street. On October 20, 1911, Commissioner Stover was quoted as saying: "I am not convinced of the necessity of giving up any part of Central Park to such a purpose. It does not seem to me so essential to have a central position for the station, when the Western Union, the Postal Telegraph, and the Telephone company have managed for so many years to get along with their head offices downtown. Then why must we go to Central Park to get away from the fire danger? Would not a location on the banks of one of the rivers be just as safe in this respect?" On February 28, 1912, the latest project for an innovation in Central Park was laid before the Commissioner. The plan is to take thirty-five acres now included in the old rectangular receiving reservoir, which extends from Seventy-ninth street to Eighty-sixth street, drain it, and use the land for museum buildings and a sunken garden. The projectors calculate that this would give space enough for six museums the size of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, with room enough over for an Academy of Design. The sunken garden would be connected with Fifth avenue by tunnel passages, and could be connected with the Museum of Natural History in Central Park West, forming a sort of museum center for the City, and, as it was phrased "the art centre of the Western Hemisphere." We venture the prediction that the project will meet with no more favor than the twenty-five or thirty other plans and innovations in Central Park. The New York Times of March 1, 1912, voiced what we believe to be the prevailing public opinion when it said: "No further invasion of Central Park, on any pretext whatever, will be tolerated by the people. The reported plan to build on the site of the lower reservoir will be defeated by public opinion." RIVERSIDE PARK, NEW YORK CITY. New York Central Railroad Tracks. The action of the Legislature in 1911 in enacting chapter 777 relative to the location of the New York Central and Hudson River Railroad Co.'s tracks on the west side of Manhattan Island has directed attention during the past year to the effect of the railroad and its proposed alterations on the Hudson River water. front and park lands of the City. The plans of the company filed with the Board of Estimate and Rpportionment have been analyzed by Mr. Reginald Pelham Bolton, one of our Trustees, who has prepared the following condensed statement of the City property sought by the railroad company. Lineal feet of water front to be acquired of varying widths.. or Square feet included along river front only. If lots to be set on end 25 ft. front, would occupy. Total square feet of streets.... Perpetual overhead rights, 5 8/10 miles. 31,500 ft. 6 miles 5,867,600 2,346 11 miles 186 feet 40 lots 1,000,000 504,000 234,000 1,738,000 The right of way of the railroad along the water front of Riverside Park effectually cuts off the public from access to the water. At a few points where favored yacht clubs have been granted permits by the city authorities to build boat houses the tracks are crossed by foot bridges closed against the public. The presence of these tracks is much regretted, and a suit has reecntly been brought against the company by Mr. G. L. Wilson for the purpose of ousting the railroad from the park, on the ground that the railroad is a nuisance. At the hearing before Justice Pendleton of the Supreme Court in February, 1912, real estate experts testified that the property on Riverside Drive was injuriously affected by the running of what the complaint calls a "public nuisance," and that the value of the lots along Riverside Drive was materially lowered by the noise and odors incident to the running of trains in the Park. Witnesses for the defense testified to the efficient conduct of the road and to the elimination of the alleged nuisances. The case is pending at this writing. In connection with plans for covering the railroad tracks and making above them an additional driveway, Park Commissioner Stover has proposed the filling in of the water front west of the railroad right-of-way and the consequent enlargement of the area of the park. The Grave of "An Amiable Child." In December, 1911, we received an inquiry from the Department of Parks as to whether any condition was imposed upon the City when it acquired Riverside Park requiring it to preserve and care for the grave, known as "the grave of an amiable child," which is in the park nearly opposite Grant's Tomb. We informed the Commissioner that so far as we could learn no such specific condition was made although there is definite evidence that the parent of the Child desired that the grave should be cared for after he parted with the property. We also represented to the Commissioner that the propinquity of the imposing monument of one of our great National Heroes to that of an amiable child appealed so strongly to popular sentiment that it was to be hoped nothing would be done to disturb their relation. So little is known in regard to this touching little memorial which excites the interest of many visitors that we give herewith a few historical facts concerning the grave and the property. [See plates 41 and 42.] The inscription upon the monument reads as follows: Erected the Memory an Amiable Child, St. Claire Pollock, died 15 July, 1797, in the 5th Year of his age. On the opposite side is the following quotation from Job XIV, 1-2: "Man that is born of woman is of few days and full of trouble. He cometh forth like a flower and is cut down; he fleeth also as a shadow and continueth not." The child was the son of George Pollock, a merchant of New York City, who once owned the property. Pollock acquired that property and adjacent land by three different deeds. One of the more northerly parcels he acquired from Nicholas De Peyster and Francis, his wife, by deed dated August 4, 1796. (Liber 57 of Conveyances, page 266, Hall of Records.) The second parcel he obtained from the same grantor April 25, 1798. (Liber 64, page 265.) The third he acquired from William Moleneor and Mercy his wife April 17, 1798. (Liber 57, page 273.) On October 21, 1799, George Pollock and Catherine his wife conveyed part of the property to Gulian Verplanck, excepting the burial plot. Soon thereafter Verplanck died, his will being probated November 30, 1799, whereupon Pollock wrote the following letter to Mrs. Gulian Verplanck, widow: (See N. Y. Evening Post, April 20, 1895). "There is a small enclosure near your boundary fence (and which can be extended to join it) within which lie the remains of a favorite child, covered by a marble monument. I had intended that space as the future cemetery of my family. The surrounding grounds will fall into the hands of I know not who, whose better taste or prejudice might remove the monument and lay the enclosure open. "You will confer a peculiar and interesting favor upon me, by allowing me to convey the enclosure to you and that you will consider it a part of your own estate. There is a white marble funeral urn prepared some time past to place on the monument, which Mr. Darley will put up and which will not lessen its beauty. "I pray you, Madame, to pardon the seeming officiousness of opinions. I have so long considered all the grounds as my own creation, having selected it when wild and brought it to its present form having so long and so delightfully resided on it, that I feel an interest in it that I cannot get rid of, but thro time. "I have the honor to be very respectfully, Madame, your obliged and obedient servant, "GEORGE POLLOCK." With a view to carrying out the foregoing wish, on January 24, 1800, George Pollock conveyed to Cornelia Verplanck a small parcel of land "beginning at the division line of the land of Gulian Verplanck and the said George Pollock," including the burial plot. The burial plot so conveyed was two chains and sixteen links (142.56 feet) deep and seventy-eight links (51.48 feet) wide, situated very near the Hudson river. The deed in which the conveyance of this plot to John Bartow Prevost (Recorder of the City of New York), is recited is dated May 10, 1803, and recorded in the Secretary of State's office at Albany June 13, 1803, in Liber M. R. of Conveyances, page 169. The records do not disclose that this burial plot was ever conveyed by Cornelia Verplanck, but the whole parcel was taken under condemnation proceedings by the City of New York for Riverside Park. In the partition of the Verplanck estate in 1806, Michael Hogan, a wealthy and important citizen of New York, became owner of the surrounding property on the west side of the Bloomingdale Road from One Hundred and Twenty-first street to One Hundred and Twenty-seventh street by deeds from John Marsden Pintard and wife and from Joseph Alston and Theodosia Burr Alston, his wife. (Liber 81, pages 403, 404.) He built the house on the premises, calling the northerly part of his property Claremont and the southerly part Monte Alta. The name Claremont was given to the place in memory of the royal residence of Prince William, the Duke of Clarence (afterwards King William IV), who had been a midshipman with Hogan and who visited him when in this country. (See page 123 preceding.) In 1811, Hogan conveyed the southern part of the property called Monte Alta through an intermediate conveyance to Jacob Mark, and in 1821 Hogan's assignees conveyed the northern part called Claremont to Joel Post. Prior to the War of 1812, the property was occupied for several years by Lord Courtenay. The Claremont property belonged to the Post heirs-at-law when it was taken for Riverside Park. Riverside Park was acquired pursuant to Chapter 697 of the laws of 1867, the City obtaining possesion of the lands in August, 1872. Under Chapter 447 of the laws of 1876 Riverside Park was placed under the control of the Park Department. MADISON SQUARE, NEW YORK CITY. Protection of the Worth Monument. While the City of New York preserves in at least three public parks graves* which were on the property before the City acquired it, it has been the policy of the City not to permit interments within grounds actually taken for pleasure purposes. In two instances, however, it has permitted the burial of illustrious dead adjacent to public highways on public land not strictly pleasure grounds although within the jurisdiction of the Park Department. One of these instances is that of Grant's Tomb on Riverside Drive *The grave of an amiable child in Riverside Park; the grave of the poet Joseph Rodman Drake in Joseph Rodman Drake park; and the Pell graves in Pelham Bay Park. |