1822–1903

With his partner Calvert Vaux, Frederick Law Olmsted created the winning design for Central Park, which has been widely imitated but never equaled. They saw parks as havens from the normal pressures of urbanity, a place of respite and calm for the soul; Olmstead believed that with the right landscape, he could exert an ennobling influence on the common man. He had a hand in designing most of New York’s parks, including Prospect Park, Riverside Park, Eastern Parkway, Ocean Parkway, and Fort Greene Park, and his ideas helped shape a century of urban planning in America.