City Hall Park, New York City

City Hall Park, Civic Center, New York, looking north from the old Post Office Building. Broadway is on the left. Photo by Thaddeus Wilkerson (TW) copyright 1910 (before August), published in a vintage postcard. Source: Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division. Continue below...

This historic park, originally the Common, was the stage of liberty speeches, where Liberty Poles were erected in the 18th century. The area is surrounded by centuries-old government buildings that date back to 1812, when the City Hall opened. In 1871 the Croton Fountain was replaced by a new fountain designed by Jacob Wrey Mould, co-designer of Central Park’s Bethesda Fountain. The park is home to several monuments, including Frederick MacMonnies’s statue of Colonial patriot Nathan Hale (1893) and John Quincy Adams Ward’s Horace Greeley (1890), which was moved to the park in 1916.