Opened in 1847 the Birkenhead Park is usually cited as the first English public park (s.p.b.s), this because it was commissioned by the then local authority and because, once completed, it was open to all citizens. In fact the local authority were dragooned by a wealthy local industrialist of modest origins Sir William Jackson, Bt. (whether there is any connection here with the once common retail outlets in Hull of ‘William Jackson’ I don’t know, probably just a coincidence of name). His enthusiasm was fired by a comparatively small park opened in Toxteth, Liverpool six years earlier, but there most of the park was reserved for nearby residents only.
As with a number of early public parks (s.p.b.s) the site chosen had for centuries been an uneconomic marshland which the designer and chief engineer, in charge of over 1000 navies across three years, transformed into a meandering lake and undulations created form the excavated soil. Famously the designer was William Paxton, once head gardener at Chatsworth and designer of the Crystal Palace building for the Great Exhibition in Hyde Park, 1851. ‘The significance of the 1851 Great Exhibition to the parks formed in Victorian Britain in subsequent decades cannot be overestimated’ Elborough, T. A Walk in the Park, 2016, p.101.
As was also commonly the case nearly half the acreage allocated was given-over to middle class housing around the perimeter of the site leaving 125 acres for the Park itself. Various rustic and neo-classical built structures added greatly to the cost – see the ‘over-the-top’ triumphal gateway in the photo above (similar but less grandious triumphal entrances can be seen at Sewerby Park, just north of Bridlington, and at Pearson Park, north Hull).
In 1850 Frederick Law Olmsted, from New England, U.S.A., happened upon Birkenhead’s Park on a visit to England and, using his influence back in New York was able to generate enthusiasm for a similar park, this leading to the creation of Central Park (s.p.b.).