Morningside Park (New York City) on September 16, 1776. Year later, during the War of 1812 three blockhouse fortifications were built on the land. The park was first proposed by the Central Park Commissioners in 1867, after Andrew Haswell Green, Commissioner and Comptroller of Central Park, proposed that a park be built in Morningside Heights to avoid the expense of expanding the Manhattan street grid across difficult terrain. In 1870, the City of New York obtained jurisdiction of the property. The original design for the park, submitted by Parks Engineer-in-Chief M.A. Kellogg in 1871, was rejected by the Board of Commissioners for Public Parks. In
Central Park Hospital who built the complex and provided nursing staff). Following the Civil War the buildings and site became a sculpture museum and restaurant, called variously the Mount St. Vincent Hotel, Stetson's Hotel, and the McGown's Pass Tavern. Today the site is used by the Central Park Conservancy as a composting area. It should not be confused with Park Hospital, which was the renamed Red Cross Hospital also located on Central Park in New York City from 1914–1922 and which the current New York University Hospital is partly descended from. Central Park Hospital The Central Park Hospital (officially the U.S. General Hospital,