This area was once used as a dumping ground for agricultural waste by farmers from nearby St. Albans and Springfield. Alfred Ashmead (1818 - 1891) and Amelia Ashmead (d. 1887), who moved to Jamaica from England purchased the land in the 1880s and created a community garden. The Ashmead’s transformed the space into “the show place of Jamaica Village” wrote the Brooklyn Eagle, a paradise of "roses, peonies, gladioli and hollyhocks . . . whose fragrance and beauty residents from all over the village came to enjoy." The Ashmead’s eventually deeded the property to the village for a public park. In 1898, when Jamaica was incorporated into greater New York City, the park came under new jurisdiction, and by 1910 had become derelict and overgrown with weeds. In 1914 the Jamaica Women’s Club, led by Kate Porter Blanchard, partnered with the Queens Department of Parks to create at Ashmead Park the borough's first public playground. The park was formally opened on July 31, 1914. Some 400 children attended the event, which featured a band, ice cream, and a speech by Park Commissioner John E. Weier. Like most city playgrounds at the time, Ashmead Park was supervised by a "play director." The Women's Club rented a nearby store to shelter children in the event of a storm and to keep first-aid supplies. Harriet Hassler of the Queens Children's Library curated a weekly "storytelling hour" for younger children. Ashmead Park was cut in half when Liberty Avenue was re-aligned through the space in the late 1930s. Too small and surrounded by traffic, it was no longer suitable for a playground. Today it survives as a little island of green, anchored by a flagpole, commemorating the long-ago generosity of the Ashmead’s and their commitment to improving life in our city.