Growth
The park grew out of the Lemon Hill estate of Henry Pratt, whose land was originally owned by Robert Morris, signer of the Declaration of Independence. It was dedicated to the public by city council's ordinance on September 15, 1855. A series of state and local legislative acts over the next three years increased the holdings of the city, incorporating mansions, waterworks, gardens, and even territory previously set aside for the Zoological Society of Philadelphia. In 1858, the city called for a comprehensive plan and the new Fairmount Park Commission held a design competition to determine the best way to “protect and improve the purity of the Schuylkill water supply” while also creating a naturally landscaped public park.
As the site of the 1876 Centennial Exposition and the first zoo in the United States, the Philadelphia Zoo, Fairmount Park was placed on the National Register of Historic Places on February 7, 1972.
Read more about this topic: Fairmount Park
Famous quotes containing the word growth:
“When I have plucked the rose,
I cannot give it vital growth again,
It needs must wither. I’ll smell it on the tree.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“We already have the statistics for the future: the growth percentages of pollution, overpopulation, desertification. The future is already in place.”
—Günther Grass (b. 1927)
“But parents can be understanding and accept the more difficult stages as necessary times of growth for the child. Parents can appreciate the fact that these phases are not easy for the child to live through either; rapid growth times are hard on a child. Perhaps it’s a small comfort to know that the harder-to-live-with stages do alternate with the calmer times,so parents can count on getting periodic breaks.”
—Saf Lerman (20th century)