Watkins Park
Inscription
Land once known as Watkins Grove was given to the city in 1870 by brick maker and contractor Samuel Watkins. It served as a site for political gatherings, school commencements and concerts. This became Nashville’s first public park in 1901. Park Board chairman E.C. Lewis planned landscape features including a stone entrance and fence, walkways, flowerbeds, and benches, which were built with materials donated by citizens.
In 1906, the Centennial Club opened the city’s first playground here, setting a precedent for public recreation facilities elsewhere in the city. Improved by the Works Progress Administration in the 1930s, Watkins Park was a park for black Nashvillians from 1936 until the 1960s, when the park system was desegregated.
Location
Sources
More markers in Davidson
Heaton's Station
Nashville-Davidson, TN
Heaton’s Station (also called Old Heaton Station, Eaton Station, and Heatonsburg) was founded by Amos Heaton after arriving here with...
Captain John Rains 1743-1834
Nashville-Davidson, TN
On Christmas Day 1779, John Rains led his family and livestock across the frozen Cumberland and settled in this vicinity.
Site Of First Store
Nashville-Davidson, TN
Lardner Clark, “Merchant and Ordinary Keeper,” came from Philadelphia, Penn. in the early 1780s with ten horses packed with goods to sell.
Nashville Plow Works
Nashville-Davidson, TN
Site of a farm implement factory operated by Messrs. Sharp and Hamilton, previous to the War Between the States.
BATTLE OF NASHVILLE Shy's Hill
Nashville-Davidson, TN
On this hill was fought the decisive encounter of the Battle of Nashville December 16, 1864.