A Brief History of Christopher Park
(Christopher Street and Grove Street at Seventh Avenue South)
Like most of the land surrounding Christopher Street, the site that would become Christopher Park was once part of a Dutch tobacco farm until the English took over New York during the 17th century. With their arrival, the large Van Twiller farm was divided into two smaller farming plots to the south and east (Trinity Farm and Elbert Herring Farm), and the Warren Estate to the north. This was the beginning of residential life along Christopher Street.
Over the years, more and more people moved to Greenwich Village, and overcrowding became a large concern, especially when a devastating fire tore through the Christopher Street area in 1835. Residents petitioned the City to condemn the block at the intersection of Christopher, Grove, and West 4th Streets to allow for some much-needed open space on the site. On April 5, 1837 the City officially created Christopher Park. The nearby IRT train line at Christopher Street was added during the 7th Avenue expansion in the early 20th century.
Desperately in need of renovations, a plan to clean up and restore Christopher Park to its 19th-century splendor was initiated in 1983 by the Friends of Christopher Park, a community volunteer group organized in the late 1970s to maintain and beautify the park. Under the direction of landscape architect Philip Winslow and at a cost of just over $130,000, the park would finally reopen in 1986, complete with a new gate, benches, lampposts, walkways, and numerous trees and shrubs.
Located inside Christopher Park there are several noticeable monuments. The flagpole, erected in 1936, commemorates several of the 1861 Fire Zouaves, an elite Civil War unit that wore uniforms styled after North African tribesmen. A bronze statue by Joseph P. Pollia of General Philip H. Sheridan, a celebrated cavalry leader during the Civil War, was also installed in 1936. Finally, though first commissioned and approved in the 1980’s as part of the renovation project, George Segal’s statue ‘Gay Liberation,’ commemorating the 1969 Stonewall Riots, was placed inside Christopher Park in 1992.
In 1999, the sites associated with the Stonewall uprising—the Stonewall Inn, Christopher Park, and the surrounding neighborhood streets—were placed on the New York State Register of Historic Places and added to the National Register.
Today, Christopher Park is one of my favorite places for sitting, chatting, and people watching along Christopher Street. At any given time of day, you can always find someone, be they tourist or local, snapping a picture with the Segal statues.
