CHAPTER VI
OCTOBER 1877–JULY 1878

During this period Olmsted was removed from his position as landscape architect with the New York parks department, losing all official connection with Central Park and the other city parks and leaving the final stages of the street planning for the Bronx in the hands of J. J. R. Croes. His health deteriorated during the period and was little improved by a four-month trip to Europe.

The report to William R. Martin of October 31, 1877, presents the plan of Olmsted and Croes for the Central District of the Bronx, the section between Jerome Avenue and Third Avenue. Olmsted’s report to the New York park commissioners of January 2, 1878, just days before his departure for Europe and subsequent dismissal, treats the question of where in Central Park it would be acceptable to place a menagerie. It demonstrates Olmsted’s willingness to examine proposals for which he had little sympathy, rather than dismissing them out of hand. The letter to Charles Dalton of May 13, 1878, with its severe critique of design competitions, played an important role in convincing the Boston park commissioners to engage him to design the Back Bay Fens section of their park system, rather than using the result of their current competition. The article that Olmsted wrote for Johnson’s Cyclopedia makes clear the difference between landscape gardening and “parterre and specimen” types of gardening; in it he demonstrates how the principles of landscape gardening could be applied to domestic grounds with limited space.

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