Parque de la Abolición (English: Abolition Park) is a city park in Barrio Cuarto,

Ponce, Puerto Rico Ponce ( , , ) is a city and a Municipalities of Puerto Rico, municipality on the southern coast of Puerto Rico. The most populated city outside the San Juan, Puerto Rico, San Juan metropolitan area, Ponce was founded on August 12, 1692Some publ ...

. It was the first park in the

Caribbean The Caribbean ( , ; ; ; ) is a region in the middle of the Americas centered around the Caribbean Sea in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, mostly overlapping with the West Indies. Bordered by North America to the north, Central America ...

to commemorate the abolition of

slavery Slavery is the ownership of a person as property, especially in regards to their labour. Slavery typically involves compulsory work, with the slave's location of work and residence dictated by the party that holds them in bondage. Enslavemen ...

. It was built in 1874 and renovated in 1956.

Background

Slaves were brought to Puerto Rico from Africa, starting in the early 16th century and lasting through the 19th century, to replace the local Indian slaves who had been decimated. The new slaves worked the

coffee Coffee is a beverage brewed from roasted, ground coffee beans. Darkly colored, bitter, and slightly acidic, coffee has a stimulating effect on humans, primarily due to its caffeine content, but decaffeinated coffee is also commercially a ...

sugar cane Sugarcane or sugar cane is a species of tall, Perennial plant, perennial grass (in the genus ''Saccharum'', tribe Andropogoneae) that is used for sugar Sugar industry, production. The plants are 2–6 m (6–20 ft) tall with stout, jointed, fib ...

, and

gold mining Gold mining is the extraction of gold by mining. Historically, mining gold from Alluvium, alluvial deposits used manual separation processes, such as gold panning. The expansion of gold mining to ores that are not on the surface has led to mor ...

industries in Puerto Rico. During the 18th century, as gold mining ceased to be one of the major industries in Puerto Rico, slaves worked mostly in coffee plantations and sugar cane fields. By a royal proclamation of

Spain Spain, or the Kingdom of Spain, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe with territories in North Africa. Featuring the Punta de Tarifa, southernmost point of continental Europe, it is the largest country in Southern Eur ...

slavery was abolished on 22 March 1873.

History

In 1874, a year after the abolition of slavery, a group of citizens built a small park in memory of the historic event. In 1880 Olimpio Otero, Juan Mayoral Barnés, and

Román Baldorioty de Castro Román Baldorioty de Castro (23 February 1822 – 30 September 1889) was a leading Puerto Rican Abolitionism, abolitionist and spokesman for the right to self-determination of Puerto Rico. In 1870, he was elected as a deputy in the Cortes Ge ...

were instrumental in creating the concept for a park dedicated to the commemorating the abolition of slavery, the only such memorial in the

. Juan Mayoral Barnés brought the idea for the creation of the park to the Ponce Municipal Assembly on 14 March 1880. It was unanimously approved by the Assembly, ratified by the Central Government, and confirmed by Royal Decree on 1 March 1881. The park was built and opened in the 1890s. It had swing sets for children, a fountain with colorful fish, and a

roller coaster A roller coaster is a type of list of amusement rides, amusement ride employing a form of elevated Railway track, railroad track that carries passengers on a roller coaster train, train through tight turns, steep slopes, and other elements, usua ...

. On 6 May 1956, under the administration of Ponce mayor Andrés Grillasca Salas, the roller coaster, swing sets and fish pond were removed, and replace with the current Concha Acústica amphitheater. The statue of the freed slave was added at the base of the obelisk. The sculpture of the freed slave is a work of Victor Cott. Also in 1956, the park's Concha Acústica opened.

Location and features

The park is located on Avenida Hostos at the fork of Salud Street and Marina Street, immediately north of the 100-foot high Monumento a la abolición de la esclavitud. It sits across from the Darlington Building, Ponce's first multi-story building, which was completed in 1952. The park features a grassy green area with trees and masonry benches as well as two monuments to commemorate the abolition of slavery in Puerto Rico: a

monument A monument is a type of structure that was explicitly created to commemorate a person or event, or which has become relevant to a social group as a part of their remembrance of historic times or cultural heritage, due to its artistic, historical ...

depicting a black male slave with broken chains depicting he is a free man, and a 100-foot high

obelisk An obelisk (; , diminutive of (') ' spit, nail, pointed pillar') is a tall, slender, tapered monument with four sides and a pyramidal or pyramidion top. Originally constructed by Ancient Egyptians and called ''tekhenu'', the Greeks used th ...

, Monumento a la abolición de la esclavitud, which rises just behind the black iron

sculpture Sculpture is the branch of the visual arts that operates in three dimensions. Sculpture is the three-dimensional art work which is physically presented in the dimensions of height, width and depth. It is one of the plastic arts. Durable sc ...

of the freed slave to accentuates and give instance to the occasion. Between the green area of the park and the two monuments is the outdoors acoustic

amphitheater An amphitheatre ( U.S. English: amphitheater) is an open-air venue used for entertainment, performances, and sports. The term derives from the ancient Greek ('), from ('), meaning "on both sides" or "around" and ('), meaning "place for vie ...

known as '' La Concha Acustica'' (English: The Acoustic Shell) which completes the park in its triangular city block. After almost 70 years of use with only minor maintenance, the park was renovated in 1956 by Francisco Porrata Doria, an architect from Ponce.''Recreacion.''
Oficina de Fomento Turístico. Municipio Autónomo de Ponce. 7 September 2009. Retrieved 5 February 2014.

References

External links

Photo of Parque de la Abolicion (ca. 1906) before the obelisk was built

Parque de la Abolicion in 1910, looking north
{{DEFAULTSORT:Parque de la Abolicion 1870s establishments in Puerto Rico Music venues in Ponce, Puerto Rico Parks in Ponce, Puerto Rico Tourist attractions in Ponce, Puerto Rico Urban public parks 1874 establishments in the Spanish Empire

Background

History

Location and features

See also

References

Further reading

External links