Nature in the City: Urban Environmental History and Central Park.

The article discusses the history of New York City's Central Park. According to the author, the park was a contested ground used and interpreted in different ways by a variety of social, economic, and ethnic groups. Details related to the eviction of people living on the site of the park and to its design by landscape architects Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux are presented. It is suggested that the architects altered and in some cases destroyed the existing natural landscape of the park in order to model the space after English park designs. The use of the park by marginalized populations, including immigrants and protesters, is also discussed.