Stony Brook Reservation is a woodland park in

Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...

and Dedham,

Massachusetts Massachusetts (Massachusett language, Massachusett: ''Muhsachuweesut assachusett writing systems, məhswatʃəwiːsət'' English: , ), officially the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, is the most populous U.S. state, state in the New England ...

, a unit of the

Metropolitan Park System of Greater Boston The Metropolitan Park System of Greater Boston is a system of reservations, parks, parkways and roads under the control of the Massachusetts Department of Conservation and Recreation (DCR) in and around Boston that has been in existence for over a ...

, part of the

state park State parks are parks or other protected areas managed at the sub-national level within those nations which use "state" as a political subdivision. State parks are typically established by a state to preserve a location on account of its natural ...

system of Massachusetts. It was established in 1894 as one of the five original reservations created by the Metropolitan Park Commission. The park is served by the Stony Brook Reservation Parkways, a road system that was entered into the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...

in 2006.

Location

The park is located in the southwest of Boston. Its main contiguous section extends southwards from Washington Street in the

West Roxbury West Roxbury is a neighborhood in Boston, Massachusetts bordered by Roslindale and Jamaica Plain to the northeast, the town of Brookline to the north, the cities and towns of Newton and Needham to the northwest and the town of Dedham to the ...

neighborhood to

Mother Brook Mother Brook is a stream that flows from the Charles River in Dedham, Massachusetts, to the Neponset River in the Hyde Park section of Boston, Massachusetts. Mother Brook was also known variously as East Brook and Mill Creek in earlier times. ...

in the

Hyde Park Hyde Park may refer to: Places England * Hyde Park, London, a Royal Park in Central London * Hyde Park, Leeds, an inner-city area of north-west Leeds * Hyde Park, Sheffield, district of Sheffield * Hyde Park, in Hyde, Greater Manchester Austra ...

neighborhood, with an additional southwest along a roadway to Mother Brook in Dedham. An adjacent portion encompasses the Bellevue Hill water towers on the north side of Washington Street. Stony Brook Reservation contains the headwaters of Stony Brook. Park elevations range from

at to Bellevue Hill, at the highest point in the city of Boston.

History

The use of parcels of undeveloped land around Boston for a system of interconnected parks were conceived by landscape architect Charles Eliot, who had apprenticed with

Frederick Law Olmsted Frederick Law Olmsted (April 26, 1822August 28, 1903) was an American landscape architect, journalist, social critic, and public administrator. He is considered to be the father of landscape architecture in the USA. Olmsted was famous for co- ...

and later assumed leadership of Olmsted's design firm in 1893. Eliot was instrumental in the founding of

The Trustees of Reservations The Trustees of Reservations is a non-profit land conservation and historic preservation organization dedicated to preserving natural and historical places in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. It is the oldest land conservation nonprofit orga ...

and the public Metropolitan Parks Commission in the 1890s and envisioned an expansion of the parks network to areas surrounding Boston. The first five areas acquired by the Metropolitan Park Commission for this system in 1893 were the Beaver Brook, Blue Hills, Hemlock Gorge, Middlesex Fells and Stony Brook Reservations.

Activities and amenities

Recreational facilities at the park include hiking and biking trails, fishing at Turtle Pond, athletic fields, tennis courts, an ice skating rink, and a swimming pool.

References

External links

Stony Brook Reservation
Department of Conservation and Recreation
Stony Brook Reservation Trail Map
Department of Conservation and Recreation {{authority control Parks in Boston State parks of Massachusetts Protected areas established in 1894 Parks in Norfolk County, Massachusetts Parks in Dedham, Massachusetts 1894 establishments in Massachusetts