National Park Service U.S. Department of the Interior

Resource History and Description of Existing Conditions
landscape work. An especial study had been made of the planning and construction of
formal gardens, so that they conform to the architectural features as found. 1066
It is possible that the large scale changes intended by the Vanderbilts were of a level of
design difficulty outside the normal scope of Meehan's services, prompting the employment of
James L. Greenleaf.
James L. Greenleaf began a second career in landscape architecture in 1894 after
fourteen years as a civil engineer. While working in private practice, he designed gardens on
many large estates in the fashionable suburban areas of New York City, including Westchester
County, Long Island, and suburban New Jersey and Connecticut. His 1903 work for Vanderbilt
at Hyde Park is one of his early and few surviving private works. The year following his work
for the Vanderbilts, Greenleaf became a member of the American Society of Landscape
Architects (ASLA). Indicative of his success in his new profession, he later served as President
of the ASLA's New York Chapter in 1914 and 1915, as Trustee of the Society from 1920-1923,
and as its national President from 1923-1926.
Through presidential appointment in 1918, Greenleaf succeeded Frederick Law
Olmsted, Jr. as the landscape member of the National Commission of Fine Arts, and in 1923 he
was reappointed to serve until 1927 when he was replaced by Ferruccio Vitale. Among
Greenleaf's activities during his service to the commission, which included consultation with the
fledgling National Park Service, he was vitally involved with the development of the landscape
of the Lincoln Memorial and Arlington Memorial Bridge. In 1919, the War Department asked
the cooperation of the Commission of Fine Arts in the development of the American Cemeteries
in Europe, a project Greenleaf remained involved with until his death in 1933.
Vanderbilt's ledger books record expenses exceeding $23,000 during 1903 for the
construction of Greenleaf's meticulous garden plans. 1067 The expensive work of creating an
Italian style garden focused primarily on the eastern third of the existing garden. Here
Greenleaf cracked open the square proportions of the previous space with the extension of the
pool pergola outside the pre-existing garden box. Through this device, Greenleaf was free to
employ the classical proportions of the "Golden Mean" in the new layout of the garden
interior. 1068 Paired with this Renaissance formula, Greenleaf also put the dramatic effects of
one-point perspective to work by setting up an axial relationship between two new pergolas
which survive as focal points in the design. The larger of the two structures is the pool pergola,
oriented to the southeast and also serving as a viewing platform to the naturalistic landscape
beyond the garden wall.
The square proportions of the formal gardens were further reshaped in 1910 with the
creation of the "Loggia Garden," an appended garden terrace extending to the east of
Greenleaf's 1903 work. Other than hints that Vanderbilt had been dismayed at the high cost of
constructing his designs, it is not understood why the Vanderbilts terminated their association
with Greenleaf and turned elsewhere for design services. 1069 The Loggia Garden was designed
under the auspices of the Thomas Meehan & Sons landscape design department, which
1066 Meehan Nursery Catalog (Germantown, PA.: Meehan Nursery, 1905), Back Cover.
1067 Cash Book, "Hyde Park 1903-1905," 205-219, Hyde Park Estate Ledgers, ROVA Archives.
1068 Rieley, et. al., 24, fig. J.
1069 Rieley, et. al., 25.
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