Prospect Park is celebrating its 150th birthday this year, and Brooklyn Historical Society is joining in on the festivities with a new exhibit.

The exhibit, The Means of a Ready Escape: Brooklyn’s Prospect Park, will examine the history of the park that’s become known as Brooklyn’s backyard. The park was designed by Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux, who transformed an expanse of forest and swamp into an iconic green space.

Photo via Library of Congress
Sheep grazing in Prospect Park’s Long Meadow in 1903. Photo via Library of Congress

The history of the park will be told through informative panels and over 150 documents and objects. Postcards, scrapbooks and photographs will all be used to illustrate the relationship between the park and the public. Artifacts of note will include Olmsted and Vaux’s original plan of the Park and a model of the Samuel J. and Ethel LeFrak Center at Lakeside by Tod Williams and Billie Tsien Architects, which opened in 2013.

The exhibit was done in collaboration with the Prospect Park Alliance and will be on display at the Brooklyn Historical Society at 128 Pierrepont Street from July 12 through July 2018. To learn more about the exhibit, click here.

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