— The Museum in the Streets —
The Belfast Ladies Improvement Society lobbied the city council in April of 1904 to establish a seaside park for the benefit of the public. The purchase price of the 15 acre lot was $3,000 and, once secured, prominent Boston landscape architect E. L. Beard drew up the park plans. Through the next two years volunteers, using donated materials, planted trees and built the roads. In 1936, a WPA project added a sea wall and saltwater swimming pool (photo c. 1915). Inset:
Edgar F. Hanson's mansion, across the street from the park, was a showplace at the city's southern entrance from 1892 until 1923, when it was destroyed by fire. Hanson, flamboyant and outspoken, served as a ten-term mayor. He was a manager of Dana's Sarsaparilla Co., a newspaper publisher, and a proponent of the building of the SS Belfast (panel #30).
| HM Number | HM14CE |
|---|---|
| Series | This marker is part of the Works Progress Administration (WPA) projects series |
| Tags | |
| Marker Number | 8 |
| Year Placed | 2004 |
| Placed By | The Belfast Historical Society and Museum, Inc., The City of Belfast, and the Belfast Community |
| Marker Condition | No reports yet |
| Date Added | Sunday, September 28th, 2014 at 11:32pm PDT -07:00 |
| UTM (WGS84 Datum) | 19T E 500289 N 4917978 |
|---|---|
| Decimal Degrees | 44.41510000, -68.99636667 |
| Degrees and Decimal Minutes | N 44° 24.906', W 68° 59.782' |
| Degrees, Minutes and Seconds | 44° 24' 54.36" N, 68° 59' 46.92" W |
| Driving Directions | Google Maps |
| Area Code(s) | 207 |
| Closest Postal Address | At or near 117 Northport Ave, Belfast ME 04915, US |
| Alternative Maps | Google Maps, MapQuest, Bing Maps, Yahoo Maps, MSR Maps, OpenCycleMap, MyTopo Maps, OpenStreetMap |
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