I am grateful to the following for their advice, help, and useful counsel: Amy Brown, Tom Comitta, Paula Deitz, Jeremiah Eck, Drew Faust, Arleyn A. Levee, Ian McHarg, Rollins Maxwell, Henry Hope Reed, William Rawn, and especially Laurie Olin. Eva Burns, M.D., thoughtfully offered a psychiatrist’s perspective. Jace Gaffney kindly suggested what became the title of this book. William Alex of the Frederick Law Olmsted Association was gracious with his time. Several people generously showed me around Olmsted works: Tupper Thomas, Administrator, and Christian Zimmerman, Landscape Architect, of the Prospect Park Alliance; Frances G. Beatty, Senior Landscape Architect of Boston Parks & Recreation; George and Mimi Batchelder of Moraine Farm; and Michael S. Cary, Head Master of Lawrenceville School.
Libraries and librarians are always helpful, but I would like to single out Mary Daniels, Special Collections Librarian of the Frances Loeb Library of the Harvard University Graduate School of Design, for guiding me through the John C. Olmsted Collection. Helpful, too, were: Marilyn M. Love, archivist of Lawrenceville School; Deborah Husted Koshinsky of the Architecture and Planning Library, SUNY Buffalo; Cynthia Van Ness of the Buffalo and Erie County Public Library; and the staff of Interlibrary Loans of the Van Pelt Library of the University of Pennsylvania. During the long writing of the book I was able to count on the helpful assistance of several able research assistants: Kate Howarth, Kiet Ta, Phuc Tran, Jason Kim, and David Bagnoli. Shawn Seaman skillfully drew the plans of Olmsted projects.
Alexandra Truitt did an outstanding job researching photographic material. Steve Boldt is a copy editor par excellence. Iris Tupholme and Nicole Langlois at HarperCollins in Toronto were helpful. Susan Moldow of Scribner was as supportive a publisher as one could ever hope to have. My editor, Nan Graham, can discuss ideas and parse sentences with equal enthusiasm—and skill. Carl Brandt lent his attentive agent’s ear. John Lukacs generously took time off from his own writing to review mine. My wife knows how much this book owes to her, so I will only say, “Thank you, Shirley.”