Trisha Shetty (Editor)

Kennedy Park (Fall River, Massachusetts)

Updated on
Edit
Like
Comment
Share on FacebookTweet on TwitterShare on LinkedInShare on Reddit
MPS
  
Fall River MRA

Area
  
23 ha

Phone
  
+1 508-324-2550

NRHP Reference #
  
83000686

Year built
  
1868

Added to NRHP
  
16 February 1983

Kennedy Park (Fall River, Massachusetts)

Architect
  
Olmsted Brothers; Vaux & Co.

Architectural style
  
Colonial Revival, Shingle Style

Address
  
S Main St, Fall River, MA 02724, USA

Similar
  
Ruggles Park, Fall River Heritage State Park, St Anne's Church and Paris, Charles M Braga Jr Memorial, Lafayette–Durfee House

Kennedy Park (originally known as South Park) is a 57-acre (23 ha) historic park located in Fall River, Massachusetts. It is bounded by South Main Street, Bradford Avenue, Middle, and Bay Streets in the southern part of the city. The area of the city where the park is located was until 1862, part of Rhode Island.

The park was originally the farm of John Durfee. The location gained national attention in December 1832, when the pregnant lifeless body of Sarah M. Cornell was found hanging from a stackpole there. Her death was later deemed to be murder. Methodist minister Ephraim K. Avery was accused of the crime, but acquitted after a sensational trial. The verdict outraged many local citizens. Sarah's body was initially buried on the Durfee farm, but moved years later to Oak Grove Cemetery when the park was being built.

Built in 1868, designed by famed 19th century landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux, the park was originally known as "South Park". It was updated in 1904 by the Olmsted Brothers. The park was renamed in 1963 following the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. The park provides a vast area of open space in the middle of a particularly dense portion of the city, surrounded by many triple-decker working-class tenement houses and the Catholic St. Anne's Church.

The park has three sections: a flat upper section used for baseball and recreation fields, a sloping middle portion with sweeping views of Mount Hope Bay, and a lower somewhat wooded portion along the Bay.

The park was added to the National Historic Register in 1983. It was restored in 2001.

Kennedy Park has long been used a place for public events in the city.

In September 1996, over 25,000 people gathered in the lower portion of the park to see then President Bill Clinton during a campaign stop for his 1996 re-election.

Each August since 1986, the park hosts the Great Holy Ghost Feast of New England, a celebration of Azorean culture which attracts over 200,000 people each year.

References

Kennedy Park (Fall River, Massachusetts) Wikipedia


Similar Topics