Shawnee Park

Frederick Law Olmsted created the general plan of Shawnee Park in 1893. The 120-acre park featured a Great Lawn for public events and recreation, as well as a beach and boating ramp along the Ohio river for boating and swimming activities.

The Shawnee Park job file includes plans both for the park and for a proposed parkway from the southeast (now Algonquin Parkway and Southwestern Parkway) as well as Western (now Southwestern) Parkway from the north. These were planned as connections to the rest of the park system and community which matched the Olmsted goal “of quickly giving people a chance to cheaply, conveniently and pleasantly escape at times from town and come under the influence of…agreeable scenery.” [First Annual Report, Louisville Board of Park Commissioners_1891_07_ prepared by F.L. Olmsted & Co., Landscape Architects]. Western Parkway connected to Market Street and included tracks of the Louisville Railway Co. which brought park users easily to the park from the center of Louisville via Market Street.