Memories of A Time Past: Part 3

On Hoarded Ordinaries,  Lorianne DiSabato writes about a landscape architect named  Frederick Law Olmsted.  Lorianne found out about him in a PBS documentary.  I had never heard of Olmsted, but certainly should have.  Anyway, thank you, Lorianne; if you didn’t post this blog, I wouldn’t have had the following memories stirred up.

I was born and brought up in Brooklyn NY.

One of the landmarks that put Brooklyn on the map.

My parents took me to Prospect Park many times when I was a young child, and before my sister was born.  Prospect Park was one of Olmsted’s earlier creations after designing Central Park in Manhattan.

One of my old stomping grounds as a young girl.

I spent many happy hours in Prospect Park as a young girl with my parents, walking along the paths, enjoying the grassy areas.  I remember my father loved taking photographs (please see “Memories of a Time Past:  Part 1“), and he took many when we were in the park.  I remember one picture he took of me holding up a fish, attached to a fishing line.  I didn’t catch it.  I think he “borrowed” it from someone who actually did the “catching,” so that he could take a photo (I searched all my old family photo albums, but couldn’t find it, but did a great organizing of my photo albums in the meantime!).  There was at least one lake in the park, and, in memory, it seemed to be a large one.  My memory doesn’t recall if there were others.

Unfortunately, as the years passed, the park fell into disrepair, and it became a destination that was not very welcoming.  In time, the city saw fit to “resurrect” it, and, with the re-gentrification of the Park Slope and surrounding areas, it again beckoned to the “city” folks to come and experience the beauty of Olmsted’s design.

Many years later, I strolled along the same hexagon-shaped concrete tiled paths with my own young children, that I had walked on when I was a child!

Here is an excellent example of the hexagon-shaped  tile as I remember it.

 

[images from bingdotcom]