EARLY PLEASURE TOURS
In connection with the tours for the enjoyment of scenery which young
Frederick Olmsted made, generally with his parents, it is perhaps
interesting to record in detail one taken in 1838, when he was sixteen.
His father, Mr. John Olmsted, kept an accurate diary, and in this we
find noted: “Journey to White Mountains,” “in our double carriage,”
“self, wife, Fredk. and John,” Aug. 8-25, 1838. The itinerary reads:
“Springfield, Mt. Holyoke, Northampton, Whateley, Deerfield (old
houses), Bloody Brook, Greenfield, Bernardstown, Brattleboro, Putney
Hills, Walpole, Bellows Falls, Charleston, Claremont, Windsor, Hanover
(view of river from hill), Orford, Haverhill (N. H.), Newbury (Vt.),
Oxbow Narrows, Bath, Franconia Notch, Mt. Lafayette, Littleton, Fabyan,
Crawford Notch, Conway, Center Harbor, Lake Winnipesaukee, Red Mt.,
Wolfboro, Rochester, Great Falls, Dover, Portsmouth, Newburyport,
Haverhill, Andover, Lynn, Nahant, Boston.”
In Boston there is a note: “Navy Yard, Bunker Hill, Mt. Auburn,
Athenæum,” Aug. 22 “F. to Andover.”
Frederick’s voyage to China before the mast in 1843 gave little
opportunity for pleasure sightseeing, and while lying in the ports of
Canton and Hongkong,--if we may judge from the few notes he has left
about this experience,--he was naturally most interested in the people
and their strange customs and their attitude towards “heathen” visitors.
There are two of Frederick’s letters relating to trips in the summer of
1845.
GLEN FALLS (N. Y.), Aug. 3, 1845.
DEAR FATHER: or whoever is at home, if Father has gone to Saratoga:
I believe the only description of the country between here and
Burlington I have given you was in a pencil letter written at
Charlotte. The afternoon’s ride of that day was through a very poor
country, clay and stones. What land had been cleared seemed to be
principally devoted to the raising of burnt stumps and mullen; some
little grass, to be sure did now and then make its appearance, but I
should think the poor sheep would find it hard work enough to live,
without troubling themselves with growing wool. A little ways out
of Charlotte, though, I recollect I was met by one of the finest
views I had ever seen. It was on a hill which overlooked the country
and the lake towards the southwest. Between me and the Lake lay
some pretty village or other on the ground sloping towards it, the
land looking really very rich,--and by the way the soil just by the
lake all along is fine. Beyond lay the Lake itself,--bays, islands,
etc.,--looking beautifully; but the chief charm was the background, a
heap of mountains over in Essex Co. I never saw mountains rise more
beautifully one above another, the larger ones seeming to cluster
round and protect the smaller, nor did the summer veil of haze
ever sit on them more sweetly. Back of all rose some magnificent
thunder-heads and they rose fast too, compelling me at five o’clock to
take refuge and toast and eggs in a little road-side inn.
“HARTFORD, Sept. 1, 1845.
“MY DEAR FRED [KINGSBURY][5]:
Charley and I had a fine cruise ’round. Charley wanted to get home
before Emma left, and we drove, with all night sleeping in a boat
or on the ground, and one night on a sloop’s transom. Sunday night
we camped out at Haddam, below. Made a sq. sail of our tent, and
turned in on a blanket under it. It was a most beautiful place, a
green grassy dell glen sloping gently up, lofty and picturesque
trees opening a way for it back to a most lovely vista. A most
charming prospect of our Rhine in front and on either side. Lots of
wild pigeons, meteors, owls, sturgeons, mosquitoes, wipporwills,
methodists, and hydrophious quadrupeds to lull us to grassy sleep. We
struck our tent and broke up camp at an hour or two before day break,
and were till noon working up to the landing a few miles above. I
believe you will think we didn’t do much at Mineralogizing. We went
with John and Rev. Mr. Gilbert to the mines--a rocky hillside, and
in an hour or two got a pocket full of tourmalines, garnites and
something else (?) and appetites and a glass of brandy for my cholic,
because we were too lazy to kindle a fire Sunday morning and eat green
apples to kill-hunger....
Both Frederick Olmsted and his brother were fond of boating, and, in
their small sail-boat, had many trips on the Connecticut River and in
the Sound, especially during the family’s summer visits to Sachem’s
Head. In spite of the harshness of his experiences on the Chinese
voyage, Mr. Olmsted retained his fondness for ships and was wont to
hold up the clipper ship as the ideal of beauty in perfect organization
for use.
There is also a reminiscence jotted down in Mr. Olmsted’s later days of
a trip to Canada in 1846.
[Illustration: The Five Friends in New Haven Days
Charles Trask Frederick J. Kingsbury John Hull Olmsted
Charles Loring Brace Frederick Law Olmsted]
Once on a time my father took me with him on a journey which carried
us into Canada. While there we had for several days as a traveling
companion an Englishman, animated, amiable, frank and engaging. As I
think of our intercourse now, I can see plainly that he looked upon me
as a new specimen and was drawing me out and turning me over with the
interest of a naturalist. It is clear also that he got some new ideas
from me and often when our conversation was interrupted, he took
notes. My experience with men in America, though I was a youngster,
had been various, and I was then fresh from association with a large
number of youngsters,--youngsters merely, but gathered from all parts
of the Union. With these I had been made intimate at foot ball and
boat club, in long walks, trouting excursions, duck shooting, long
winter night talks over the stove and more formal debates of our
“Society.” My experience of mankind and my views of men were crude
and bigoted, but they were obviously sincere and simple convictions
and they were as strange to the Englishman as average English
country-gentlemen’s convictions would surely be to me.
FOOTNOTES:
[5] This letter, written to one of his chums, refers to a sailboat
trip from New Haven to Hartford, with Charles Loring Brace, another
of the group of five young men formed during the New Haven days (John
Hull and F. L. Olmsted, Charles Trask, and the two just mentioned). In
a reminiscent letter Frederick Olmsted says of Charles Brace: “We had
many long tramps together; I remember once being with him for a week
or two on a walk which took us through Litchfield, Stockbridge and
Lenox. I remember also vividly a fine run of fourteen miles on skates,
ending in a cold bath. He entered college with my brother and they were
room-mates; and, as for four years afterwards I lived in or near New
Haven, and was, a part of the time, attending the same lectures with
them, we continued to be in close intimacy.”