Here’s something we bet you didn’t know: Every person in Lower Manhattan is within a half-mile of designated open space. Bowling Green at Broadway and Whitehall is one of many quiet neighborhood respites. With a proclamation dating back to 1733, it’s the city’s oldest park, and before that, served as a council ground for Native American tribes. While Bowling Green always looks radiant, it has a special glow in the summer light. [Photo by Brian DiFeo]
I am fascinated by early American history, and I love to learn new things about it. So I headed over to Fraunces Tavern Museum recently to learn a bit more about the role of Lower Manhattan in the American Revolution.
What first struck me about Fraunces Tavern was the building itself. Through decades of skyscraper construction in Lower Manhattan, this historic structure has been perfectly preserved—though not without a fight! In the early 1900s the tavern was saved from demolition and sold to the Sons of the Revolution who opened the museum in 1907.
Since then the museum has expanded with an extensive gallery of paintings and artifacts. Be sure to check out the Revolution and the City exhibit. It holds some amazing artifacts, including a cannonball similar to one that crashed through the tavern’s roof in 1775 and a piece of the statue of King George III that stood in Bowling Green until 1776, when Patriots pulled it down and melted most of it into musket balls.
While you wander through the galleries at Fraunces, be sure to step into the Long Room. It was here that George Washington gave his famous farewell speech to the officers of the Continental Army. The museum has recreated the space to reflect its layout in 1783. It’s easy to picture General Washington standing at the front of the room addressing his officers.
The museum is open from noon to 5 PM Monday through Saturday and noon to 5 PM on Sundays through the end of the summer. Feeling hungry after your journey through history? The first floor of the tavern has been recently renovated and serves lunch and dinner.
Over the centuries, Bowling Green has been a cattle market, a private bowling ground and a quiet urban oasis at the foot of an Indian trail known as Broadway. Today, it is the city’s oldest park and home to the Bowling Green Greenmarket, open 8 AM to 5 PM Tuesdays and Thursdays year-round. It’s a wonderful place to find farm-fresh fruit, vegetables and other delicacies. [Photo by Brian DiFeo]
Barely any leaves left on the trees in Bowling Green this week.
This year in planning our fall Community Planting Day at Bowling Green Park, we decided to have a free pumpkin giveaway for kids. In addition to planting 1,500 red tulip bulbs in preparation for the spring, kids will have the opportunity to get a gourd and decorate it in time for Halloween!
I think this event will be a hit with City kids. My own family had a trip planned for pumpkin picking to Lancaster Pennsylvania. That trip was canceled by my daughter’s impromptu virus – do kids only get sick when you plan to go away for a weekend? So, we will be home, in the City, for the next few weekends, and will need to rely on local resources for our pumpkin decorating experience.
Last year, we did a fall Community Planting Day and gave kids potted flowers to take home, but I think this is a better reward for helping beautify Bowling Green Park – the oldest public park in New York City.
I hope you will join us on Saturday, October 17th from 11AM to 1PM for some light refreshments, pumpkin decorating and, of course, tulip bulb planting. We will be out there rain or shine, so stop by – maybe next year we will add face painting?
An hour before last year’s adopt a geranium day event, there was a line around the perimeter of Bowling Green Park.
This fall, I’m hoping for more of the same.
Last year, in an effort to involve the Downtown community in beautifying our open spaces, we managed Adopt-A-Geranium Day (check out a few photos from the event). Though we were unsure whether many people would show up to claim a free potted geranium from Bowling Green Park, a hoard of Downtown workers showed up on a crisp fall day.
As the event progressed, I saw that people were not just there to be handed a plant. Perhaps to the surprise of the many women in heels and men in ties, their work cubicles and office lighting didn’t sap their bodies of outdoor spirit entirely. They rolled up their sleeves, grabbed trowels and got dirty.
On October 7th and 17th, it’ll be time to do it all again.
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This year we are once again offering Adopt a Geranium Day on Wednesday, October 7th from 10:30AM to 12:30PM. In addition, we will also have our Fall Community Planting Day on Saturday, October 17th, from 11AM to 1PM.
The Adopt a Geranium event will provide participants with a free geranium from the Bowling Green Park, in preparation for our fall tulip bulb planting. Participants will also have the opportunity to dig up their own geranium and pot, if they so choose. The Downtown Alliance will provide woven recyclable totes to carry home the potted geranium. For Fall Community Planting Day, we will have free pumpkins for participants to decorate, in addition to bulb and kale planting.
