Chancellor Park

No map in the County Clerk’s office is so much consulted as that flied in 1811 by Charles C. Brodhead covering the property of the Bleecker family. There was set out an area of three and four-tenths acres as a public common or park, known as Chancellor Square and this included the original site of the Academy and Courthouse. The lots on the east and west ends originally fronted on the square itself and could only be approached through it. Eventually Bleecker Street wormed its way on the north side and Elizabeth on the south.

As the city grew, Chancellor Park became a sort of gateway between the business section to the northwest and the residential portion to the southeast. The residents enjoyed the cool shade of the trees for picnics and celebrations. To keep the rummaging hogs and ducks of the townspeople from invading its sacred precincts, the city fathers erected a wooden fence around the park. Streets were laid out on the east and west sides, and by ordinance of the Common Council of April 7, 1837, the street on the east side of the park between Bleecker and Elizabeth was named Kent Street and that on the west side Academy. Both Chancellor Park and Kent Street were named for the same person, James Kent, the distinguished jurist and chancellor of the State.

In June of 1845 workmen commenced tearing away the un­sightly old fence around this beautiful piece of ground and rapidly replaced it with a new one. The interior of the Square also underwent many improvements. Tastefully planned walks, in all more than a mile in extent, were laid out and a number of new trees planted.

Steuben Park

Steuben Square was laid out in 1827. It stood well out of town at the time and Charlotte Street, which terminates at its northern side, contained only a few residences. It was named for Baron Wilhelm von Steuben, the Prussian nobleman who fought in the Revolution. Our first Mayor, Joseph Kirkland, ordered a fence erected around it and laid out gravel walks. On July 13, 1832, the Common Council decreed that that part of Bridge Street (Park Avenue) extending across Steuben Square be discontinued and the Street altered to run on the northwesterly side; that it be enclosed with a fence and walks made around and diagonally and transversely across said square. On June 13, 1834, the name was changed from Steuben Square to Steuben Park. In 1841, William Begg was appointed park keeper; followed in 1857 by John B. Marchisi; and in 1866 by Bernard Malloy, a landscape gardener. Later the old picket fence was removed.

The third of the early parks was Johnson Park at the intersection of Square and West Streets. It was deeded to the city by Alexander B. Johnson on October 27th, 1849. The deed recites that, “A. B. Johnson has resided in the said Utica for the last forty-nine years and feels toward the inhabitants thereof much good will; that his parents resided therein and are there buried, and that his father, Bryan Johnson, as early as the year 1799 gave Utica its first commercial impulse by the purchase of country produce for the New York market, and by the sale of foreign merchandise on an enlarged scale and at low prices.”

When Charles W. Hutchinson became Mayor of Utica in 1875, he determined to add handsome fountains in Utica’s parks. The one at Steuben Park was purchased from J. L. Mott, of New York City. It was made of iron with the figures of zinc. It was 18 feet high, constructed in the Renaissance style, surmounted by a large and graceful figure of Canova’s Hebe, the goddess of youth, holding a pitcher in her right hand above her head from which she poured water into the bowl held in her left hand. The figure was semi-nude and very graceful and beautiful. Around the base were the figures of four boys in different attitudes of bathing, and two

Johnson Park

swans. Two of the boys were seated and in the act of undressing. Of the other two, one had his hands folded as if to dive into the water, while the second was taking off his last garment. The swans were on the east and west sides, and had their wings extended heads down, and bills open as if enraged.

But time took its toll on the fountain and in June 1907, she was removed and J. L. Mott constructed a new one. The basin was ten and one half feet in diameter and together with the statue was 12 feet high. The figure of a boy holding high in one hand an electric globe was selected and from the globe the electric radiance spread over the park. The jets of water came from the base of the statue of the boy and fell into an octagon basin.

The 1875 fountain placed in Chancellor Park was made of zinc, covered with bronze and represented Neptune riding in a shell chariot upon two dolphins. He grasped the traditional trident, which he pointed at the head of one of the dolphins. From the nostrils of the dolphins, two jets of water were thrown to a height of twenty-five or thirty feet, while from their mouths were jets fan shaped letting the water fall into the basin. On the back of the chariot were numberless small spray jets. The fountain was eight and one-half feet high and rested on a stone base about five feet square. The basin was fifty feet in diameter.