Today I send a happy bow of thanks to Charles Eliot, one very talented arhitect who found himself on the grounds of a castle in Europe and, drinking in the "energy of the place" managed to put it all in perspective and thus change the world.  

Like many others, this man believed that  buildings and their architectural features must be taken in context; must be appreciated from the viewpoint of the land on which they stand.

From this viewpoint, human beings remain in the equation,and from-it, too, the eco-friendly traits we all can enjoy emanate... . 

So today,thankfully, I'm telling the story of the Father of Human-Scale Development ...Charles Eliot. " Charles Eliot pioneered many of the fundamental principles of regional planning and laid the conceptual and political groundwork for land and historical conservancies across the world.!" (exclamation mark is mine)

Graphic of Charles Eliott From Wikipedia

I inherited a legacy of appreciation for architecture in context and a love of stewardship from my Grandfather whose hero was Charles Eliot. , Grandpa was a Land Man.  He loved natural beauty. A salt-of-the-earth kind of man, most days he could be found in an overalls and his favorite well worn hat. So Charles Eliot could have been an unlikely hero for Grandpa.  But not so! Grandpa outright admired him. Often when we picnicked at beautiful Belle Isle in Detroit, Michigan where I grew up, Grandpa would remind me that Eliot had his hand in the design. In fact, as far back as 1890, Grandpa said, Eliot  led the way protect scenic treasures and viewsheds.

Charles Eliot (1859-97) son of Harvard University president, worked with Frederick Olmsted. Although he was only 38 when he died, in his short lifetime Eliot's accomplishments were many. He designed the metropolitan park and open-space systems of Boston, and founded the first U.S. organization devoted to historic landscape preservation.  

A well known landscape architect around the turn of the 19th century, Eliot may be an unfamiliar figure to some today. Yet, he was a bright light in the field of human-scale development, pioneering many of the fundamental principles of regional planning eco-friendly developers use today.  Also to his credit is the conceptual groundwork for land and historical conservancies.

New Urbanist Pioneer.
Charles Eliot has to be the  original new urbanist.When I visit friends in Celebration , Florida, I can see his influence there. Here's a picture (again from Wikipedia) that illustrates my point.

Concerned with the quickening pace of development beyond metropolitan Boston, where he lived and worked,  Eliot proposed an unique park system in the form of a trust. Land Trusts got their start that way.

Grandpa would be pleased to see how Eliot's seeds have bloomed. Today land trusts have matured into "privately based, nonprofit, tax-exempt charitable corporations and partnerships whose primary focus is to conserve open space or purchase conservation easements."

They are growing in popularity and size. You will find conservation-minded organizations in small towns, operating locally.You will find them operating regionally and statewide.  You will find them where families are thinking about sustainability and positive futures.  In fact, Charles Eliot's creative influence remains. His legacy touches selected communities who are receiving assistance in taking the principles Eliot first envisioned and putting them into practice.

Copyright ©Green-o-Lina, 2007

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