Mid-Park Self-Guided Tour

Belvedere Castle
In 1867, Calvert Vaux, Park co-designer and architect, created this fanciful observation tower as a “belvedere,” Italian for “panoramic viewpoint”. Placed atop Vista Rock, it overlooks the old reservoir (now the Great Lawn). Designed in the Norman Gothic style, the Castle is constructed of the same Manhattan schist as its promontory, giving it the magical appearance of rising out of the rock itself.

The United States Weather Bureau set up offices in the Castle in 1919 to monitor and report New York City's weather. In the early 1960s, the Weather Bureau installed automated meteorological instruments, and the staff vacated the building. The empty Castle deteriorated into a sad, graffiti-covered ruin. In 1983, it was restored by the Central Park Conservancy and became a popular visitor center and nature observatory. The weather instruments remain on the Castle's tower and monitor New York City's weather around the clock. When you hear “The weather in Central Park is…” on the radio or television, remember the information comes from Belvedere Castle in Central Park.

King Jagiello and Turtle Pond
This imposing statue by Polish sculptor Stanislaw Ostrowski (1879-1947) portrays King Jagiello, the Grand Duke of Lithuania, who united Lithuania and Poland after marrying the Queen of Poland. The monument depicts the moment preceding his victory at the Battle of Grunewald of 1410 when the King crossed the two swords - handed to him by his adversaries, the Teutonic Knights of the Cross - above his head.

The sculpture was chosen in 1939 for the entrance to the Polish Pavilion at the World's Fair in New York. That year, the Nazis invaded Poland, preventing the sculpture's return to its homeland. In 1945 it was placed in Central Park by the Polish government as a symbol of the proud and courageous Polish people.

The King Jagiello statue is located at the eastern end of Turtle Pond, which attracts migrating birds and waterfowl and three species of turtles. The snapping turtles can reach nearly 20 inches (50.8 cm) in diameter, and can be seen sunning themselves at the waterline of Vista Rock. The nature blind, a platform that juts out into the northern side of Turtle Pond, is a wonderful place from which to observe wildlife.

Obelisk
This 3,500-year-old monument stands directly behind the Metropolitan Museum of Art. To celebrate the 30th year of his reign, Egyptian pharaoh Thutmosis III (c. 1479-1425 B.C.) commissioned a pair of obelisks for the sacred city of Heliopolis. In 12 B.C., they were moved to Alexandria, where they stood until the 19th century, when all great cities around the world clamored for an ancient Egyptian obelisk. The Khedive of Egypt gave one obelisk to England in 1879 and the other to America in 1881, in exchange for foreign aid to modernize his country.

On a snowy January 22, 1881, thousands of proud New Yorkers celebrated the turning of Central Park's 220-ton obelisk (nicknamed “Cleopatra's Needle”) to an upright position. The renowned filmmaker Cecil B. DeMille, who fondly remembered playing in the area as a boy, donated the plaques that translate the hieroglyphics.

Great Lawn
Very few people know that the Great Lawn, a luxurious green area at the geographical center of Central Park, was originally the site of the Croton Reservoir completed in 1842, fifteen years before the construction of Central Park began. With the City's increasing need for water, plans for a new water system rendered this reservoir obsolete. The reservoir was drained in 1931, filled in, andopened as a luxurious green oval in 1937.

The Great Lawn is better known as the venue for famous concerts and events, beginning in the 1970s. Concerts by Elton John, Diana Ross, Simon and Garfunkel, and Luciano Pavarotti; the exhibit of the AIDS Quilt; the visit of Pope John Paul II; and the film premier of Disney's Pocahontas drew enormous crowds, causing severe damage to the lawn. In addition, the site still held the subterranean walls of the old reservoir, which prevented adequate drainage, and by the 1980s the Great Lawn had turned into the “Great Dustbowl.”

From 1995 to 1997, the Central Park Conservancy and the City of New York undertook the largest single restoration in Central Park's history - the 55-acre area covering the 13-acre Great Lawn Oval and its surrounding landscapes. The Great Lawn is once again the setting for ballgames, sunbathing, and picnicking; the Metropolitan Opera and the New York Philharmonic each give their two traditional performances a year. All these activities are carefully monitored in accordance with the management guidelines instituted to ensure the continuing health of the Great Lawn.

The Great Lawn is a particularly good place to admire some of the Park's 26,000 trees. The Arthur Ross Pinetum at the northern end of the Oval features 15 species and five varieties of pines. The twin linden trees inside the middle of the eastern edge of the Oval mirror each other, their intertwined branches forming an elegant heart-shaped silhouette.