Boston -- Franklin Park

Correspondence written on verso. Postcard postmarked July 30, 1953, published by American Art Post Card Co., Brookline, Mass.

Franklin Park (named for native son Benjamin Franklin) was created in 1885 as the terminus of the "Emerald Necklace" park system designed by Frederick Law Olmsted for the City of Boston. Comprising over 500 acres, with 200 acres of woodland, the park was intended to enable working class people to experience and enjoy a rural atmosphere within the surrounding urban area. In that regard it shared the philosophy of Olmsted's two other major creations, Central Park and Prospect Park. Over the years formal recreational areas have been developed beyond those envisioned in Olmsted's original plan (for example, the "Country Park" was converted to a golf course), but many elements of the original design--such as the road system and extensive woodland walks--remain. In recent years citizen activism by the Franklin Park Coalition and other organizations has led to significant preservation efforts for the park's landscape and historic structures. Persons associated with the site include Frederick Law Olmsted (landscape architect, 1885).