important organisation with a considerable annual turnover and reluctantly remained a tenant of the QAS. These difficulties were resolved by the passage of the National Association and Acclimatisation Society Act of 1890 under which the Queensland Government resumed the land occupied by the National Association from the QAS and granted it to the Association. By 1906, the QAS was relocating its operations to Lawnton on the North Pine River and the Brisbane Municipal Council held the former Acclimatisation Gardens as a reserve for a public park under the Acclimatisation Act of 1907. By 1914 the QAS had removed its diminished operations to depots at Lawnton and Wellington Point. The Brisbane Municipal Council purchased the Society's remaining holding in Bowen Park and officially opened the gardens as a public recreational reserve on 11 June 1914. The Council regarded Bowen Park as both a public park for pleasure and recreation and as a nursery for their parks and reserves. Under the supervision of the Council's first Parks Superintendent, Henry Moore, substantial works and improvements were undertaken, including the erection of a bandstand rotunda, introduction of a water service, repair of the glass house and bush house, filling in of the lagoon and construction of new entrance gates. Landscaping work was undertaken including the establishment of eighteen flower beds, five of which formed a rondel around a palm tree on the southern sloping. A number of rose beds were planted out and four statues that had been part of the Acclimatisation Society gardens' fountain were relocated in open lawns. A cottage was erected on O'Connell Terrace for the Council's chauffeur and in 1915 the public toilets on the Bowen Bridge Road boundary were constructed. The path configuration was consolidated during this period of work with secondary paths to the Bowen Bridge Road edge added later under Oakman. From 1930 to 1950 further parcels of land were sold to the now Royal National Agricultural and Industrial Association (RNA) and in 1940 the widening of Bowen Bridge Road reclaimed a further . There was considerable opposition to attempts by the RNA to claim more land from Bowen Park during the 1950s but was reclaimed for the wood chopping stadium in 1955. Between 1950 and 1959 Harry Oakman, Parks Superintendent for Brisbane City Council, oversaw changes to the park, During 1950 to 1959, Harry Oakman, Parks Superintendent for Brisbane City Council, prepared a plan for additional