playground

NYT of June 13, 1915 select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F10E12FF3D551273... reports that "Hundreds of children shouted "Hurrah!" and waved their hats and their hands yesterday afternoon as little Fred Lewis, 5 years old, of 275 West 150th Street, and William J. Lee, Supervisor of Recreations of the Department of Parks, sent the Stars and Stripes fluttering to the pinnacle of a tall flagpole, and Astor Field, a children's playground, was dedicated. "

child at play,what a lovely sit to see. better than watching the play on xboxs

swanq: Thank you for the New York Times article about the opening of this playground. We will add some of the details to the description when we update.

The article in Swanq's link notes that the playground was on land owned by Vincent Astor en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vincent_Astor , who loaned his land to the city and installed the playground equipment on an acre of land between 7th and 8th Avenue and 49th and 50th Street (in West Harlem, not far from the Polo Grounds). Today the entire block is a single apartment house development made up of several buildings. The article also notes that some of the notables due at the opening of the park were delayed by the Fireman's parade (the subject of the set of photos immediately prior)

Wigwam Village #2 still exists. wigwamvillage.com/ But this sign is no longer there. Streetview 2013

Hi, I'm an admin for a group called Eye Candy Art Post (share 1 comment 1), and we'd love to have this added to the group!

Excellent image and glas, Very thanks and Greetings.

Kids here in Ann Arbor used to do stuff like this sixty years ago -- probably still do. It was a service of the parks system, called "Supervised Play," and for mere pennies we could weave potholders by stringing elastic cotton loops across a grid of nails, or braid raffia into lanyards. (Our "raffia" came in a selection of bright colors, and was made of some kind of synthetic, plasticized material). We ended up with segments of lanyards that never got finished: the same kind of project that the poet Billy Collins wrote about in his wonderful poem, "The Lanyard," in which he describes one he fashioned as a boy in an Adirondak summer camp: "this useless, worthless thing I wove out of boredom." "The Lanyard" ---------- thegoodenoughwitch.typepad.com/cyn/2009/04/the-lanyard-by...

NYT of July 3, 1921 query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9C04EFD71739E133A... describes the NYC system of playgrounds that operated over the summer. "The public school playgrounds open Tuesday. Throughout the season they will be open from 1:30 P.M, to 5:30 P.M. daily. The regular school term, which closed on June 30, did not end the responsibility of the Board of Education for the welfare of the children...." NYT of August 10. 1913 query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9501E4DC113BE633A... mentions raffia class in particular.

We still had the supervised play when I was growing up in Ann Arbor. I eagerly looked forward to sending my own son off to the park on Saturday afternoons but they have long since discontinued it.