Time Travel through Dallas History: Old City Park Page: 2 of 6
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TEXAS HIGHWAYS--OLD CITY PARK--MALLORY 2
Time is warped, and history comes alive at North Texas' premier living history village, Old
City Park.
In 1876 the city of Dallas acquired this site for its first park. A natural spring here became
the city's first water supply. The park sported Dallas' first horticulture center and, until the 1890s,
its first zoo.
Fast forward to the 1960s. A group of history-minded women founded the Dallas County
Heritage Society. They convinced the city to move an 1862 mansion, known as Millermore, to the
park, restored the home, opened it to the public, and gradually added more buildings to replicate a
historical village.
Old City Park now comprises some three dozen restored buildings on 13 wooded acres
near downtown. Most are period structures relocated from their original North Texas sites. A few
are replicas based on existing examples. The homes, businesses, church, and school line
simulated shady city streets and a country lane.
Visitors ramble on self-guided tours through rooms filled with period artifacts from the
Society's collection of 25,000 pieces, dating from 1840 to 1910. (Two homes, Millermore and the
1885 Sullivan House, are open for guided tours only.)
Six years ago, the village shifted its interpretive mission from static displays to living history.
Now, visitors also can observe and interact with first-person interpreters who daily reenact two
telltale years in Dallas history.
Six fulltime reenactors portray fictional Dallasites of 1861 and 1901. (Plans call for a fulltime
cast of 20 in coming years. Several other part-time costumed interpreters appear periodically,
especially during the park's half dozen annual events, including the Old-Fashioned Fourth
celebration, July 4, 2004.)
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Mallory, Randy. Time Travel through Dallas History: Old City Park, text, 2004-07~; (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc1923999/m1/2/?q=%22Sports+and+Recreation+-+City+Parks%22: accessed May 30, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting UNT Libraries Special Collections.