August 15, 2005 - The History of the Hills in Central Park; a Tall Tale

What I'm about to tell you is 100% true, mostly.

If you ever run or walked through Central Park you know the place is filled with hills. Long slow hills, short steep ones, curved hills, you get the picture. Over the years they've accquired names, Heartbreak Hill, Navy Hill, Pilgrim Hill, Cat Hill, Great Hill and others. What you may not know is how the hills came to be.

I must start this with a disclaimer: I grew up a St. Louis Cardinals fans, and my allegiance to any ball club now is limited to the home stadium I'm sitting in at any given time.

After hill training in the park this week, I was tired. Really tired. The practice finished at dusk and I spent most of my run back to the starting point (East 90th street) by myself. I actually had to take a few minutes to stop running and stretch my IT band (see the picture to the left for what an IT Band is) because the hills had done a number on them. So here I was doing this on the grass:





This older guy walked up to me. Remember now, it's getting dark in Central Park, I'm pretty much by myself off the main drive of the park. I was a little leery of the old dude, but something about him was familiar. I had seen him before. He looked an awful like, and I am not kidding you, Babe Ruth. But the Babe was wearing contemporary running clothes. This is what he told me:

Tough night on the hills, Jim? (he knew my name, so I figured he was part of Team in Training). Yeah, they can be a real tough son of gun. You know how they got that way? (of course I did not) A lot of people think it's because Olmstead and Vaux, the designers of the park had to incorporate the rolling landscape and swamp land. But that's not it. It's a problem of clams.(obviously he registered my disbelief) That's right. Clams. When the two were designing the

park, both of them were members of a club, similar to the Masons, made up of builders, landscapers who liked to play a new game called baseball. They called themselves the YANKEES. Olmstead and Vaux appealled to their club for help in making the park a success.

It just so happened that while researching this, a rival designer, Bennet T. Blockart (pictured here), from Boston was in attendance during the research. He too, was a member of a similar club in Boston which distinguished itself by wearing bright red socks. In fact the club was called the RED SOX, the 'x' in the sox was due in part to the poor spelling skills of the Boston club's secretary. Blockart said, he knew of a custom whereby if a builder buried a bushel of clam shells under the project in question, the project would be a smashing success. Bennet then offered to send Olmstead and Vaux a bushel of Boston's finest clams upon his return to Bean Town.

The clams arrived with these simple instructions were simple: Prepare a Clam Chowder at midnight, bury the shells in a pit after consuming the chowder. Best wishes, B.B.

The club set up a big pot in the middle of the soon to be Central Park. They had a clam chowder feast to beat the band.

What they didn't know was Blockart had put one bad clam in the bushel. One bad clam can do a world of hurt even on a good chowder. The scene was not pretty. The next morning all nine of the members were discovered with their heads in the hole, so sick they couldn't move. Each was carted away to their homes to convalesce.

They recovered after a while. In that time, Olmstead and Vaux learned of the dirty joke Blockart had played on the Yankees. Rather than respond by sending bags of tainted Bagels, Olmstead and Vaux struck back by inviting Blockart and his club, the Red Sox to a friendly match of baseball.

The Red Sox were trounced. At the end of the game, Olmstead stood on the pitcher's mound and declared: May all your sorrows and broken dreams be collected under the foundation of this park and make this park the GRANDEST PARK IN THE WORLD.

Thunder clapped over head. Lightining struck the bench where the Red Sox were sitting, scattering the Boston like buckshot. Then the howls of pain and fright from the Red Sox Club were sucked in to the hole made by the lightning. Everyone stood slack jawed as the ground beneath them began to swell and rise up. Everyone but Olmstead and Vaux. They stood strong and when all was said and done, they were standing on what is now know as the Great Hill.

Blockart, his face white, turned to Olmstead and Vaux and vowed that the Yankees had not heard the last of the Red Sox. A clap of thunder and Blockart cowered the tripped and rolled down the new hill his club's loss had created.

Since then, everytime the Red Sox lose the hills get a little larger. People talk about the Curse of the Bambino, but that has nothing to do with it. So much fuss over a bad clam. But look around, this really is a great park, hills and all. You know Heartbreak Hill? I got one word for you: Buckner. That poor SOB, that's his doing.

So the pain in your knees and the stress on your joints, you can thank the Boston Red Sox for those.

I bent down to check my laces, saying that was a nice story mister. and when I looked up he was gone. I continued back to meet up with my Team in Training compadres and I swear I heard, "Buckner what have you done?" followed by a visceral moan, "oooooohhhhhh nooooooo!"

So if you're in the park at dusk on the night of a full moon, put your ear to the wind, and you can hear the cries and broken dreams of the Red Sox fans escaping from under the hills.

Happy Trails,

JP