CHAPTER IV
APRIL 1891-OCTOBER 1891

The year 1891 was a time of remarkable productivity for Olmsted. In letters to Rudolph Ulrich, Henry Van Brunt, his son Rick, and his partners, Olmsted outlines his vision for the World’s Columbian Exposition while acknowledging the challenges of the swampy site. Rick provided another set of eyes and ears for the firm, as Olmsted arranged with Daniel H. Burnham to have his son take up a voluntary position with the fair in order to advance his education. George W. Vanderbilt’s projects continued to occupy Olmsted’s time and attention. In one letter to James Gall, Jr., Olmsted recommends the hiring of Gifford Pinchot as Biltmore’s head of forestry. In a letter to Vanderbilt, Olmsted discusses the severe challenges of working at Mount Desert Island for Vanderbilt’s Point d’Acadie residence. In a letter of April 20, Olmsted attempts to convince Hamilton McKown Twombly to take a more holistic view of his substantial property in Madison, New Jersey, in order to realize its full potential. Letters in this chapter also show Olmsted’s initial involvement in one of the most important park systems undertaken by the firm: that of Louisville, Kentucky. Olmsted’s letter to park commission president Thomas H. Sherley of August 26 outlines the distinctive qualities of each of the city’s three parks and cautions against trying to design each park to offer identical amenities to city residents. Olmsted’s letter of the following day, addressed to Charles Sprague Sargent, the “Omniscient Editorial Majesty” of Garden and Forest, offers an important aesthetic defense of the rustic architecture Olmsted employed in various locations in the Boston park system and elsewhere. Three biographical letters—to John Murray Forbes, William James, and George Curtis—offer important insights into Olmsted’s sense of the significance of his books on the slaveholding South, unusual experiences during his voyage to China in [336] 1843–44 and as a Staten Island farmer, and his views on the profession of landscape architecture. Other important letters are to William A. Moore containing Olmsted’s advice for cemetery design; to W. C. Barry regarding Olmsted’s hopes for a world-class shrub arboretum in Rochester’s Highland Park; and to Kate Sessions expressing Olmsted’s desire to find a satisfactory solution to landscape design in the semiarid West.