paradox of parks

8/12/2019 Paradox of Parks

1/34

Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power, 13:139171, 2006

Copyright Taylor & Francis Group, LLC

ISSN: 1070-289X print / 1547-3384 online

DOI: 10.1080/10702890500535749

139

The Paradox of Parks

Brett Williams

Department of Anthropology, American University,Washington, DC, USA

This article focuses on the Fort Circle Parks of Washington, DC, and also providesexamples from other cities to explore the histories, problems, and possibilities of

urban parks. As public space, parks are crucial to community and identity. They

provide important natural habitats and healthful environments, but they can also

become toxic sites. Planners have tried to organize how they are used through how

they are designed; then other people have used them in different, contested ways.

Parks are sites of deeply rooted folk traditions, shifting ideologies, and corporate

power. They attract loyal champions and volunteers, and engage fervent place-

based activism. Parks express and exacerbate shifting inequalities in cities. In

parks, people with power may slight and denigrate the poor, the problematic, and

the aimless, and sometimes blame them for the parks problems. But diverse people

also come together there in startling, serendipitous ways. Parks tell stories about

power, and about democracy.

Key Words: parks, urban history, Washington, DC, environmental justice, race

Urban parks express many contradictions. They provide crucial habi-tats and life-giving qualities to cities, but they are sometimes toxicsites. Planners have tried to organize how they are used through how

they are designed; then other people have used them in entirely differ-ent, contested ways. Parks are sites of deeply rooted folk traditions,shifting ideologies, and corporate power. In many cities, they havebecome shopping centers. They attract loyal champions and volun-teers, and engage fervent place-based activism. Parks express andexacerbate shifting inequalities in cities. In parks, people with powermay slight and denigrate the poor, the problematic, and the aimless,and sometimes blame them for the parks problems. But diverse peo-ple also come together there in startling, serendipitous ways. Parks

tell stories about power, and about democracy.I live, work, and do field research in a city that is rich in parks.Washington, DC, is awash in parkland, much of it national. Two hun-dred years of planning and preservation have left a mark: from theNational Mall through Rock Creek and Anacostia Park. Most of my


2/34

140 B. Williams

research has focused on Anacostia Park and the Anacostia River, pre-cious to the people who live there, but polluted because it sits at the

bottom of a degraded watershed (Williams 2001). In this article, Ifocus on the Fort Circle Parks, officially the Civil War Defenses ofWashington, old fort sites razed of trees along the citys hilly perime-ter to watch out for menace, and defend the capital from Confederatearmies. Acquired piecemeal over time for parkland as the woods beganto grow back, the Fort Circle parks do more or less encircle the city(Washington 1970). They express many of the contradictions of otherurban parks but, like much of the capital city, they are unique.Although they are Civil War fort sites, and each one bears the name of

the fort that stood there, they do not really commemorate the causes,consequences, or meanings of the Civil War. In a city filled with warmemorials, they do not celebrate the end of slavery, the victory of theNorth, or the preservation of the nation (Figure 1).

Despite shifting, mostly failed, plans to treat them as one greatpark, the Fort Circle parks have taken different trajectories. In part,they reflect the inequalities of the city: the best-kept parks are inwealthy neighborhoods, the run-down parks lie in poor communities.They also reflect shifting government commitments to race relations,

northsouth reconciliation, and a seeming reluctance to remember aWar Between the States in a capital that celebrates nationalism. Butjust as interesting are the ways in which the parks neighbors attachtheir own cultural meanings to their parks. These meanings rangewildly, nevertheless having in common an almost thorough disregardfor the Civil War. This disregard does not mean that the parks lackhistorysome are deeply historical to people who remember stories ofthe freed slaves villages; an Earth, Wind, and Fire concert; a familyreunion; or a particularly rich community harvest. Other parks are

dog parks, or hikers landmarks, or popular places to go sledding. Othersare simply subway stops or dumping grounds.

When my sons were little, we hiked Fort Bunker Hill and wentsledding at Fort Stevens. We avoided scary Fort Totten and, as theygrew older, walked across Fort Reno to their junior high school. Mydogs and I explored Fort DeRussy in Rock Creek Park, and the woodsat Fort Slocum.

But living in a city is not the same as learning about it. When weresearchers began to study the parks, I discovered that not only did I

not know that there was such a phenomenon as the Fort Circle Parks,but also that I did not know the first thing about them. I was notalone: I know few residents who recognize the history of the forts and Ihave found no guidebook for tourists that mentions them. Parks havehistories; states and citizens attach meanings there. Parks are what


3/34

The Paradox of Parks 141


4/34

142 B. Williams

people make of them, given many limitations of power and resourcesas well as a great deal of resilience and creativity.

I began working in the Fort Circle Parks in 1995, when theNational Park Service initiated research to guide the managementplan for its national urban parks in Washington, DC. AnthropologistMuriel Crespi, who headed the Ethnography Section of the nationaloffice, had long argued that anthropology was important to under-standing the cultural heritage of the national parks, but most of thepark service research had been dedicated to understanding NativeAmerican sites and their religious meanings. Crespi expanded thisresearch to include Mexican-American history at the San Antonio

Missions, the jazz legacy in New Orleans, and African-Americanexperiences and understandings of a plantation in Louisiana. Crespihoped that ethnographic research might similarly inform the newmanagement plan for the Fort Circle Parks and Anacostia Park.Tanya Ramos and I were the principal investigators on the research,but our plan called for close collaboration with community ethno-graphers. Our team included two teenage mothers, a communityactivist who used a crutch, a young man who was HIV-positive, afisherman, a soccer player, a Senior Olympian, and many other

researchers who ensured that we would learn that people see and useparks in different ways, and that parks should be accessible and wel-coming to many different kinds of people. If I had done this researchalone, I would not have learned what we learned together. Negotiat-ing the bureaucracy was difficult, and none of our recommendationswere implemented, but for some of us the parks became a cause thatoutlasted the contract.

In what follows, the Fort Circle Parks anchor my argument. But Itry not to be trapped in the local. Therefore, other examples come

from around the country, and, in one case, from the waterfront parksof Europe.1I draw on and synthesize literature from a range of disci-plinesurban history, ecology, urban planning, landscape architec-ture, geography, journalism, and environmental studiesbecause Ibelieve that anthropologists should know and use this literature.This article is not simply a cry to preserve urban parks. I also makethe claim that we connect our identities and our communities tourban parks and that we can use urban parks as an optic for under-standing race, history, and changing political economy in the United

States.My argument is fourfold. First, I explore the original visions of

nineteenth-century park planners, shifting state visions for urbanparks, and the competing visions and practices of park users. Second,I examine the contradiction between the life-giving habitats of parks


5/34


and the likelihood that they will be toxic, especially in poor neighbor-hoods. I then trace the recent rush of capital, driven by overaccumulation,

to commodify urban parks. Finally, I lay out the possibilities and per-ils of political activism in and around park life.

Planners visions

American city dwellers once used cemeteries as their parks, becausethey liked to keep the dead nearby, in the town center. But in the latenineteenth century, public health concerns plagued urban planners,who began to worry that bad smells and diseases were wafting from

the graves, and they banished the dead to new rural cemeteries. Citieswere left bereft of their dead and of tranquilizing green spaces(Schuyler 1986).

Frederick Law Olmsted and his brilliant, energetic team broughtrelief, designing the great nineteenth-century parks of Boston, NewYork, Washington, DC, and Louisville. Olmsted was a landscapearchitect, but he collaborated with geologists, sanitary engineers, pub-lic health doctors, and social theorists to create civilized, peacefulsanctuaries where people could find refuge from the sights and sounds

of the nineteenth-century city.Olmsted wrote boundlessly of his visions and his experiences. He

imagined a park more spacious, simple, and natural than a garden,but more scattered, less dense, than a wood. Each element of a parkwould be modest; its complexity came in the arrangement. Views andsurprises would delight ramblers by popping up before them in innu-merable combinations. The park would be soothing and refreshing andwould draw the mind away from artificial interests and habits. Olm-sted thought views of ferns and rocks and wild flowers would help vis-

itors forget their troubles, like a visit to the mountains. At the sametime, the irregularity, variety, and recombinant design of the parkmade it strongly picturesque, like a railroad station or a painting byTurner. There should be no confined spaces, no profuse monuments,no zoos, no cemeteries, no public buildings, and no athletic facilities.Parks should not be overly ornamental like the royal parks of Europe.They should be republican parks. They should not be didactic: nolabeling of trees and shrubs in an Olmsted park (Olmsted 1875, inBeveridge and Hofman 1992).

Olmsted was a thoroughly urban man, unlike his mentor, AndrewJackson Downing, or Thomas Jefferson, who had inspired Downingwith his vision of a society grounded by the democratic, educated,truth-seeking gentleman farmer (Bender 1975). But he shared some oftheir patrician bias. Downing wrote:


6/34

144 B. Williams

Let our people see for themselves the influence for good which it [a pub-lic park or garden] would effect, no less than the healthful enjoyment

that it will afford, and I feel confident that the taste for public pleasure-grounds, in the United States, will spread as rapidly as that for cemeter-ies has done. If my own observation of the effect of these places inGermany is worth any thing, you may take my word for it that they[parks] will be better preachers of temperance than temperance societ-ies, better refiners of national manners than dancing-schools, and betterpromoters of general good-feeling than any lectures on the philosophy ofhappiness ever delivered in the lecture-room (1848: 146).

Although his ideal park user was a rambler, Olmsted too sought more

than strolling:

The Park is not simply a pleasure-ground, that is, a ground to whichpeople may resort to obtain some sort of recreation, but a ground towhich people may resort for recreation in certain ways and undercertain circumstances which will be conducive to their better health(Olmsted 1873, in Beveridge and Hoffman 1992: 299).

Olmsted wanted to bring the landscape to city dwellers to

strengthen community life and to relieve them from social antago-nisms, nervous tensions, and the deadening routines of their work. ToOlmsted, cities were positive in many ways. People grew older there,and both epidemics and ruffians were more easily controlled. Morethan small towns, cities housed a hefty proportion of educated, indus-trious, orderly citizens. But urban dwellers were also beset by exhaus-tion, irritation, and depression. Their jobs pointed them toward selfishgoals. The government should therefore protect all citizens from theselfishness of some. Large urban parks would bring all classes into the

easy contact essential for democratic urban life. The layout of NewYork (and many other frightening city grids) expressed on the land aneconomic vision of property ownership and progress, but parks dis-rupted this space. Parks might also elevate the masses and help themtoward their better selves (Bender 1975, 2002).

Olmsteds legacy is paradoxical. Some argue that decisions to creategreat urban parks like Central Park were less Olmsteds than thegrowing influence of real estate speculators and property owners whodid in fact see their property values rocket upward in the years after

parkland was set aside. Olmsteds ideas have been differentiallyappropriatedfor socialism, American nationalism, an environmen-talist critique of industrial society, and both an endorsement andrejection of urban life. Scholars have found Olmsted a crude behavioristand a hearty democrat, a class snob and an egalitarian, a great artist


7/34


on the land where the park embodies the best of the human imagina-tion, or a social control freak whose parks legitimate power and ideol-

ogy, class-based cultural instructions on how to behave, andinscriptions of hideous anxieties about poor people and social change(Gandy 2002).

Olmsteds parks are a great gift, although people use them in wayshe did not prescribe. His parks, whatever the intent of a genteel stroll-ing citizenry, have prospered as popular, lasting, rich, diverse, inclu-sive public spaces. Through our social life in parks, we transform andenliven his plans.

Parks have often been contested. Roy Rosenzweig, in a wonderfully

textured account of the Worcester urban parks, challenges one histori-cal perspective that emphasizes the class biases and social-controlmotives animating park and playground planners and reformers. Thisview holds that playgrounds were designed to socialize working-classyouth to embrace a working-class fate. Rosenzweig argues for a morecomplicated vision: that other motives, such as the love of Europeangardens, an impulse to make America the nature nation, and real con-cerns about disease, also inspired the champions of parks. Addition-ally, park users wanted to play baseball, they didnt like the Keep Off

the Grass signs and they reshaped their parks (Rosenzweig 1983).Sometime well into the twentieth century, building on the efforts of

playground reformers and settlement-house workers, middle-classplanners began to embrace this ideal of a great range of park activi-ties. Jane Addams and the women of Hull House had brought play-grounds to Chicago, Theodore Roosevelt endorsed the idea, and Bostonestablished riverbank gyms. Later, Robert Moses helped the move-ment prosper and landscape architects designed playgrounds and re-habilitated parks for field sports all over the country (Newton 1971).

But some cities failed to participate in this movement. As early as1909, reformers warned Los Angeles leaders about the citys loomingshortage of parks and public beaches. In 1930, the Olmsted Brothers(who had taken over their fathers firm and his vision) laid out a pro-gressive and sensible plan for parkways, childrens playgrounds, andpublic beaches, but city planners and developers were not courageousand imaginative enough to do anything but bury it. Like a ghost park,the plan haunts Los Angeles with lost possibilities. Buried plans andlost stories about property values, the enclosure of vacant land, and

the barring of the poor haunt many cities. Other cities never eventried. Mike Davis writes, for example, that Las Vegas was born dumb(2002: 93). Las Vegas has no green commons at all, low-wage workersin the city center have no place to play, and the built city is such ascorching heat island that at night it is fifteen degrees hotter than the


8/34

146 B. Williams

surrounding desert. Las Vegas is a shimmering example of the maximthat what is bad for nature is usually bad for humans as well.

Parks in Washington, DC

The cumbersome, layered bureaucracies of the federal city have longcomplicated parks in Washington, DC. The city has endured 100 yearsof Commissioner Rule, the alternating waves of investment andneglect that plague all cities, and various congressional social experi-ments. Residents needs are often at cross-purposes with state needsfor a gleaming capital city on display for tourists and world leaders.The National Mall, which violates every principle of good, healthyurban parks, is a shining example of those cross-purposes. The inhu-man scale of the mall far surpasses peoples ability to gauge size,scale, and distance; the buildings are too big; and there are few treesor shrubs, almost no water, and no gathering places.

Woody, hilly, Rock Creek Park is like Central Park, as it followsRock Creeks ridges and valleys north and south through the city,graced by hiking and horse trails; stables; fox; deer; beaver; newcomercoyotes; picnic groves; a working mill; and, despite the Olmsteds aver-sions to overly organized public space, a nature center, tennis courts,an art barn, a zoo, and an outdoor theater (Spilsbury 2003). DCs mostcomic site may be the theater parking lot where, as a rite of passage,new drivers have gone for years to careen around learning to drive. Asthe city grew away from its rivers, and the more affluent residentsmoved into neighborhoods accessed by automobiles and governed byrestrictive covenants, Rock Creek Park came to segregate DC as wellas receiving preferential beautification and maintenance.

A century ago, on a ramble that might have made Olmsted veryhappy, John Burroughs enthused:

Rock Creek has an abundance of all the elements that make up not onlypleasing but wild and rugged scenery. There is, perhaps not another cityin the Union that has on its very threshold so much natural beauty andgrandeur, such as men seek in remote forests and mountains. A fewtouches of art would convert the whole region into a park unequaled byanything in the world . . . it is a small, noisy brook, flowing through avalley of great picturesqueness, shaded nearly all the way by woods of

oak, chestnut, and beech, and abounding in dark recesses and hiddenretreats (Burroughs 1871 in Magoc 2002: 8990).

Anacostia Park also was an Olmsted Brothers Park in Washington,DC, stretching for five miles along the Anacostia River, acquired in


9/34


five separate sections over the twentieth century, an orphan park formost of its history, but open to the fresh, lively, lovely uses that people

make for themselves. Like most waterfronts, it faces challenges andprojects from development and gentrification today. DC is also filled withneighborhood parks and odd little parklets formed where streets meetirregularly (Barthold 1993). In what follows, I will focus largely on theparadoxical Fort Circle Parks, the Civil War Defenses of Washington.

Julia Ward Howe memorialized the Civil War forts as she gazed outof her room in the downtown Willard Hotel while composing theBattle Hymn of the Republic. She thought she sensed God in thebrave little fires that circled the city to protect it from Confederate

troops: I have seen Him in the watchfires of 100 circling camps, shebegan her second stanza. (In 1915, Civil War veterans visited the cap-ital for a moving re-illumination of these bonfires, perhaps the onlytime the circle of forts has been commemorated (Washington Post1915). Howe recognized the immense symbolic and material impor-tance of the forts to the defense of the Union, echoed in the press untilthe end of the nineteenth century:

When the first gun was fired at Fort Sumter, the city of Washington was

in a most defenseless condition. Surrounded by hills from which the fireof an enemy could descend with sad havoc upon the Government build-ings, bordered on the south by hostile territory, and with few soldierswithin her gates, the position of the Capital was indeed precarious(Washington Post1891: 2).

They were thrown up almost volcanically at a period of convulsiveenergy and terror. Most of them were of the temporary field works type,extending in a circuit of thirty-nine miles, including both sides of thePotomac and all points of entrance into Washington and Alexandria. . . .

They served, however, chiefly as bugbears to the Southern forces. . . .Still, their brief career, spasmodic, alert, pungent with the odor of pow-der was full of the feeling of war, and the high batteries sweeping therange of hills did good scouts work, and the knowledge of their verypresence acted as a stout defense (Washington Post1900: 21).

These fortifications and batteries, with their green sod walls andyawning embrasures from which the black muzzles of huge guns peeredout menacingly upon every exposed height, were the most prominentand suggestive feature of the landscape, as one approached Washington

from any direction from the spring of 1862 until the close of the war(Washington Post1902: G11).

The city itself housed many southern spies and sympathizers, manyof whom fled when the war began. Still, dread and anxiety filled the


10/34

148 B. Williams

city until the arrival of volunteers from Pennsylvania, Massachusetts,and New York, who built the magnificent system of forts and batter-

ies, 68 in number, each flanking the other and spread aroundWashington or a distance of 37 miles that so adequately protected thecity against the assaults of invaders (Salamanca 1931: 5).

Fifty battlegrounds lay almost at the very doors of Washington, DC;the wars bloodiest battles (at Antietam, Apomattax, Bull Run, andGettysburg, among others) were fought nearby and Richmond, thecapital of the Confederacy, lay a mere ninety miles away. Soldierschopped down trees all around DCs hilly perimeter so that they couldspot spies or troops approaching. On the hills, they mounded earth-

works for protection and erected cannons. When they needed to sendmessages, soldiers carried them by hand. Refugees from slave statessought sanctuary there and often camped nearby to work for thetroopscooking, doing laundry, and playing music. Union troopsfought only one battle in Washington, DC, when General Jubal Earlymarched north from Richmond, around the city to Silver Spring,Maryland, then down Georgia Avenue to attack Fort Stevens. Soldiersstationed at Fort Slocum and Fort DeRussy hiked over to lend a handand President Lincoln rode up from the White House to lend moral

support. A tall target in his stovepipe hat, he unwisely mounted theparapet to observe the fighting. General Horatio Wright entreatedhim to get out of harms way. Urban legends take the story from here.Some say a surgeon standing nearby was struck and killed; othersthat a union soldier bravely took a bullet meant for the presidentthat might have changed the course of history. Tiny BattlegroundCemetery on Georgia Avenue holds the remains of the Massachusettsregiment assigned to Fort Stevens (Coates 2004; Furgurson 2004;Salamanca 1931; Washington Post1891, 1900, 1902; Washington Post,

Times Herald1970).But, as early as 1900, aPostreporter warned that:

The old defenses of Washington form today the most picturesque and inter-esting fragments of the civil war. They never cease to attract attention,sunken and plowed up as they are. Theres something about old bastionedworks, armed batteries, rifle trenches, and stockades that arouses anunfailing curiosity in very passerbybe he a darky [sic] in a dump cart, or agloved young gentleman driving a tandem. . . . The general and indefinite

statement old fort seldom satisfies him. He inquires the name. It is forgot-ten. The people who live in the neighborhood, and have there since thecountry was settled, speak about the cartridges they have plowed up, shellsthey have stumbled across, and old parts of guns and cannons they haveunearthed . . . [but] The history of the forts seems drowned in oblivion(Washington Post1900: 21).


11/34


The earthen forts were overgrown, beaten down by nature, butgreen space remained and the citys various governing bodies vowed to

restore them as parks. It is important to distinguish between theforts and the parks as city planners, park officials, politicians, andneighborhood activists saw them after the war was over. The forts aresimply the remains of the earthen walls and parapets mounded on thetop of the hills. Only the earthworks at Fort Stevens have beenrestored and decorated with cannons. The most intact earthworks, theones that seem to give visitors the best sense of watching for enemies,lie at Fort Totten, next to a subway stop and the citys sanitation cen-ter. They are rarely visited.

The process of acquiring the forts as parkland was protracted,encumbered by the machinations of many players, and partiallyenabled by New Deal programs (Washington Post 1911a, 1911b,1911c, 1925a, 1925b, 1925c, 1926a, 1926b, 1927a, 1927b, 1928a,1928b, 1934). In 1934, the Capper-Crampton Act authorized no-interestloans for the acquisition of federal lands to be set aside as parks,enabling the District Commissioners to acquire the Fort Circle parksbetween 19341950. The New Deal-era Civilian Conservation Corpsbrought young men in from Idaho and New Jersey to spend three

years landscaping, planting, constructing trails, doing erosion control,cleaning up the woods, hewing logs, and building picnic tables, clus-tered in small groups, each with a fireplace and a water fountain.Embracing the Olmsted vision of natural, rambling parks, they devi-ated only in building a golf course in Fort Dupont (Washington Post1933a, 1933b, 1933c, 1938b; Whittlesey 1938).

The park service placed a generic sign featuring somewhat bored-looking white soldiers at each site, and each park began a differentkind of journey that reflected the needs and experiences of its neigh-

bors, the imagination of the managers and rangers assigned there,and the value of its surrounding land. Ironically, the camps that spoketo Howe of unity grew into parks that spoke to racial inequality anddivisions. Today, the fort parks mirror the ongoing and rampant racialsegregation of the District of Columbia. Some provide expansive dogruns or hiking trails for their wealthy neighbors; others meet regionalneeds with subway stops and athletic fields. East of the AnacostiaRiver, most have been neglected.

Fort Dupont is the east-of-the-river exception to the rule of aban-

doned parks, and this exception reflects changing patterns of racialsegregation. Before World War II, Washington east of the AnacostiaRiver was rural, undeveloped, and mostly white. White citizens clam-ored for improvements in the infrastructure and cityscape, with somesuccess (Giddens 1941; Sadler 1939; Washington Post 1938a, 1942,


12/34

150 B. Williams

1946). By 1938, the Fort Dupont area formed part of a grand plan for acontinuous 1,200-acre park serving the whole eastern portion of the

city. Park service officials imagined virtually boundless areas forrecreationgolf, tennis, field games, swimming, riding, boating, pic-nicking, and outdoor acting, with a wide variety of scenery. Theyexpected land values to rise and new residents to be attracted to thescenic hills overlooking the Anacostia River. The scenery and topog-raphy of the [eastern] section of the District are distinctly beautifulbut the heretofore ugly approaches to the area have discouraged itsprivate development as a residential area, parks officials claimed.They dreamed of new highways and rich developments, as the forth-

coming George Washington Memorial Parkway, Fort Circle Drive,Anacostia Highway, and a new superhighway to Baltimore would linkthe park systems and revitalize the area (Giddens 1941; Washington

Post1938a, 1942).In 1931, Salamanca could rhapsodize in the Washington Postthat

They [the forts] are, indeed, to be preserved for all time, and made thecenters of attraction and loveliness in a beautiful drive which will encir-cle the hills of Washington and the forts they embrace. These forts will

be developed into beautiful park areas, so that the completed drivewill afford enchanting vistas . . . and spots of keenest historic interest(Salamanca 1931: 11).

The park area at Fort Dupont opened to the public in 1938, whenthe Washington Daily News described it as a pint-sized version ofRock Creek Park and predicted that it would become a picnicheaven, a spot appealing more to the hiker and the old-fashioned pic-nicker who likes a little inconvenience and hard work with his out-

ings. One of the two mounted policemen serving at Rock Creek Parkwas transferred to Fort Dupont in 1946, as horseback riding grew inpopularity at the park.

At the same time, other forces were at work both nationally and inthe city westof the Anacostia River that would transform the charac-ter of the Fort Dupont community and pose new challenges to thepark. The New Deal and World War II brought rapid populationgrowth and new buildings to the monumental core of the city. ManyAfrican-American migrants came to the city from the south seeking

work. District Commissioners, planners, and journalists felt that thecrowded inner core of the city blighted their efforts to create a beauti-ful capital befitting its status as a new world power and democratic,capitalist beacon. Massive urban-renewal projects displaced black res-idents from the core into giant, hastily constructed, segregated public


13/34


14/34

152 B. Williams

amphitheater, an ice skating rink, and free weekend concerts in aneffort to provide entertainment for low-income families in the commu-

nity surrounding the park (Crowley 1976). In 1980, the WashingtonPostreported that

Every Saturday and Sunday at 8:30 p.m., an average crowd of 20,000 to25,000 people walk, roller skate, drive, bike, piggyback or run to a holein the woods in Southeast for a couple of hours of fun . . . a whole familycan picnic in the park, without paying for baby sitters or gas, stretch outand take in Washingtons laid-back summer scene (Washington Post1980: A14).

During the 1970s, the concerts were largely jazz and blues, but alsoincluded gospel and go-go music, childrens theater and modern dance,in an environmentally pleasing wooded setting (Washington 1974;Sargent 1981). Many Washingtonians have beloved memories of theconcerts at Fort Dupont, of hearing wonderful music and of anextraordinary feeling of community. Also in 1974, a volunteer initi-ated a community garden program at Fort Dupont. Today, there areover 300 plots in three different areas of the park. The other fort sites

east of the river also received limited projects and programs such asday camps, sleep-over camps, and special tension-reduction days(Bowman 1983; Combes 1972; Lewis 1972; Meyer 1972; Raspberry1966; Secrest 1962; Washington Post, Times Herald1965, 1966, 1970,1971; Washington Post1982). Then, with public cutbacks during the1980s, these parks were virtually abandoned (Milloy 1985). Like manyparks, they reach far beyond the Olmsted vision to speak to hiddenhistories. In DC, this history is a many-layered history of race: at alarger ideological level, an unwillingness (in stark contrast to the reso-

nance of the Old Confederacy in the South) to celebrate the end ofslavery through the Civil War and, on a local level, the materialeffects of urban renewal, integration, and white flight.

However, the Fort Circle parks have lasted as open space, a star-tling corridor of green that welcomes those entering the city from thesouth. The park service has been tenacious about protecting the landfrom commercial development. East of the Anacostia River, there isalmost no other green space. Residents have to climb, burrow, andscramble to get across the interstate highway to reach the river. The

old forts, with the exception of Fort Dupont, appear to have been delib-erately left unmaintained and abandoned. Swings hang from onechain; an old upside-down car reposes in Fort Mahon. Still, residentsin the eastern portion of the city value urban parks. In the next sec-tion, I discuss the use values of urban parks to poorer residents, with


15/34


reference to parks in other cities but with special emphasis on the FortCircle parks.

Use values

People do the most amazing things in parks. Along the East River inNew York, residents remember, appease, and heal: in the Middle Pas-sage Ceremony, the Mother Ganga ritual observed by Hindus, thehonoring of Kanaloa, the morning practice of Tai Chi. Japanese recitethe Shinto chronology of creation. But for the ritual to be healing, thewater must be healthy and clean. The anglers in DCs Anacostia Park

have the same problem. But they share the park on weekends withcruisers who, in a never-ending loop, court, play music, and show offtheir outfits, cars, and dogs (Baard 2002; Godfrey 2003; Williams et al.1997). On other days, people who live nearby go to Anacostia Park tofish, be alone, play basketball, and mind children (Blagburn 2000).

The community gardens at Fort Stevens abound with red corn fromEcuador, sweet potatoes from Georgia, and callaloo from Jamaica andTrinidad, as well as lemon balm and two kinds of thyme for jerk sauce;Nigerian squash; tomatillos; curry; tomatoes; peppers; marigolds and

mulberries to repel insects; pinto bean vines; the peppery crisperpurslane, an eager, creeping volunteer that visits everybodys plots; andthe towering collard greens that fortify the whole city. The gardeners atFort Stevens also plant peas, lettuce, string beans, tomatoes, sevenkinds of squash, two kinds of Swiss chard, dandelions, cabbage, arug-ula, white and purple eggplant, garlic, and beets (Gerhart 2002;Williams et al. 1997). Gardeners at Fort Dupont grow collard greens,turnip greens, mustard greens, squash, tomatoes, cabbage, stringbeans, turnips, lima beans, butter beans, early peas, okra, zucchini,

peppers, watermelon, celery, carrots, and cantaloupes. As part of ourstudy of the Fort Circle parks, community ethnographer Susie McFad-den-Resper, anthropologist Sherri Lawson Clark, her husband/basket-ball player Penn Clark, and I interviewed community gardeners at FortDupont. Their stories reveal some of the ways that people use parks tomake the city home. Gardeners spoke of growing up in the South:

I started when I was small, I had no choice, my job was to take care ofthe garden. Id clean out the chicken house and spread it across the field.

In rural North Carolina it was survival. There were very few things wehad to buy.

Along the same theme, I started as a kid myself, I lived on a farmtill I was 9 years old. My father took great pride in gardening . . . it wasnot just a thing of planting vegetables, he wanted to be the best he


16/34

154 B. Williams

could be. He used the manure from the barnyard to enhance his gar-dening and his pride. Because I took an interest he gave me a garden.

He said, This is your little spot right heregrow whatever you wantin this. I grew radishes, and I thought they looked pretty. But I atesome of them and they almost had to catch me because those thingswere hot as I dont know what. But that was it, I started as a kid, withmy father and my family. My father won the PTA prize as the best gar-dener in our community. For many years I said I would strive toalways have one of the best gardens.

I didnt grow up gardening but I was always picked to clean out mymamas flowerbed. Every time Id go in there to get the weeds out theflowers began to grow. She told me I must have a green thumb. . . . Im

still learning, everyday I go over there I try to learn something . . . youhave to study the soil and garden just like anything else; its not justthrowing seeds and scratching around with a hoe. If you want a crop youhave to work at it.

Gardeners learn from and study their gardens, exchange insights andresources with other gardeners, and share their harvest with theirneighbors:

As a kid my father did all the gardening, and I carried the water whenhe planted sweet potatoes. My first crop did pretty good; my second onedidnt do too good because I didnt know anything. H___ helped me alongwith what I did and Im pretty proud of it.

Weve had several people come through the parkthis is an out of theway region, people just happen through that way, or sometimes someonemay bring them through for the first time, and they stop their cars, andtheyll say Oh my goodness they have a farm in the city, will you sell mesome vegetables? Well say, No maam but we will give you some vege-tables. And they cant believe that.

Senior citizens, you know we share the food. I have two ladies, 6000Sargent Road. Theyre already asking me, when Im gonna bring themsome greens. I say. Mrs. H we havent got out of Christmas yet! I justcame from shopping myself. But no, I give away a lot of stuff. Im aretired insurance man and I know a lot of people, its like religion, I tellit everywhere I go, Im a gardener. The mistake that is as soon as yousay Im a gardener, they want you to bring em some squash, bring emsome tomatoes, and I enjoy that. But I can stuff, I can tomatoes, thatsthe only thing I know how to do. I leave them all over town, with littlelabels that say from the kitchen of___, and I like that.

Gardening is also a storied experience and exaggeration, goodhumor, friendly competition, and cooperative discourse fill thesestories. When the gardeners told stories, they frequently joined in to


17/34


help each other to a punch line, to fill out information, or to embellishthe tale. They also laughed heartily at each others stories.

I love Fort Dupont. I spend a lot of time walking all over the gardenlooking at every plot in everyones garden, always eager to learn. Fromone plot to the next the soil is different. You got to study, watch yourplants just like you watch a baby, they will change on you overnight. Itsa lot of fun because I may think that Im doing what is right for my plotand I look over there at Mr. H___ and he thinks hes doing whats rightfor his, his looks good, mine doesnt look so good, Ill go over and conferand find out whats going on and in the end we have a successful projectgoing every summer. The comradeship and the learning process.

I enjoy the greenery, being in the park, being in the dirt and up underthe shade trees and the grass and stuff, its better than going to a doctor.You cannot get more relaxation than you get going to that garden. Ienjoy the garden, the people, C___ here is a philosopher, we talk and welie. (laughter). . . . the guys be lying about what they used to do. . . . Wehave an absolute good time and theres not any one thing in this commu-nity that has contributed more to the comradeship of people . . . beforeyou know it youre running into people in the street and talking andlaughing. It brings people together. This garden is more than plantingsome vegetables and getting them growing and harvesting. Its a socialcircle and we enjoy it. I hope theres gardens here until Im 117.

But gardeners are also firm about the fact that gardening is not justrelaxing. They cherish the hard work, the challenge, the opportunityto learn and to overcome the obstacles:

I found out the best way to do is make sure your soil is tilt real goodbecause with nice soft soil your vegetables will grow better, and then yougotta do something about them weeds because those weeds is coming.

But I had to beg to differ with him . . . aint a whole lot of relaxin outthere to me. This is called work.

But in view of that . . . all of that takes into consideration the challenge.If you can get out there and overcome all those thingscool weather in thespring, extreme wet weather this past summer, extreme hot weather wehad year before last . . . if you can get out there and work and concentrateand have a nice garden, thats what its all about. Its the challenge andwhat you produce and what you see from your produce thats your reward.

Part of the knowledge and skill that flourish in the community gar-dens include the sensitivity to the rhythms of the year:

In springtime, I think most people agree that we go out and we plantwhats called salad greens in the early spring. Turnip greens, mustard


18/34

156 B. Williams

greens, things like that grow in a cooler climate before it gets too hot, ifindeed like John said its not real wet or anything. We used to plant

whats called early peas but for the last two years its been so wet and sowe havent had a chance to plant the early peas.

And also your onions, those were the beginnings of the garden; lettuce;these were cool crops. Later on, round in May, we plant our warm weathercrops . . . tomatoes, beans, screen beans, cucumbers, squash, okra, corn,carrots, celery, watermelon, cantaloupes (all joining in, laughing). Andafter that we have a fall crop. Now you can plant turnip greens again, forthe fall, and also your collards continue from the summer, collards andSwiss chard, they can hold over during the summer and into the fall.

String beans, greens, squash, you can plant your greens first, then

when your greens go put your other string beans in, your lima beans,cause it takes butter beans, lima beans longer than a string bean. Plusas soon as the cool weather hits, if you got some butter beans that arejust beginning to fill, youre out of luck; gonna stop them right in theirtracks. Make sure theyre planted at a time to come out at a max,August or September.

Skills and knowledge also involve coping with pests, which arerespected adversaries:

You need a different poison for different bugs. Some poisons will takecare of this bug, but this bug might enjoy it.

Japanese Beetles: they work in pairs. Usually if you find one theresanother one somewhere, anytime you see one eating, and you dont seeanother one but you can find it in the dirt somewhere.

Last year lots of rain, what was the result? We got different bugs wedidnt know about. As long as its raining you cant get in the garden butthe bugs are there, having a good time.

Gardeners also share many special recipes:

You can slice your green tomatoes and put them in the freezer on singlesheets of paper, and they taste the same as when they come out of thegarden.

Putting up tomatoes in a jar is about the simplest thing you can do.The main thing is having good clean jars. You dont need a pressurecooker, just use a pot big enough to set four jars in. You have to knowwhat youre doing, dont set a cool jar in hot water. Temper your waterby pouring hot water on the jars, fill the jars with hot tomatoes, set emin, cook for 45 minutes. . . . Put em in scalding water, as many as youcan, pack em in the jar. Put a teaspoon of salt in the top and boil forabout an hour. I mean boil, dont play around with it. Then you turn itupside down; if it bubbles, somethings wrong. Put the jars back in thecase, and put em away for that snowy day.


19/34


People also organize family, class, organizational, and communityreunions in the Fort Circle parks. Some have been holding reunions in

the parks for as long as a quarter-century. Some families gather everyyear; some every few years; some alternate between reunions inWashington and reunions in another location such as Baltimore, NewYork, or a southern town.

Family reunions offer dispersed extended families the opportunityto gather, not just for a funeral, a time of sadness, but to come togetherwhen its a good time. To remember, to share from long ago, talk aboutwho did what when, how they responded and acted. Family reunionscommunicate to children where your family started, how they migrated

out. Our history is not written; it must be done through word of mouth.The reunions allow us to bring history back, for kids to see. They givesubstance to what youve told your children. . . . Plus an identity. Some-times they dont carry the name, but they carry a physical trait. Onewoman described the large ears characteristic of one side of her family.Although her children do not carry that name, they spent time at thefamily reunion examining all their cousins ears. They were so happy,she reported, at how the ears went on down.

These reunions give children ownership, a heritage. It maintains

that togetherness. One gets a sense of what other relatives are doing.They may be a singer, a doctor, a teacher. This way youre not losingsight of who you really are. Children can reflect on who they want toemulate, how they want to look back. Reunions give you a roadmark, what to do with your life and self. They position you to knowsomething about somebody else you wouldnt ordinarily know. Familyreunions are important to our cultural heritage as African Americans,for keeping the family structure together, communicating what wereall about, defining who we are, maintaining ourselves as a group of

people. We can come together and share in fellowship who we are.One woman stated of her church, which has held reunions in Fort

Dupont for twenty years, that these events bring people back whohave moved away. Sometimes the choir travels down south, and thosefriends and family will travel up to the reunion to keep up the connec-tion. A woman who organizes class reunions noted that

I never hear from them until this time of year, and its beautiful. Were 18again. You look exactly the same. Your essence is still the same. You just

want to know that people are doing okay. They say of your children, Theylook just like you. Or I remember your Mama. We laugh and laugh.

But the other, less privileged parks east of the Anacostia River arenot so well used because they are not maintained and sometimes feel


20/34


21/34


22/34

160 B. Williams

habitat in the larger context of the mowed grass and wooded areas ofother parts of the park. They provide the shrubs and berries that offer

food and winter cover for birds, butterflies, and other insects and con-tribute to a more diverse natural habitat in the park. While the birdscan change migration routes, or simply fly away, the reptiles andamphibians need the park to survive. Fort Davis is one of the lasturban sanctuaries for indigenous species in the DC area for red andgray fox, white-tailed deer, spotted salamanders, and beaver. FortDavis is also used frequently as a dump. On one of our visits there,what appeared to be the entire contents of a household had been leftin the park.

Park ecologies run deep. Today, the urban forests found within cityparks across the country serve as organic sponges for various forms ofpollution and as absorbent storehouses of carbon dioxide to help offsetglobal warming, however locally. Trees also protect and cool asphaltand thus reduce the risk of potholes as they help the pavement last,anchor the soil and prevent erosion, and store and replenish crucialsupplies of groundwater in the city (Beatley and Manning 1997).These ecologies are compromised by acid rain, pesticide-laced runoff,the contaminated soil in many community gardens and the festering

water that nurtures the preventable and curable diseases that afflictmany poor people.

We should learn much more about the interactions among people,animals, and plants affecting park ecologies. What kinds of biodiversitydo urban park landscapes nurture? What happens to the street seedsor remains from family reunions, for example? How does the burgeon-ing population of housecats triaged during hard times affect the birdsthat are their prey and the plants the birds help pollinate and the catshelp fertilize? Have unchecked urban deer and Canadian geese that

have forgotten how to migrate joined the ranks of vermin? Why doopossums and raccoons venture onto city streets? How do humans con-tribute to the invasions of exotic species, and are those always detri-mental? Do they make the parks more joyfully serendipitous or jam upthe food chain in lethal ways? How do urban anglers affect the wet-lands that are so important to migrating shorebirds, for whom waterlevel is everything as they circle the earth? How can we measure themental health a park provides? Can parks alleviate the escalatingasthma rates in inner cities?

Park habitats are peculiar and shifting. Exotic species battle fornew niches, birds and endangered little animals find sustenance andprotection, and creatures on the move through globalizationviruses,rats, mosquitoes, and bacteriamutate the mix. Urban parks todaycan make the whole world present.


23/34


We are just learning about the ecologies of parks we could createfrom old industrial sites like Calumet in Chicago. Alaka Wali and her

colleagues at the Field Museum have documented the remarkablepatches of habitat and surviving wetlands there, coexisting withclosed mills and devastated neighborhoods, toxic wastes, industriallandfills, steel slag, waste, bacteria, cyanides, heavy metals, PCBs,and hydrocarbons. The Wali research team, which includes schoolchildren, argue that threats to animals and plants in a biological com-munity also hurt human beings. For example, the disruption of thehydrological cycle degrades wetlands and also floods homes. Industrialcontaminants poison both animals and humans. Non-native species

and non-native pests are often a misery for everyone. In Calumet,nature bears witness both to the heady days of strong worker unionsand well-paid work and to the corporate abandonment of neighbor-hoods (Wali et al. 2003).

Rivers and river parks are particularly complex habitats. Cities andtowns evolved along waterways, which offered transportation, freshwater for people and animals, and food for birds. But cities have longhad paradoxical relationships to riverswe crowd them too closelyand we get sick from the septic waters carried by floods and the mos-

quitoes that thrive in marshes. So urban history has often been aboutturning our backs on riversfinding other sources of food, transporta-tion, and recreationre-routing, paving over rivers and obliteratingwetlands. Rivers have been left to fester among ramshackle aban-doned factories and massive dumps.

Highways poison the water that runs into rivers carrying pesticides.In Washingtons Anacostia River, agricultural sediment has afflictedcatfish with excessive rates of liver cancer manifested in tumors. Theimpervious surfaces of highways fail to filter rainwater as wetlands do

and rainwater carries erosions from construction sites, chlordane,PCBs, acid, oil, and grease into the river. These toxins settle to the bot-tom, ruining the habitat, crowding out oxygen, and killing aquatic life.On shore, monsters bloom and rocks grow beards. Fecal bacteria poisonrivers, flowing after every hard rain into the Anacostia through DCscombined sewers. Human fecal bacteria mingles with that of dogs, cats,deer, and geese to create a toxic stew and a fish advisory. Watershedsare like great chutes, so that a Styrofoam cup tossed into an erodedfeeder stream can strangle an egret far downstream.

Sometimes, outsiders pathologize rivers and the people who livenearby. In the Washington Postmagazine, for example, Megan Rosenfelddescribes a boat trip down the Anacostia, ignoring the stinking gar-bage and floating soft-drink bottles and a wild man she saw on thebank:


24/34

162 B. Williams

He was not us: primeval, living by his wits and probably a toxic fish hedcaught and was about to cook, happy in his fire and his food and his

wildness. She also describes a strange apparition, a mysterious fire,and dogs and cats with their legs tied, and throats slit, as in an animalsacrifice (Rosenfeld 1997: 18).

Still, poor and working-class park users endure. In the AnacostiaRiver, and at Fort Foote along the Potomac, anglers wade throughtrash to stand on the beach (sometimes under warning signs) to fishfor white and yellow perch, catfish, and rockfish or to net the herringthat run in the spring. Fishing is often a convivial, all-day affair that

occurs year-round. Fishers find mussels, clams, beaver, raccoons,deer, opossums, squirrels, egrets, geese, cranes, ducks, and gulls. Oneman reported that a beaver tried to snatch his fish right off the line.

Capital to the rescue

Politicians and reporters are alert to the colonization of parks, butthey too often identify the invaders as youth gangs, wild homelessmen, and drug dealers. They tend to overlook the developers. The

interstate highways that slashed through shoreline urban parks andwalled rivers off from poor residents nearby appear almost benignwhen compared to global capitals contemporary rush to standardizeevery environment, gentrify urban parks, and create shopping centersand fake, sometimes gated, substitute communities from urbannature.

Invasions of the waterfront have been chronic since the collapse ofshipping in the 1970s and the decline of old ports, the turn to contain-erization, and, for the ports that remain, changes in the size and

nature of ships and the transport systems that carry cargo inland.Harbors have had to relocate to deeper water and better transportlinks, thus creating new frontiers for urban development along aban-doned waterfronts (Breen and Rigby 1993; Seiber 1991). Pent-up capi-tal rockets into this new space to build offices, high-end housing,shopping centers, and destinations for urban tourists that, as SharonZukin notes, aestheticize the problems they displace (Zukin 1996: 46,49). Local residents often attach memories and meanings to theirwaterfront, but even as they regain access to it, they find other politi-

cal and economic interests competing there. Politicians and developersuse waterfronts to accommodate their personal ambitions and to buildnew nodes in the global economy. The lofts and condominiums informerly water-based factories and warehouses in Richmond, VA,Chicago, Cincinnatis Heritage Center, and Pittsburghs Grand


25/34


Concourse exemplify these new uses. These projects may have little todo with water, but sometimes waterfronts feature festive waterside

activities (such as Water Fire in Providence or Thunder over Louis-ville) against a backdrop of high-density commercial development.

Never more than a heartbeat behind, federal Washington has desig-nated western Anacostia Park and its neighborhoods a desolatewasteland, although the area happens to include a large public hous-ing community, the citys much-loved and patronized gay dance clubs,and Seafarers Yacht Club, the first African-American boating facilityin the North east, and more of an environmental community serviceorganization than a yacht club, since half the members do not even

own boats. In Washington, government facilities and public memorialscollaborate with capital in colonizing space. Publicprivate partner-ships will create a great governmentshopping complex in AnacostiaPark, a small bustling city of Navy office workers (Fehr andMontgomery 2000; Wilgoren 2001: B1). Recreation will be provided aswell, including a new baseball stadium, thus substituting a new mani-cured, artificial community for existing communities that are actuallyrooted on the waterfront and reflect the era of civil rights activism(Williams 2002).

The Fort Circle parks face gentrification and development as well.The name of African American Benjamin Banneker, Pierre LEnfantsassistant, now graces luxury housing abutting Washingtons FortDupont, where no one who lives within miles of the park today couldafford to live. The developer refers to the Seafarers club across theriver as an eyesore that spoils the view from the development. Thepresident of a nearby community-development corporation asserted tome that the edges [of the park] need to be restudied in terms of howto be able to utilize the site in front of the Minnesota Avenue Metro

Station. [The Park Service] should pull back some of the edges andmake it more available to commercial uses. He believes that the parkblocks the restoration of Minnesota Avenue, which he sees as a prob-lem area with a limited amount of space for commercial uses. Wecant do anything because the park is there, he claims.

Political perils and possibilities

People have often gathered in urban parks to express dissent and fight

for social change: from Peoples Park in Berkeley, CA, and the KensingtonWelfare Rights Union protests in Philadelphia through the Bonusmarchers and swim-ins in Anacostia Park. Citizens use parks to dis-tribute clean needles and free food. Tompkins Square Park in NewYork City became a national symbol of the struggle against


26/34


27/34


28/34


29/34


state (Hyatt 2001). However, volunteers sometimes become committedactivists with long-term goals for social change. Citizens with bulldoz-

ers are attacking some of the two million small dams in the UnitedStates, which have urbanized buffer-zone riparian parks, slowed downleaf decomposition, blocked the fish, and killed the trees. And a groupof volunteers organizes walks around the Fort Circle parks, holdingthat maybe we can be one city.

Place-based activism too often becomes trapped in the local andtainted with ideologies about how the poor drag down the quality oflife. The poor are cast as perpetrators of environmental degradation,from the hanging swing in Fort Mahan to the depletion of rainforests.

Sometimes, as in Ciudad Juarez, the state makes the poor who sufferthe most from environmental degradation responsible for preservationand cleanup as well (Hill 2001).

It is very difficult to transform the interests of a place-bound com-munity, where we feel the assaults of state and capital so deeply inour daily lives, into a broader vision that analyzes and repels thoseassaults (Carbonella 1996; Goode and Maskovsky 2001; Gregory1999). But parks are deeply political and the struggle over parks is astruggle over democracy.

Park signs and memorials may elide history, but parks also inscribeevidence of corporate greed, state repression, inequality, and glim-mers of protest and reform over the last century. Olmsteds vision of astrolling citizenry mutated into land speculation, as developers capi-talized on the escalating property values that accompany attractivegreen space. But urban nature is precious in ways we hardly under-stand. Poor people need nearby open spaces, to play, to socialize, andto be alone. Urban parks also offer nostalgic opportunities beyondromancing Jim Crow or the old welfare state. We can remember and

reinstitute the public works programs and summer in the parks.Parks offer potentially valuable jobs programs. They could employecologists, builders, landscapers, actors, recreation directors, childcareproviders, archaeologists, and musicians, who could help tighten thelabor market. We could bring back departments of recreation, once thequintessential employers of black urban residents. We could pay peo-ple to farm, as Washington once did the veterans tilling great greenspaces around the Old Soldiers Home, built for them with booty fromthe Mexican War. We could rebuild and reinvent orphan parks (Sostek

2004). We could fill parks with activities and people to keep them livelyand safe, install walkways and railings to accommodate strollers andwheelchairs, and restore park edges so that parks knit the city together,as Jane Jacobs hoped they would (Jacobs 1961). We could live sustain-ably within the boundaries of our watersheds and restore precious


30/34

168 B. Williams

wetlands. Wetlands with dense vegetation and wide, shallow basinshost migrating shore birds, slow storm water, trap nutrients for

plants, and lower pollution loads. We can daylight springs, install oiland grit separators and detention ponds, and harvest rain and graywater for landscape irrigation on private property, manicuredlawns, street cleaning, and golf courses. We could revegetate parkswith native species and recycle abandoned stores and vacant lotsinto natural habitat parks and community gardens (Beatley andManning 1997)

The serendipity and empathy nurtured in urban parks can betransformed into a politicized vision; volunteers canbecome activists.

As we keep our eyes on our parks, we must remember not to blame thepoor but instead to identify the movements of state and capital. Theenvironment includes, is expressed in, and is protected by democraticpublic space.

Notes

Address correspondence to Brett Williams, Department of Anthropology, AmericanUniversity, 4400 Massachusetts Avenue NW, Washington, DC 20016, USA. E-mail:

bwillia@ american.edu

1. I collaborated with anthropologists Tanya Ramos, Sherri Lawson Clark, MelindaCrowley, Lisa Kinney, and Patrick Pierce and community ethnographers JackieBrown, Penn Clark, Benjamin Daugherty, Susie McFadden-Resper, Kenny Pitt, andTerik Washington to do the framework and fieldwork in the Fort Circle parks thatinforms this study. We interviewed park staff, users, and neighbors; visited parks;mapped parks; documented signs of use; held focus groups; went to their meetings;and reviewed archival materials and use permits. I also appreciate the comments andadvice of Yvonne Jones, John Hale, Micaela di Leonardo, Elizabeth Sheehan, JoeDent, Rhoda Kaananeh, Joan Gero, Michael Twitty, Marianna Blagburn, Sue Barnes,

Roger Legerwood, Billy Cobb, Ric Zeller, Stephen Syphax, and Jon Adelson.

References

Baard, Eric 2002. Holy Waters.Village Voice,11 June: 3439.Barthold, Elizabeth 1993. The predicament of the parklets. Washington History,

Spring/Summer: 2845.Beatley, Timothy and Kristy Manning 1997. The Ecology of Place.Washington, DC:

Island.Bender, Thomas 1975.Toward an Urban Vision: Ideas and Institutions in Nineteenth-

Century America.Lexington: University of Kentucky Press.Bender, Thomas 2002.The Unfinished City.New York: The New Press.Blagburn, Tom 2000. Whos Got Next? Pick-Up Basketball in Washington, D.C. 34th

Annual Smithsonian Folklife Festival Program Book. Pp. 3132.Bowman, LaBarbara 1983. For These D.C. Residents, Theres No Place Like Fort

Chaplin Park. Washington Post: B5.


31/34


Breen, Ann and Dick Rigby 1993.WaterfrontsCities Reclaim their Edges.New York:McGraw-Hill.

Burroughs, John 1871. Spring at the Capital. InSo Glorious a Landscape. Chris Magoc,ed. Wilmington, DE: Scholarly Resources. Pp. 8491.Carbonella, August 1996. Reconstructing histories and geographies: Some dissident

remarks on anthropologys unwaged debate.Focaal26/27: 159165.Coates, Patricia 2004. Fort Stevens: At the Gates of Washington. Washington Post,9 July: 30.Combes, Abbott 1971. Fort Dupont to Close Golf Links. Washington Post, Times Herald: B4.Combes, Abbott 1972. House Unit Approves Funds for Park Projects. Washington Post,

Times Herald, 9 June: C9.Cornebise, Alfred Emile 2004. The CCC Chronicles. Jefferson, NC, and London:

McFarland and Company.Crowley, Susan 1976. A New Ice Rink in Ft. Dupont. Washington Post, 17 June: DC4.

Davis, Mike 2002.Dead Cities and Other Tales.New York: The Free Press.Downing, Andrew Jackson 1848.Rural Essays. George William Curtis, ed. New York:

Putnam. Reprinted in 1974, New York: Da Capo.Fehr, Stephen C. and David Montgomery 2000. Sea Change Seen on Waterfront.

Washington Post, 8 June: DC 1, 5.Furgurson, Ernest 2004. Freedom Rising: Washington in the Civil War. New York:

Alfred A. Knopf.Gandy, Matthew 2002. Concrete and Clay: Reworking Nature in New York City.

Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Gerhart, Ann 2002. The Plot Ripens.Washington Post,29 June: C1, C2.Giddens, Lucia 1941. Recreation Plan Favors Anacostia.Washington Post,12 May: 13.

Gillette, Howard 1995. Between Justice and Beauty. Baltimore, MD: Johns HopkinsUniversity Press.

Godfrey, Sarah 2003. Braking Away. Washington City Paper, 29 August: 19, 20, 22,2426, 32, 34, 36.

Goode, Judith and Jeff Maskovsky 2001. The New Poverty Studies. New York: NewYork University Press.

Gregory, Steven 1999.Black Corona.Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Hill, Edwin 1990. In the Shadow of the Mountain. Pullman: Washington State

University Press.Hill, Sarah 2001. The environmental divide.Urban Anthropology30: 156187.Hillenbrand, Liz 1956. Park Police Chief Blames Riot on Soft Penalties. Washington

Post, Times Herald,4 April: 17.Hyatt, Susan 2001. From Citizen to Volunteer: Neoliberal Governance and the Erasure

of Poverty. In The New Poverty Studies: The Ethnography of Politics, Policy, andImmiseration in the United States. Judith Goode and Jeff Maskovsky, eds. NewYork: New York University Press. Pp. 201235.

Jacobs, Jane 1961.The Death and Life of Great American Cities.New York: Random House.Lacy, Leslie Alexander 1976.The Soul Soldiers.Radnor, PA: Chilton.Lewis, Alfred 1972. Deputy Marshall Charged in Rape of Girl. Washington Post, Times

Herald, 16 March: B1.Lewis, Alfred and Harry Gabbett 1958. Juveniles Harass Baby Precinct. Washington

Post, 14 January: A20.Lewis, Rae 1938. District Folk Dont Flee From the Capital as They Used To. Washing-

ton Post,7 August: B5.Little, Charles 1990. Greenways for America. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press.Magoc, Chris J. 2002.So Glorious a Landscape: Nature and the Environment in Ameri-

can History and Culture.Wilmington, DE: Scholarly Resources.


32/34

170 B. Williams

Meyer, Eugene 1972. D.C. Plan Unveiled by Nixon. Washington Post, Times Herald,5 February: A1, B11.

Milloy, Courtland 1985. Peaceful Anacostia. Washington Post, 2 July: C3.Newton, Norman 1971.Design on the Land: The Development of Landscape Architec-ture.Cambridge, MA: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press.

Olmsted, Frederick Law 1873. General Order for the Organization and Routine ofDuty Of the Keepers Service of the Central Park. In The Papers of Frederick LawOlmsted. Charles Beveridge and Carolyn Hoffman, eds. 1997, Baltimore, MD: TheJohns Hopkins University Press. Pp. 281307.

Olmsted, Frederick Law 1875. Park from the American Cyclopedia. In The Papers ofFrederick Law Olmsted. Charles Beveridge and Carolyn Hoffman, eds. 1997, Baltimore,MD: The Johns Hopkins University Press. Pp. 308329.

Raspberry, William 1966. Greble Park Fete Fine, but Washington Post, Times Herald,

7 September: B1.Rosenfeld, Megan 1997. River City.Washington Post Magazine,9 July: 1728.Rosenzweig, Roy 1983.Eight Hours for What We Will. Cambridge, U.K., and New York:

Cambridge University Press.Sadler, Christine 1939. Southeast Washington Looks to the Future. Washington Post,

17 December: F1.Salamanca, Lucy 1931. When Washington was Fort-Girdled. Washington Post, 25

January: MF2.Sargent, Edward 1981. Fort Dupont Concerts. Washington Post, 6 August: DC3.Schuyler, David 1986. The New Urban Landscape: The Redefinition of City in

Nineteenth-Century America.Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press.

Secrest, Meryl 1962. Stay-at-Homes Enjoy Day Camp. Washington Post, Times Herald,1 July: F8.

Shapiro, Leonard 1971. Golfers Cant Fight Holdups. Washington Post, Times Herald,25 July: 40.

Sieber, R. Timothy 1991. Waterfront revitalization in postindustrial port cities of NorthAmerica.City and Society5 (2): 120136.

Smith, Neil 1996. After Tompkins Square Park: Degentrification and the RevanchistCity. InRe-presenting the City. Anthony King, ed. New York: New York UniversityPress. Pp. 93107.

Sostek, Anya 2004. Continued Makeover Urged at NW Park. Washington Post, 20 May: 34.Spilsbury, Gail 2003.Rock Creek Park.Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press.

Stallybrass, Peter and Allon White 1986. The Politics and Poetics of Transgression.London: Methuen.

Wali, Alaka, Gillian Darlow, Carol Fialkowski, Madeleine Tudor, Milary del CampoandDouglas Stotz. 2003. New methodologies for interdisciplinary research and action inan urban ecosystem in Chicago. Conservation Ecology 7(3): 2. Available at http://www.consecol.org/vol7/iss3/art2/.

Washington, Erwin 1974. Fort Dupont Summer Theater. Washington Post, 22 July: B1, B2.Washington, Henry Aubin 1970. Districts Old Forts. Washington Post, Times Herald,

28 December: B1.Washington Post1891 Washington the Place. 18 July: 1, 2.Washington Post1900. Some Notable Forts. 9 September: 21.Washington Post1902. Guns Frowned on All Sides. 7 October: G11.Washington Post1911a. Old Forts as Parks. 8 September: 14.Washington Post1911b. Health is Menaced. 1 October: C1.Washington Post1911c. Citizens Seek New Park. 17 September: 3.Washington Post1915. Light Civil War Forts. 28 September: 2.


33/34


Washington Post 1925a. Boulevard Linking City Park System and Forts Planned.2 February: 1.

Washington Post1925b. Brookland Citizens Express Grievances. 14 February: 2.Washington Post 1925c. Big Park Planned at Fort Dupont; 80 Acres Bought.16 December: 1.

Washington Post1926a. The Old and the New Anacostia. 24 January: SM3.Washington Post 1926b. Brookland Citizens Urging Bunker Hill Fort for City Park.

27 June: M6.Washington Post1927a. Civil War Fort Site Sought as City Park. 14 January: 20.Washington Post 1927b. Plan Commission to Consider Four Parks Proposals. 18

February: 8.Washington Post1928a. 113 Acres Are Added to Parks of District. 16 February: 20.Washington Post1928b. Fifteen More Acres Obtained for Parks. 26 February: M2.

Washington Post1933a. Forest Camp Will Be Set Up in Washington. 27 September: 16.Washington Post1933b. 168 Youths Fill Districts C.C.C. Quota. 15 November: 15.Washington Post 1933c. Football, Turkey and Fixins Planned for Forest Campers.

30 November: 8.Washington Post1934. Fort Dupont Park. 30 September: B4.Washington Post1938a. $2,000,000 Is Asked to Extend Parks. 3 December: 1.Washington Post1938b. Dupont Park To Be Made Play Center. 17 December: 11.Washington Post1942. FWA Grants $235,000 for 9 D.C. Play Areas. 28 July: 1.Washington Post1946. Benning Area Playground Sites Wanted. 10 October: 10.Washington Post1948. U.S., District in Controversy of Play Areas. 24 October: M1.Washington Post1980. Weekends at Fort Dupont. 21 January: A14.

Washington Post1982. Grilling in the Park. 28 May: W46.Washington Post, Times Herald1948a. Eight Apartments Will Have 740 Units. 2 May:

R2.Washington Post, Times Herald1948b. 9-Hole Fort Dupont Public Golf Course Opens

This Morning. 10 July: 11.Washington Post, Times Herald1956. Boy Indicted in Ft. Dupont Melee. 1 June: 15.Washington Post, Times Herald1962. New Apartments in SE. December: D7.Washington Post, Times Herald1965. Waitress Raped and Then Robbed. 2 September:

A40.Washington Post, Times Herald1966. A Day in the Park. 7 September: A34.Washington Post, Times Herald1970. Parks For All Seasons. 4 September: B14.

Washington Post, Times Herald1971. Outdoor Concerts. 25 June: C4.Whittlesey, Merrell 1938. Washington Post, New Deal Planned for Golfers.

31 December: 14.Whyte, William H. 1988.City: Rediscovering the Center.New York: Doubleday.Wilgoren, Debbi 2001. SE Riverfront Vision Aims for HUD Funds. Washington Post,

9 July: B1, B7.Williams, Brett 2001. A river runs through us.American Anthropologist103: 409431.Williams, Brett 2002. Gentrifying water and selling Jim Crow.Urban Anthropology31:

93121.Williams, Brett, Tanya Ramos, Jacqueline Brown, Pennelton Clark, Melinda Crowley,

Benjamin Daugherty, Lisa Kinney, Sherri Lawson Clark, Susie McFadden, PatrickPierce, Kenneth Pitt, and Terik Washington 1997.Park Users and Park Neighbors.Washington, DC: National Park Service.

Zukin, Sharon 1996. Space and Symbols in an Age of Decline. InRe-Presenting the City.Anthony King, ed. New York: New York University Press. Pp. 4359.


34/34

paradox of parks

Documents