We all know the New York Post can get a little wild with the headlines every now and then. But this one is, well, pretty much spot-on:
Washington Square is one of New York's liveliest parks, with NYU students, dog walkers, street performers, tourists and drug dealers crowding its nearly 10 acres of lush sidewalks and meeting spots. But just below all this bustling humanity lurks a shocking secret: 20,000 dead bodies.
"What lies beneath that splendid, recently re-landscaped and renovated outdoor sanctuary is a bit more morbid," research librarian Carmen Nigro wrote in a blog post for the New York Public Library.
From 1797 to roughly 1820, the eastern two-thirds of Washington Square Park was a potter's field, where the bodies of poor and unidentified New Yorkers were unceremoniously dumped in mass graves. For just $4,500, New York City purchased the plot so impoverished locals could afford a decent spot to rest in peace.
You can appreciate the necessity. It's New York. There are a ton of people there and there always have been. Back in the day you had to locate cemeteries pretty much wherever you could.
So how did it become the beautiful Washington Square Park we know today?
Soon after the ground reached its capacity for human burials, mayor Philip Hone initiated his strategy for transforming the potter's field into a public square. His intent was to raise the property values adjacent to the square, and it was related to a scheme to raise funding for a charity called Sailor's Snug Harbor ... Hone's models were prestigious London squares such as Belgrave Square. But instead of a private space like London's squares, the mayor wanted to create a free public space. In 1827, courts agreed with him and Washington Square was legally declared a "public space."
