Joseph Rodman Drake Park
2.49 acres
The property of Joseph Rodman Drake Park in the Hunts Point area of the
Bronx was once the site of a Weckquaesgeek Indian village called Quinnahung, meaning
"a long high place" or "the planting neck." During the Revolutionary
War, George Washington’s continental troops passed through this plot in their retreat
from Long Island. In the late 17th century, Thomas Hunt (for whom the Hunt’s Point
neighborhood is named) acquired this property and built his stone mansion, the Grange. The Hunt mansion served as a childhood haven for Joseph Rodman Drake.
Born on August 7, 1795, Joseph Rodman Drake was a descendant of Sir Francis Drake, a 16th
century navigator who was the first Englishman to circumnavigate the globe. Joseph Rodman
Drake was a gifted young poet who praised the natural beauty of the Bronx in his verse. In
1813 Drake abandoned a career in business and began studying medicine with local doctors.
That year he met and immediately befriended fellow poet Fitz-Greene Halleck. From March to
July 1819, they collaborated on "The Croaker Papers." This series of humorous
poems lampooning City officials was published in the New York Post. Although he worked as a physician, Drake is best known as the
celebrated author of poems including "The Culprit Fay" and "The American
Flag." When he died of tuberculosis at the age of twenty-five on September 21, 1820,
Drake was laid to rest in the Hunt family burial ground at the Grange. Halleck wrote the
epitaph on Drake’s tombstone: "Green be the turf above thee; Friend of my better
days; None knew thee but to love thee; Nor named thee but to praise." Drake’s
daughter compiled and published his works in October 1835. The burial ground of the Hunt mansion consists of about fifty markers
including names such as Hunt, Leggett, and Willett—all families associated with the
settlement and development of the Bronx. The streets near the cemetery are named for
prominent poets including Drake, Halleck, (John Greenleaf) Whittier, and (Henry Wadsworth)
Longfellow. In 1905 the cemetery was saved from destruction by local literary enthusiasts.
Four years later, Parks acquired the property. The park was named in honor of Joseph Rodman Drake in 1915. That year
the Bronx Society of Arts and Science installed a seven-foot marble shaft inscribed with
Halleck’s words to mark Drake’s grave. The Society placed another tablet in
Drake’s honor near the Lorillard Snuff Mill in the New York Botanical Garden. A 1934
survey at the site shows a stone dwelling, a metal garage, and a tool shed standing in the
vicinity of the burial ground in 1934. These features were no longer in place when a major
renovation was undertaken in 1953. At that time, an iron picket fence was installed around
the cemetery, benches were placed along the paths and cinder sidewalks were built along
the perimeter. In 1962 the timber curbs around the cemetery were replaced with concrete.
Even as the surrounding neighborhood has grown more industrial, the pastoral beauty of the
Joseph Rodman Drake Park endures.
Wednesday, Mar 03, 1999