsted's Olmsted, Vaux and Company was hired in 1869 to plan such a park. In their plan they envisioned Washington Park as the centerpiece of a string of parks and boulevards similar to those they had designed in Buffalo, Boston, and Brooklyn. Though Olmsted and his company was not involved in the actual design of the park, their broad vision was followed for the detailed designs, including the idea of damming the Beaver Kill (Beaver Creek) to form a grand lake.
Construction of the park
The New York Legislature passed a law in 1869 authorizing the creation of a large public park on the spot and the creation of the Board of Trustees of the Washington Park of the City of Albany (later Commissioners). John Bogart and John Cuyler drew the plans for Washington Park in 1870. Bogart had worked for Olmsted and Vaux on Central Park in New York and later Bogart was the chief engineer for the New York City Department of Parks from 1872 to 1877. From 1869 to 1872 R.H. Bingham was the chief engineer in charge of the drafting of the plans and the supervision of construction, after 1872 his assistant William S. Egerton took charge. It was under Egerton that the formal garden settings were planted.
Work on the Washington Parade Grounds between Willett and Knox streets was begun in July 1870 and finished by the end of the year. During 1871 the former cemetery was landscaped and that area reopened as part of the park. The section of Washington Park between Lexington (formerly Snipe) and Robin streets was the focus of work in 1873, including the damming of the Beaverkill to form Washington Park Lake. In 1874 focus shifted to roughly along Madison Avenue from Lake to Robin and a footbridge was built over the lake in 1875. Nine acres of mostly row houses along Knox Street north of Madison were purchased, destroyed, and landscaped in 1880; this included the area that would be the site of the King Memorial Fountain. The large house and landscaped grounds of John Taylor was the last part of the park to be purchased, in 1882, since 1889 it has been the site of tennis courts. The northwestern corner that is cut out of the park's otherwise rectangular shape was never part of the park; those plots were mostly owned by the Barnes family and developed into urban mansions facing Thurlow Terrace and Englewood Place. The process of buying and improving the land piecemeal was criticized because each improvement raised the value of the existing land that still needed to be purchased. The increase in property value can be shown through the value of the lands surrounding Washington Park almost doubling in the six years in which the majority of the park improvements were made; from $2,696,688 in 1869 to $4,843,440 in 1875. The properties next to Washington Park on Robin Street, which was renamed Englewood Terrace, increased in value from $9,500 in 1875 to $175,800 by 1891.
The Commissioners, including John G. Farnsworth, were given by the state additional powers to build and maintain approaches to the park and other parks as well, this allowed the commissioners to build a series of boulevards around the city. Western Avenue from the northwestern corner of Washington Park to the location of the toll gate of the Western Turnpike was under the purview of the commissioners. Work on the road began in late 1876 and was finished the next year. The total construction cost of the park, including purchasing the real estate and improving Western Avenue, was $1,073,020.91. In 1878 Northern Boulevard (today Manning Boulevard) was constructed by the commissioners, it extended from the western end of their jurisdiction on Western Avenue north and east to the intersection of Clinton and Central avenues. In 1896 the state legislature also gave the commissioners authority over Lake Avenue from the park corner at Madison Avenue south to New Scotland Avenue (then- Albany, Schoharie, and Rensselaerville Plank Road). In addition to boulevards the Commissioners of Washington Park also gained control of other existing parks, and built new ones throughout the city, including Academy Park, Bleeker Park, Hudson Avenue Park, Clinton Square, Rensselaer Park, St. Joseph's Park, Townsend Park, Beaver Park (later Lincoln Park), and the former grounds of the Dudley Observatory. In 1900 the board of commissioners was transformed into the Bureau of Parks in the Department of Public Works and later the bureau became a separate department.
Modern times In 1958 Lancaster Street, which had previously ended at Willett Street opposite the park, was extended through to Northern Boulevard (today Henry Johnson Boulevard). Associated with this extension Northern Boulevard was also widened and both Lancaster and State streets were turned into one-ways. Entrances to Washington Park from Thurlow Terrace and Englewood Place were closed in 1972 turning those into dead end streets from Western Avenue. In 1988 Washington Park Road was renamed Albany Plan of Union Avenue in honor of the colonial congress held in Albany by Benjamin Franklin that proposed closer ties and support among the Thirteen Colonies. In 1991 Northern Boulevard from its intersection with Madison Avenue and Willett Street north through the park and continuing to Livingston Avenue in Arbor Hill was renamed Henry Johnson Boulevard in honor of African-American World War I hero Henry Johnson.
In the 1950s Dutch elm disease (Ceratocystis ulmi) killed all the elms that once populated the park and crab apples were planted to replace the elms along the pedestrian mall. After deteriorating over the decades Washington Park saw a revival in the 1990s and 2000s with the flower beds being restored to their original specifications, the pedestrian mall removed of pavement and widened to its original dimensions with disease-resistant elms planted to form a canopy, the King Fountain relit at night, and the lilac shrub border around the periphery of the park being restored.
Structures
Originally, Washington Park included many buildings: several shelters of untrimmed logs, a pavilion, wellhouse, croquet shelter, and lakehouse once dotted the landscape. The wooden lake house was replaced in 1929 with a "modern" brick structure while the others over time succumbed to age and changing use-patterns for the park and no longer stand. The footbridge over Washington Park Lake, erected in 1875, is the only remaining original structure in Washington Park. The lamps on the bridge were originally gas lamps, but they were electrified in 1881.
The current Washington Park Lake House was built in 1929 replacing the original stick style structure constructed in 1876. It is constructed in the Spanish Revival style with terracotta, terrazzo, brick, and guastavino tile. The area in front of the lake house has been the site for the performance of plays by the Park Playhouse for over 20 years. A 900-seat amphitheater faces the lake house allowing for comfortable seating for the over 60,000 people who visit every year. A proposal by the city to turn the lake house into a 125-seat restaurant and 200-seat banquet hall with an expanded dock with boat, cross-country ski, and ice skate rentals failed to materialize due to a lack of interest from the private business sector.
Monuments
Dr. James H. Armsby Memorial is a bust of James H. Armsby, the co-founder of Albany Medical College. Erected in 1879, it was the first memorial in the park. Robert Burns Statue is a bronze statue erected in 1888, with four panels around the base installed in 1891. It is of the famous Scottish poet Robert Burns, his statue was sculpted by Charles Calverley and each of the four panels around the base have one of Burns' poems carved by George H. Boughton. The Saint Andrew's Society funded conservation of the statue in 1978. King Memorial Fountain is a fountain erected in 1893 with a monumental bronze statue of Moses smiting the rock for water on Mount Horeb. Four figures of Israelite slaves around the statue on the side of the mountain represent the four stages of life: infancy, youth, adulthood, and old age. The fountain is in the center of formal gardens laid out by William S. Egerton. It was a gift from Rufus H. King and was sculpted by J. Massey Rhind, who also sculpted the Philip Schuyler statue that stands at the center of the intersection of Eagle Street and Washington Avenue in front of city hall. In 1988, the statue of Moses was cleaned and applied with a wax coating to protect it from the weather, and an arm was reattached to one of the four other statues on the fountain. Marinus Willett Memorial is a monument to Colonel Marinus Willett commemorating his combat and character during the French and Indian Wars. It consists of a boulder from the "scenes of conflict" he fought in, and the plaque is dedicated to his "patriotic services in defense of Albany and the people of the Mohawk". The boulder was placed by the Sons of the American Revolution in 1907, facing towards an entrance to the park from the corner of State and Willett streets, an entrance that no longer exists. The boulder's back faced Henry Johnson Boulevard (formerly Northern Boulevard) and was the scene of many vehicular accidents as drivers missed a sharp curve. In 2006, as part of the 200th anniversary of the park, the boulder was moved to the corner of State and Willett.