A Walking Tour of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania
Harrisburg has been an important transportation center since the days of riverboat traffic. In
colonial days, John Harris operated a ferry at Harrisburg. Its western boundary is formed by
the Susquehanna River. This location played an important part in its selection as the capital
of Pennsylvania in 1812. Because of its location, Harrisburg played a large part in the early
development of the Pennsylvania canal system and the subsequent development of the railroads,
highways and airlines. Today, Harrisburg is one of the most important commercial centers and
distribution points in the East.
At the turn of the 20th Century, spurred by the design of New York’s Central Park by the Frederick
Olmstead, a nationwide conservancy effort began. In Harrisburg that movement was spearheaded
by City natives J. Horace McFarland and Mira Lloyd Dock, who established Harrisburg’s League
of Municipal Improvements. In 1901, their visionary efforts, collectively known and “The City
Beautiful Movement,”established Harrisburg’s first official park system and saw to its expansion over
the next decade to include Riverfront Park, Reservoir Park, City Island and what is today known as
the Capital Area Greenbelt.
Since that time Harrisburg has gone through many transformations. By the early 1980s,
Harrisburg’s once grand park system had become symbolic of the blighted city around it.
Harrisburg was near bankruptcy and been declared the second most distressed city in the nation.
The City’s parks were in a terrible state of repair and were widely misused for criminal activity. The
1982 election of reformist Mayor Stephen R. Reed changed everything for the City, especially the
suffering parks system. The Mayor’s Parks Improvement Program was born and saw the investment
of more than $29 million since 1984, a proverbial phoenix of greenery rising from the ashes of
decades of neglect. New developers and preservationists have adhered to the program in the years
since.
Our walking tour will start at the symbol of the Commonwealth, the State Capitol, a building
President Theodore Roosevelt proclaimed as “the most beautiful building he had ever seen” when he
attended its dedication in 1906...
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