Park
Park names 4 different subjects across the 6 encyclopedias on this shelf. Each is set out below.
Park a public ground for recreation
Aiton's Encyclopedia (1910)
a public ground for recreation. Parks are of several types. The older parks are the grounds of the Old World nobility. Some are of great extent and are almost in a state of nature; many are studded with noble oaks and other forest trees. The grass is cropped by grazing deer. Fish play in the pools and swans nest on artificial islands. Birds are protected, flowers are cultivated, and hedges are trimmed. In others landscape gardening is brought to a fine art. "Royal," "Imperial," are but Old World terms for public. Parks of this sort are as open as American parks. The owners of many estates take pride in making the public welcome. Other owners order their iron gates swung open only on certain days or during the absence of the family, or at such hours as the great family may not desire to walk or ride abroad. Many a so-called owner allows the village urchin to flatten his face against the iron bars, vainly wishing he might reach what was the public common or playground centuries ago. There are many beautiful city parks on the other side of the Atlantic. Zoological collections are a feature. European city teachers make a practice of improving a half holiday by taking their charges to see the animals. Paris has spacious "woods." Stockholm has 33 parks; Moscow, 48; London, 50; Glasgow, 30; Liverpool, 20; Edinburgh, 15; Birmingham, 13; Brussels, 11; Hamburg, 11; Berlin, 83; and even Athens has 2. The most noted parks on this side of the Atlantic are the Yellowstone National and the Canadian National, to each of which a separate article is devoted. The forest reserves are national parks in the best sense. If maintained on the present scale it will be many a century before America will be so crowded that there will be no chance to go camping. Of American cities, New York leads with 6,909 acres of actual park. Philadelphia is second, with 4,044 acres. Other cities having over a thousand acres in trees and sward and flowers and water are Boston, Chicago, St. Louis, Baltimore, Cleveland, San Francisco , Buffalo, Minneapolis, St. Paul, and Milwaukee. Some of the noted city parks of the world are: Parks Acres. Fairmount Park, Philadelphia 2,648 Richmond Park, Surrey, Eng 2,253 Bois de Boulogne, Paris 2,158 Prater, Vienna 2,000 St. James' Park, London 1,752 Pelham Bay Park, New York 1,700 Forest Park, St. Louis 1,372 Central Park , New York 840 Belle Isle, Detroit 700 Bronx Park, New York 661 Thiergarten, Berlin 630 Jackson Park, Chicago 586 Prospect Park, Brooklyn 516 Regent's Park, London 472 Franklin Park, Boston 467 Lincoln Park, Chicago 400 Hyde Park , London 400 Kensington Gardens, London 210 Eden Park, Cincinnati 209 Phoenix Park, Dublin 91 Parc de Chaumont, Paris 62 The Common, Boston 50
Park NATIONAL MILITARY
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
NATIONAL MILITARY. In the United States the name is given to a group of battlefields, celebrated in the Civil War, cared for by the War Department, and containing memorials commemorative of personages and events The most famous of them in that war. is the Gettysburg National Military Park, established in 1895, with an area of 24,460 acres, comprising the field on which the battle of Gettysburg was fought in 1863. Another is the Chickaand Chattanooga Park, in mauga Georgia and Tennessee, established in 1890, with 6,966 acres, comprising the Missionary Ridge and Lookout Mounof the tain, and the battle grounds nds Chickamauga and Chattanooga engagements. Shiloh National Military Park battle was fought in 1862. Vicksburg Nacontains the field of Shiloh, where a tional Military Park, in Mississippi, is commemorative both of the Confederate and Union forces, and the positions held by them in the spring of 1863. These sites were not established as national property immediately after the war, but after the passage of a number of years had given them a reminiscent and hallowed character. An endeavor is made to preserve them in the condition they were in when the events commemorated occurred.
Park in a legal sense
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
in a legal sense, a large piece of ground inclosed and privileged for wild beasts of chase, by the monarch's grant, or by prescription. The only distinction between a chase and a park was that the latter was inclosed, where a chase was always open. The term now commonly means a considerable piece of ornamental ground connected with a gentleman's residence; or an inclosed piece of public ground devoted to recreation, and generally in or near a large town. See NATIONAL PARKS.
Park MUNGO, a celebrated Scotch traveler
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
MUNGO, a celebrated Scotch traveler; born in Selkirkshire, Scotland, Sept. 10, 1771. He was sent to Africa unde under the auspices of the African Association, and explored the Gambia and Up Upper Niger, publishing on his return the well-known "Travels in the Interior of Africa" (1799). On his second expedition, which was equipped by the British Government, he descended the Niger some 1,500 miles; and after losing the majority of his men from fever, was treacherously murdered by natives, in 1806.
What Has Changed in the Last Century
Aiton's 1910 list of city acreages still reads accurately in places – Central Park is 843 acres today – but the American national side has been transformed by the creation of the National Park Service in 1916, which now administers more than 400 units covering some 85 million acres and draws over 300 million visits a year, a level of crowding Aiton thought " ">many a century" away. Collier's 1921 note that the Civil War battlefields are "cared for by the War Department" was overtaken in 1933, when Gettysburg, Chickamauga and Chattanooga, Shiloh, Vicksburg and the rest were transferred to the Park Service, where they remain. The legal definition – a ground "privileged for wild beasts of chase, by the monarch's grant" – is now purely historical, and Britain's great private parks are largely open to the public through the National Trust and paid admission rather than at the family's convenience. Mungo Park's dates and death on the Niger in 1806 still stand, though he is now read as much for what his "Travels" reveal about the beginnings of European penetration of West Africa as for the geography.
Written for this edition, 2026.