Pearson Park, Beverley Road, Hull was the town’s first public park. Like Baysgarth Park, Barton it was the result of private benevolence in that the then town’s mayor Zacharia Pearson donated land for the creation of the Park, land that was then beyond the northern fringe of the built-up area. Unlike Baysgarth Park then Pearson Park was created from previously open agricultural land rather than from a former privately emparked park.
Goodwill and Lawson’s map of Hull, published 1861, is the first detailed map of the town to show Pearson’s Park (see above map extract). It shows the network of footpaths, a curving ornamental lake, a comprehensive planting programme of young trees (many of the mature trees seen today will date from this planting) and the establishment of 43 rectangular plots to be sold-off for the building of elegant detached mansions, the tenants/owners then to enjoy the outer suburban location and the Park’s facilities. Interestingly the map extract shows no main thoroughfare along which the carriages of the wealthy might drive, to see and be seen. This was a feature of many early parks and cemeteries, its absence here suggesting more egalitarian aims and objectives.
Malet Lambert Local History Reprint (Extra Volume) No. 82, a reprint of One Hundred and Twenty One Views of Hull and District c. 1910 includes a number of photographs of Pearson Park at that time including two of the lake and one of the ‘old ruins’, a collection of tracery and building freestone from medieval ruins (genuine ?).
Any reference to Malet Lambert Reprints serves to remind us of the life and work of the great Geoff. Bell.