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[From the “Bridgeport Standard,” August 21, 1865.]
The names of P. T. Barnum, Capt. John Brooks, Mr. George Bailey, Capt. Burr Knapp and Henry Wheeler have gone into history as the generous contributors to the best enterprise ever attempted for the benefit of our city; and the city has accepted the trust with the most commendable promptness, and appointed its commissioners, who have already entered upon their duties. We shall watch now with eager interest the unfolding and development of such a park as can nowhere be found on either side of the Sound, and one which shall be “a thing of beauty and a joy forever” to our city.
It needs but the hand of skilful art, assisted by a proper public spirit, to render the Sea-side Park a charmed spot of delightful resort for public drives or private walks. The commissioners chosen to superintend the inauguration of the laying out and improvements of the grounds are men of correct taste, of good judgment and of liberal and comprehensive views as to the wants and demands of a growing city like Bridgeport. They understand that Nature is here to be made so attractive by Art, that all classes shall be drawn hither not merely for the pleasure of enjoying a favorite resort but also for the profit which comes to the nobler impulses of our nature, by the contemplation of cunning handicraft upon the landscape, as God left it for man to adorn and beautify. Here will be planted trees of every variety that will endure the temperature of this latitude, and flowers of every hue and perfume; here will walks serpentine through shady groves, and anon lead out to behold the broad expanse of the beautiful Sound.
Some one has aptly said, that one work of art was worth a thousand lectures on art. Here, then, let the statues of the artist be placed, to educate the masses by their silent teachings, and win them to higher ideas and better views of life by their mute eloquence. One feature of American parks is especially worthy of mention: they are essentially and emphatically democratic. They are made for the people, and are in turn appreciated by the people. They are open alike to the millionnaire with his coach-and-six, and the poor pedestrian without a penny. The advantages possessed by Bridgeport as a manufacturing city are becoming daily more and more appreciated by business-men from various portions of the country. There is no city in the State which can compare with ours in the recent erection of large and permanent manufacturing establishments. This fact brings into our midst a large industrial population, for which, even now, the supply of dwellings is inadequate to the demand. This population, commingling and combining with our own, and possessing energy, enterprise, business tact and intelligence, will rapidly develop the resources of our city and its surroundings for mechanical pursuits, and the productions of the various manufacturing establishments already erected, or in process of erection. To such a class, the benefits of a Park, possessing such facilities for recreation and improvement as the Sea-side Park will present, will be incalculable, in fostering the health, promoting the happiness, and elevating the taste of all who can avail themselves of its beneficial influences.
To the public-spirited gentlemen who have so generously donated to the city the land for the Sea-side Park, Bridgeport owes a debt of gratitude which she can never repay. Their names will descend to posterity, and be remembered with pride and exultation as among the noblest of public benefactors, so long as the flowers bloom and the waves wash the margin of the Sea-side Park. No citizen of Bridgeport, identified with her growth and prosperity, and having the future welfare of the city at heart, should fail to contribute, in such a manner as best he may, to such a grand improvement. Let our citizens take hold of this noble enterprise with that large and liberal spirit in which it has been conceived and thus far consummated, and Bridgeport will ere long possess an attraction which will draw hither for permanent residence much of the wealth and intelligence, refinement and virtue of the great metropolis, which now sequesters itself along the banks of the Hudson, or among the sand-knolls of New Jersey.
Thus was my long-cherished plan at length fulfilled; nor did my efforts end here, for I aided and advised in all important matters in the laying out and progress of the new park; and in July, 1869, I gave to the city several acres of land, worth at the lowest valuation $5,000, which were added to and included in this public pleasure-ground, and now make the west end of the park.
At the beginning, the park on paper and the park in reality were two quite different things. The inaccessibility of the site was remedied by approaches which permitted the hundreds of workmen to begin to grade the grounds, and to lay out the walks and drives. The rocks and boulders over which I had more than once attempted to make my way on foot and on horseback were devoted to the building of a substantial sea-wall, under the able superintendence of Mr. David W. Sherwood. Paths were opened, shade-trees were planted; and fortunately there was in the very centre of the ground a beautiful grove of full growth, which is one of the most attractive features of this now charming spot; and a broad and magnificent drive follows the curves of the shore and encircles the entire park. Although work is constantly going on and much remains to be done, yet a considerable portion of the park presents a finished appearance: a large covered music-stand has been built; and, on a rising piece of the ground, a substantial foundation has been built for a Soldiers’ Monument. The corner-stone of this monument was laid with impressive ceremonies and a military display, in the presence of a large concourse of citizens and soldiers, among whom were Major-General Alfred H. Terry, U. S. A.; Major-General and Governor Joseph H. Hawley; Adjutant-General Charles T. Stanton; Quartermaster-General Julius S. Gilman; Surgeon-General Philo G. Rockwell; Paymaster-General William B. Wooster; Aides-de-Camp and Colonel John H. Burnham, Alford P. Rockwell, William H. Mallory, Charles M. Coit, General S. W. Kellogg, of the First Brigade; Colonel S. E. Merwin, jr., Colonel Crawford, and other officers of the Governor’s staff, and of the Connecticut State Militia.
The branch horse-railroad already reaches one of the main entrances, and brings down crowds of people every day and evening, and especially on the evenings in which the band plays. At such times the avenues are not only thronged with superb equipages and crowds of people, but the whole harbor is alive with row-boats, sail-boats and yachts. The views on all sides are charming. In the rear is the city, with its roofs and spires; Black Rock and Stratford lights are in plain sight; to the eastward and southward stretches “Old Long Island’s sea-girt shore”; and between lies the broad expanse of the salt water, with its ever “fresh” breezes, and the perpetual panorama of sails and steamers. I do not believe that a million dollars to-day would compensate the city of Bridgeport for the loss of what is confessed to be the most delightful public pleasure-ground between New York and Boston.
For these magnificent results, accomplished in so short a time, the people of Bridgeport are indebted to the park commissioners, and especially to Mr. Nathaniel Wheeler, whose untiring energy and exquisite taste have been mainly instrumental in bringing this work forward to its present state of completion.
There is easy and cheap access to this ground by means of the horse-railroad from East Bridgeport and Fairfield, and numerous avenues open directly upon the park from Bridgeport. It is the daily resort of thousands, who go to inhale the salt sea-air; and the main drive is already, on a lesser scale, to the citizens of Bridgeport, what the grand avenue in Central Park is to the people of New York; with this priceless advantage, however, in favor of Sea-side Park, of a frontage on the Sound, and a shore on which the waves are ever breaking, and sounding the grand, unending story of the mysteries of the great deep.
On the western and northern margins of this public ground, in sight of the Sound and in full view of every part of the park, will hereafter be built the villas and mansions of the wealthiest citizens, and, when the hand that now pens these lines is stilled forever, and thousands look from these sea-side residences across the water to Long-Island shore, and over the groves and lawns and walks and drives of the beautiful ground at their feet, it may be a source of gratification and pride to my posterity to hear the expressions of gratitude that possibly will be expressed to the memory of their ancestor who secured to all future generations the benefits and blessings of Sea-side Park.
CHAPTER XLVII.
WALDEMERE
MY PRIVATE LIFE – PLANS FOR THE PUBLIC BENEFIT IN BRIDGEPORT – OPENING AVENUES – PLANTING SHADE-TREES – OLD FOGIES – CONSERVATISM A CURSE TO CITIES – BENEFITING BARNUM’S PROPERTY – SALE OF LINDENCROFT – LIVING IN A FARM-HOUSE – BY THE SEA-SHORE – ANOTHER NEW HOME – WALDEMERE – HOW IT CAME TO BE BUILT – MAGIC AND MONEY – WAVEWOOD AND THE PETREL’S NEST – MY FARM – THE HOLLAND BLANKET CATTLE – MY CITY RESIDENCE – COMFORTS OF CITY LIFE – BEGGING LETTERS – MY FAMILY – RELIGIOUS REFLECTIONS – MY FIFTY-NINTH BIRTHDAY – THE END OF THE RECORD.
WHAT I can call, without undue display of egotism or vanity, my “public life,” may be said to have closed with my formal and final retirement from the managerial profession, when my second Museum was destroyed by fire, March 3, 1868. But he must have been a careless reader of these pages, which record the acts and aspirations of a long and industrious career, who does not see that what, in opposition to my “public life,” may be considered my “private life,” has also been largely devoted to the comfort, convenience, and permanent prosperity of the community with which so many of my hopes and happiest days are thoroughly identified. I speak of these things, I trust, with becoming modesty, and yet with less reluctance than I should do, if my fellow-citizens of Bridgeport had not generally and generously awarded me sometimes, perhaps, more than my need of praise for my unremitting and earnest efforts to promote whatever would conduce to the growth and improvement of our charming city.
When I first selected Bridgeport as a permanent residence for my family, its nearness to New York and the facilities for daily transit to and from the metropolis were present and partial considerations only in the general advantages the location seemed to offer. Nowhere, in all my travels in America and abroad, had I seen a city whose very position presented so many and varied attractions. Situated on Long Island Sound, with that vast water-view in front, and on every other side a beautiful and fertile country with every variety of inland scenery, and charming drives which led through valleys rich with well-cultivated farms, and over hills thick-wooded with far-stretching forests of primeval growth, – all these natural attractions appeared to me only so many aids to the advancement the beautiful and busy city might attain, if public-spirit, enterprise, and money grasped and improved the opportunities the locality itself extended. I saw that what Nature had so freely lavished must be supplemented by yet more liberal Art.
Consequently, and quite naturally, when I projected and established my first residence in Bridgeport, I was exceedingly desirous that all the surroundings of Iranistan should accord with the beauty and completeness of that place. I was never a victim to that mania which possesses many men of even moderate means to “own everything that joins them,” and I knew that Iranistan would so increase the value of surrounding property that none but first-class residences would be possible in the vicinity. But there was other work to do, which, while affording advantageous approaches to my property, would at the same time be a lasting benefit to the public; and so I opened Iranistan Avenue, and other broad and beautiful streets, through land which I freely purchased and as freely gave to the public, and these highways are now the most convenient as well as charming in the city.
To have opened all these new avenues, in their entire length, at my own cost, and through my own ground, would have required a confirmation of Miss Lavinia Warren’s opinion, that what little of the city of Bridgeport and the adjacent town of Fairfield was not owned by General Tom Thumb, belonged to P. T. Barnum. It is true that, apart from my East Bridgeport property, I became a very large owner of real estate on the other side of the river, in Bridgeport proper and in Fairfield, my purchases in Fairfield lying on and so near to the boundary line – Division Street – as virtually to be in Bridgeport. Everywhere through my own lands I laid out and threw open to the public, streets of the generous width which distinguished the old “King’s roads” in the colonies, before grasping farmers and others encroached upon, and fenced in as private property, land that really belonged to the public forever; and on both sides of every avenue I laid out and planted a profusion of elms and other trees. In this way, I have opened miles of new streets, and have planted thousands of shade-trees in Bridgeport; for I think there is much wisdom in the advice of the Laird of Dumbiedikes, in Scott’s “Heart of Mid-Lothian,” who sensibly says: “When ye hae naething else to do, ye may be aye sticking in a tree; it will be growing when ye’re sleeping.” But, in establishing new streets, too often, when I had gone through my own land, the project came literally to an end; some “old fogy” blocked the way, – my way, his own way, and the highway, – and all I could do would be to jump over his field, and continue my new street through land I might own on the other side, till I reached the desired terminus in the end or continuation of some other street; or till, unhappily, I came to a dead stand-still at the ground of some other “old fogy,” who, like the original owners of what is now the shore-front of Sea-side Park, “did not believe there was money to be made by giving away their property.”
And this is the manner in which these old fogies talked: “We don’t believe in these improvements of Barnum’s. What’s the use of them? We can get to the city by the old road or street, as we have done for forty years. The new street will cut the pasture or mowing-lot in two, and make a checkerboard of the farm. It was bad enough to have the railroad go through, and we would have prevented that if we could; but this new street business is all bosh!” And then, singularly enough, every old fogy would wind up with: “I declare, I believe the whole thing is only to benefit Barnum, so that he can sell land, which he bought anywhere from sixty to two hundred dollars an acre, at the rate of five thousand dollars an acre in building-lots, as he is actually doing to-day.”
It is strange indeed that these men, who could see the benefit to “Barnum’s property” by opening new streets which would immediately convert cheap farm and pasture land into choice and high-priced building-lots, should not see that precisely the same thing would proportionately increase the value of their own property. Conservatism may be a good thing in the state, or in the church, but it is fatal to the growth of cities; and the conservative notions of old fogies make them indifferent to the requirements which a very few years in the future will compel, and blind to their own best interests. Such men never look beyond the length of their noses, and consider every investment a dead loss unless they can get the sixpence profit into their pockets before they go to bed. My own long training and experience as a manager impelled me to carry into such private enterprises as the purchase of real estate that best and most essential managerial quality of instantly deciding, not only whether a venture was worth undertaking, but what, all things considered, that venture would result in. Almost any man can see how a thing will begin, but not every man is gifted with the foresight to see how it will end, or how, with the proper effort, it may be made to end. In East Bridgeport, where we had no “conservatives” to contend with, we were only a few years in turning almost tenantless farms into a populous and prosperous city. On the other side of the river, while the opening of new avenues, the planting of shade-trees, and the building of many houses, have afforded me the highest pleasures of my life, I confess that not a few of my greatest annoyances have been occasioned by the opposition of those who seem to be content to simply vegetate through their existence, and who looked upon me as a restless, reckless innovator, because I was trying to remove the moss from everything around them, and even from their own eyes.
In the summer of 1867, the health of my wife continuing to decline, her physician directed that she should remove nearer to the sea-shore; and, as she felt that the care of a large establishment like Lindencroft was more than she could bear, I sold that place. I have already spoken of my building of this residence. It was emphatically a labor of love. All that taste and money could do was fairly lavished upon Lindencroft; so that, when all was finished, it was not only a complete house in all respects, but it was a perfect home. And a home I meant it to be, in every and the best sense of the word, for my declining years. Consequently, from basement to attic, everything was constructed, by days’ work, in the most perfect manner possible. Convenience and comfort were first consulted, and thereafter, with no attempt at ostentation, elegance, pure and simple, predominated and permeated everywhere. No first-class house in the metropolis was more replete with all that goes to constitute a complete dwelling-place. Under this new roof I gathered my library, my pictures, my souvenirs of travel in other lands, and assembled my household “gods”; while the surrounding grounds, adorned with statuary and fountains, displayed also, in the walks, the arbors, the lawns, the garden, the piled-up rocks even, the profusion of trees and shrubbery, and the wealth of rare and beautiful flowers, my wife’s exquisite taste, which in times past had made the grounds of our loved and lost Iranistan so celebrated as well as charming. It was hard indeed to tear ourselves from this fascinating spot, but there are times when even the charms of home must be sacrificed to the claims of health.
Lindencroft was sold July 1, 1867, and we immediately removed for a summer’s sojourn to a small farm-house adjoining Sea-side Park. During the hot days of the next three months we found the delightful sea-breeze so bracing and refreshing that the season passed like a happy dream, and we resolved that our future summers should be spent on the very shore of Long Island Sound. I did not, however, perfect my arrangements in time to prepare my own summer residence for the ensuing season; and during the hot months of 1868 we resided in a new and very pretty house I had just completed on State Street, in Bridgeport, and which I subsequently sold, as I intended doing when I built it. But, towards the end of the summer, I added by purchase to the Mallett farm, adjoining Sea-side Park, a large and beautiful hickory grove, which seemed to be all that was needed to make the site exactly what I desired for a summer residence. It will be remembered that I bought this Mallett farm, not for myself, but so that a portion of it could be devoted to the public park; and, a generous slice having been thus given away, there were several acres remaining which were admirably adapted to one or more residences, and the purchase of the grove property made the location nearly perfect.
But there was a vast deal to do in grading and preparing the ground, in opening new streets and avenues as approaches to the property, and in setting out trees near the proposed site of the house; so that ground was not broken for the foundation till October. I planned a house which should combine the greatest convenience with the highest comfort, keeping in mind always that houses are made to live in as well as to look at, and to be “homes” rather than mere residences. So the house was made to include abundant room for guests, with dressing-rooms and baths to every chamber; water from the city throughout the premises; gas, manufactured on my own ground; and that greatest of all comforts, a semi-detached kitchen, so that the smell as well as the secrets of the cuisine might be confined to its own locality. The stables and gardens were located far from the mansion, on the opposite side of one of the newly opened avenues, so that in the immediate vicinity of the house, on either side and before both fronts, stretched large lawns, broken only by the grove, single shade-trees, rock-work, walks, flower-beds and drives. The whole scheme as planned was faithfully carried out in less than eight months. The first foundation stone was laid in October, 1868; and we moved into the completed house in June following, in 1869.
It required a regiment of faithful laborers and mechanics, and a very considerable expenditure of money, to accomplish so much in so short a space of time. Those who saw a comparatively barren waste thus suddenly converted to a blooming garden, and, by the successful transplanting and judicious placing of very large and full-grown forest trees, made to seem like a long-settled place, considered the creation of my new summer home almost a work of magic; but there is no magic when determination and dollars combine to achieve a work. When we moved into this new residence, we formally christened the place “Waldemere,” – literally, but not so euphoniously, “Waldammeer,” “Woods-by-the-Sea,” – for I preferred to give this native child of my own conception an American name of my own creation.
On the same estate, and fronting the new avenue I opened between my own property and the public park, I built at the same time two beautiful cottages, one of which is known as the “Petrel’s Nest,” and the other, occupied by my eldest daughter, Mrs. Thompson, and my youngest daughter, Mrs. Seeley, as a summer residence, is called “Wavewood.” From the east front of Waldemere, across the sloping lawn, and through the reaches of the grove, these cottages are in sight, and before the three residences stretches the broad Sound, with nothing to cut off the view, and nothing intervening but the western portion of Sea-side Park. Sea-side and sea-breezes, however, do not include the sum of rural felicities in summer; and so I still keep possession of the fine farm which, years ago, was the scene of the elephant-plowing feats. On this property, which is in charge of a judicious farmer, I have some very fine imported stock, including several head of the celebrated white-blanket “Dutch cattle,” which excite the curiosity and attract the attention of all who see them. These cattle are black, with a distinctly defined white “blanket” around their bodies, giving them a very unique appearance; and when they struck my fancy in Holland, some years ago, I imported several of them: nor is their singular appearance their best recommendation, for they are excellent milkers, and my dairy and farm products keep my table constantly supplied with fresh fruits and vegetables, poultry, and that choicest of country luxuries, pure cream.
Amid such comforts, advantages, and luxuries the summer months speed swiftly and sweetly by. My well-supplied stables afford the means of enjoying the numberless delightful drives which abound in the vicinity; and my salt-water-loving friend, Mr. George A. Wells, is always ready to minister to the pleasure of myself or my guests by tendering the use of anything in his Sound fleet, from a row-boat to a yacht. The five months in the year which I devote to rural rest seem all too short for the enjoyment which is necessarily compressed in the twenty weeks. But I can feel at the end of the season that it is a consolidation as well as compression, not only of pleasure, but of capital, in the way of health and vigor for the winter’s campaign of city living and metropolitan excitement.
For, at my time of life, and especially for a man who has had so much to do with the metropolitan million as I have done, I am convinced that the city is the most congenial residence during the cooler season of the year. No matter how active may have been one’s life, as a man grows older, if he does not become a little lazy, he at least learns to crave for comfortable ease and seeks for quiet. To such a man, the city in winter extends numberless pleasures. There is a sense of satisfaction even in the well-cleared sidewalks after a snow-storm, and an almost selfish happiness in looking out upon a storm from a well-warmed library or parlor window. One loves to find the morning papers, fresh from the press, lying upon the breakfast-table; and the city is the centre of attractions in the way of operas, concerts, picture-galleries, libraries, the best music, the best preaching, the best of everything in æsthetical enjoyments. Having made up my mind to spend seven months of every year in the city, in the summer of 1867 I purchased the elegant and most eligibly situated mansion, No. 438 Fifth Avenue, corner of Thirty-ninth Street, at the crowning point of Murray Hill, in New York, and moved into it in November. My residence therein in the winter season has fully confirmed my impressions in its favor. The house is replete with all that can constitute a pleasant home, and the location is so near to Central Park that we spend hours of every fine day in that great pleasure-ground. While I am in town, it is scarcely more than once or twice a week that I take pains to ascertain by personal observation that I am living on the edge of a toiling, excited city of a million inhabitants. My pecuniary interests in Connecticut and in New York occupy my attention sufficiently to keep me from ennui, and an extended correspondence – for which I do not yet feel the need of a private secretary – employs an hour or more of every day. I have had letters from New Zealand, and other remote quarters of the globe, respecting curiosities, and addressed simply to “Mr. Barnum, America,” and the post-office officials, knowing of no other Barnum who would be likely to receive letters from such out-of-the-way places, regularly put these vaguely addressed letters in my New York box.
Yet I suppose that not less than two-thirds of all the letters I receive are earnest petitions for pecuniary aid. This begging-letter business began to persecute me as long ago as the time of the Jenny Lind engagement, and even before. Many of these letters ask money as a free gift, and some of them demand assistance; while others request temporary loans, or invite me to furnish the capital for enterprises which are certain to bring the richest returns to all concerned therein. When I was travelling with Jenny Lind, I received a letter from a woman in Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, who informed me that she had named her just-born boy-and-girl twins “P. T. Barnum” and “Jenny Lind,” coolly adding that we might send $5,000 for their immediate wants, and make such provision for their future education and support as might be determined upon at the proper time! In some of these letters, the amusement afforded by the orthography and grammar was almost a compensation for the annoyance and impudence of the requests. One very bad speller, referring me to a former employer of the letter-writer, wrote: “I Can rePhurr you too Him”; another, urging his petition, declared; “god Nose I am Poore”; and not long ago I received a communication from an old man who claimed to be too decrepid to earn a support, but he urged that he was a religious man, and added: “I tak grait pleshur in Readin my bibel, speshily the Proffits”; and it did look a little as if he had a sharp eye to the “Proffits.”
I have said but little in these pages of the immediate circle which is nearest and dearest to me. My wife, with whom I have lived so many happy years, and who has been my support in adversity and my solace in prosperity, still survives. Our children are all daughters: Caroline C., the eldest, was married to Mr. David W. Thompson, October 19, 1852; Helen M., my second daughter, was married to Mr. Samuel H. Hurd, October 20, 1857; Frances J., the third daughter, was born May 1, 1842, and died April 11, 1844; and Pauline T., the fourth daughter, was married on her birthday, March 1, 1866, to Mr. Nathan Seeley. For my eldest daughter I built and furnished a beautiful house on ground near Iranistan, and she moved into it immediately after her marriage, though of late years she has resided in New-York in winter and in Bridgeport in summer. For Helen and Pauline, I bought and furnished handsome houses in Lexington Avenue, in New-York, within a short distance of my own city residence in Fifth Avenue. A fine young rising generation of my grandchildren is growing up around them and me.
I have written as little as might be, too, about my religious principles and profession, because I agree with the man who, in answer to the pressing inquiry, declared that he had “no religion to speak of”; and I believe with him that true religion is more a matter of work than of words. When I am in the city, I regularly attend the services and preaching of the Rev. Dr. E. H. Chapin, and I usually go to the meetings of the same denomination in Bridgeport. “He builds too low who builds beneath the skies”; and I can truly say that I have always felt my entire dependence upon Him who is the dispenser of all adversity, as well as the giver of all good. With a natural proclivity to look upon the bright side of things, I am sure that under some of the burdens – the Jerome entanglement, for instance – which have borne so heavily upon me, I should have been tempted, as others have been, to suicide, if I had supposed that my troubles were brought upon me by mere blind chance. I knew that I deserved what I received; I had placed too much confidence in mere money and my own personal efforts; I was too much concerned in material prosperity; and I felt that the blow was wisely intended for my ultimate benefit, – a chastening, which, like the husks to the prodigal son, should cause me to “come to myself,” and teach me the lesson that there is something infinitely better than money or position or worldly prosperity in our “Father’s house.”
