post along the French Lick by the same name in 1714, which was the first European settlement in what is now Nashville. The French Lick and spring attracted settlers from East Tennessee to the region in 1779, who established Fort Nashborough, the namesake of Nashville, along the Cumberland River, and founded the Cumberland Association the following year. The spring continued to be used as one of the city's primary water sources throughout the 19th century, and the area gradually became known as Sulphur Bottoms. As Nashville grew, a number of residences and businesses occupied the site. Between the 1880s and the 1950s, part of the site that was prone to flooding was used as a dump, with many relics from this period found during construction. A brick sewer tunnel was also constructed under the site of the park in 1892. Beginning in the early 20th century, the area fell into disrepair, and became a red light district. By the 1940s, many of the structures on the site were declared substandard and were subsequently demolished as part of an urban renewal project initiated in 1950. Park history In the late 1950s and early 1960s, a building boom resulted in several skyscrapers being constructed around the capitol building. The view to the north, however, remained unobstructed, and a movement arose to preserve this. The state began gradually acquiring much of the land north of the capitol in the early 1970s with the intent of eventually constructing a large office complex, necessitated by the growth in the size of the state government. In 1985, Nashville landscape architect Joe Hodgson suggested redeveloping the land north of the state capitol into a public park, which was echoed by John Bridges of Nashville-based Aladdin Industries in 1988. On July 19, 1989, then-Governor Ned McWherter suggested that the land to the north of the capitol be converted into a linear green space modeled on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., with the intent of opening to the public for the state's bicentennial. On November 7, 1991, the Metropolitan Nashville Council approved a revitalization plan for downtown Nashville, which included the mall. On June 1, 1992, McWherter signed an executive order creating the Tennessee Bicentennial Commission to oversee the planning of the statewide bicentennial celebration. This 23-member panel, which included a number of prominent business leaders, celebrities, and governmental leaders from around the state, began preliminary planning work