Bowery Boys Tours: The Park as a Potter’s Field
Join us for expert-led tours from Bowery Boys Walks: a walk through history with podcast pros. Tours meet in Holley Plaza.
Friday, September 25 at 11:00 am: The Park as a Potter’s Field
Long before Washington Square Park was a place to gather, it was a place of rest – literally. From the late 1700s through the early 1800s, the land served as a city potter's field, a public burial ground for the poor, the unknown, and the many victims of the yellow fever epidemics that repeatedly swept through New York. Estimates put the number of people buried beneath the park's grounds at over 20,000. One of those people was James Jackson, a 28-year-old Irish immigrant and watchman who died of yellow fever in 1799. His sandstone headstone was unearthed during renovation work in 2009 and can be seen today in the window of the Park House. The city eventually repurposed the land as a military parade ground in 1826, setting off the real estate boom that would transform the surrounding neighborhood into one of Manhattan's most coveted addresses.
The Conservancy is deeply grateful to the Mellon Foundation for its support of the NYC Parks Burial Ground Project, which is advancing a critical effort to recognize and commemorate those buried in parkland sites across New York City, including in Washington Square Park.