I was a frequent visitor to the park in the late 1940s and early 50s on outings with my family. Fifty years passed before I visited the park again when I retired and lived in Monticello for a few years. It was wonderful to find the Park well kept, and little changed from my childhood. I became a Park volunteer and spent two enjoyable years tending the Brick Wall Garden and helping with outdoor maintenance in wintertime.
In the Peony Garden in March 1953 my sister, age 5, poses with a stone sphere that a vandal has dislodged from atop the garden wall (pictured left). In those days visitors could climb a little spiral staircase and walk the tops of walls on a cantilevered concrete walkway built for garden viewing. In 2012 the little staircase was still there but the walkway itself was decayed and unsafe. By the way, it wasn’t me that knocked the stone ball down, honest!
Fast forward fifty-nine years and here (pictured right) are me and a Park employee cleaning decades of grime off the concrete figure of Ephebe atop the main entrance gateposts shortly before the opening of the new bridge in September 2012.
