Oakbourne Park

August 26, 2007: I went for a run in what I thought was a local "woodchip nature trail and soccer field" township park, and I discovered an incredibly awesome Victorian mansion and folly that you could use tomorrow as the set for a movie about a madcap professor with magical powers. Or the swanky gentleman scientists' headquarters in a steampunk epic; that folly in the picture above is actually a water tower. It features a huge cast-iron tank, studded with rivets, high in the air, supported by decorative brick arches, wooden gingerbread, and slate tiles. It's just WAITING for a long-awaited electro-telegraphic signal, at which time it will free its twenty-foot arms, stand up in a choking cloud of brick dust, and start striding towards the horizon, coal-fired eyes glowing red, its head filled with the phonographic instructions of its long-dead pipe-smoking master. In other words, this place is INCREDIBLY AWESOME. And the nearby mansion is empty, mahogany-panelled, and filled with sunbeams. And there are small birdhouse entrance built right into the gables of the stone garage. And it has an interesting past, having been a woman's convalescent home for a hundred years or so until 1971. So it's probably filled with, you know, fluttery Victorian ghosts in frilly linen shifts.

Best. Running discovery. EVAR.

This page is just a placeholder I threw up when I saw that the domain name "oakbournepark.org" was available, and I also saw in the Daily Local News that volunteers were needed. Since I make websites for a living, I am slapping this up while my two-year old is asleep. Since plentiful Google searches for "Oakbourne Park" did not reveal many pictures of the architectural awesomeness of Oakbourne's mansion and tower, I can't wait to take some. My intention is to pitch in and help Oakbourne increase its visibility. Here's the Oakbourne Tower in Google Earth; here are the "Friends of Oakbourne"; here's a little bit of information on Chester County Connect.

This is absolutely not intended to step on anybody's toes, and if any of the Friends of Oakbourne Park see this before you get my membership application in the mail, please don't worry -- I'm going to be showing up for October's meeting and offering my services; scraping paint, making phone calls, whatever! If there's already a website project for Oakbourne in progress, I'll gladly turn over the keys to the domain name, or participate in creating a website for the park (without my enthusiastic ranting about victorian ghosts, natch), as you all need. Mr. Foster, your point in the Daily Local about "two-week enthusiasms" is well taken!

Why am I doing this? It was the little birdhouses built into the gable ends of your stone garage, man. That victorian stuff KILLS me. And plus it was the surprise of discovering a Giant Victorian Folly right in my backyard, so to speak. This park is wonderful and eccentric and amazing, and I'll be glad to help support it in any way I can!

Best regards,
John Young
john DOT young AT gmail DOT com