3. Several Fountains Once Stood in the Place of the City Hall Park Fountain

It took five years to build the Croton Aqueduct, which brought fresh drinking water from upstate to Manhattan. In celebration of its opening, a fountain display at City Hall Park was held on July 4th, 1842, featuring the new Croton Fountain (the city’s first decorative fountain), which shot water from the aqueduct up to 50 feet in the air.

The beautiful structure, noted for its 1850s style bronze candelabras, has since been replaced by a new fountain designed by Jacob Wrey Mould (the present-day City Hall Park Fountain). It was initially installed in City Hall Park in 1871, only to be disassembled and shipped to Crotona Park in the Bronx in 1920.

In its temporary absence, Frederick MacMonnies’s controversial Civic Virtue was erected in 1922, which was then replaced by the Delacorte Fountain in 1972. The Mould fountain, however, was restored and brought back to its original site in 1999 after $34.6 renovation of the park.