the enterprising owners. The name, if trite, is apt. The change from the wild state of these woods and banks to their present condition, has been magical. The Hamadryads, it is true, have perished in great numbers, and the Sylvans retired to other nooks, where the solitary lover of nature may still explore their haunts. It was impossible that these shores and groves, along which there is one of the finest walks in the world, should remain forever in their rude state, so near the crowded city. The business of reform fell happily into good hands. Nature has been tamed, not violated; and our citizens have reasons to thank the owners of this property, while they boast of having, so near their wilderness of brick and mortar, a place of resort for health and recreation. The Elysian Fields became a popular destination for city-weary New Yorkers, with ferries to the grounds originating at Barclay, Canal, and Christopher Streets. "From the opening of the 'River Walk' to the public in about 1810, until the Civil War," wrote historian William Mann, "New Yorkers flocked to the Elysian Fields in the summer months. Among the luminaries that history records as visitors were Charles Dickens, Edgar Allan Poe, Martin Van Buren, Daniel Webster, and Washington Irving. Descriptions of the place were made by many of the park's visitors, including [William Cullen] Bryant, Mrs. Frances Trollope, Frances Kemble, and scores of lesser-known writers." During its midcentury heyday, the grounds drew upwards of 20,000 visitors on weekends, and proved a financial bonanza for the family of Col. Stevens. According to Gilbert: The Stevenses' pleasure grounds ... became New York City's main playground for much of the 19th century. It provided New Yorkers with something their government could not or would not provide, ample green park space, including grounds for baseball, cricket, and other sports—for free. One by one, the top New York City baseball clubs gravitated to Hoboken. And the Stevenses' pleasure grounds helped sell a lot of real estate. ... John Stevens's real estate sales and the Hoboken Land and Improvement Company, formed in 1838 and owned by Colonel Stevens's son Edwin, made an astronomical amount of money. When Edwin Stevens died in 1868 the real estate company's holdings were valued at $20 million, a figure that did not include the Elysian Fields and other waterfront land worth an additional $15 million, for a total