View of Park in the End of 19th Century in Korea

Abstract

In 1876, Korea opened herself to Japan and other foreign countries, not by her own will but due to foreign force. Since then, her government has sent missions abroad. Some of them put on record information about foreign parks.
They thought that urban parks were an essential facility in modern industrial cities. Rarely, were parks thought of as a kind of facility for the enlightenment of the people.
The necessity for building parks and planting trees in both cities and the country side was hotly debated not by the Korean Government but by the Independence Club, a private organization established on July 2nd 1896. They thought building parks and planting trees were beneficial in building a healthy urban environment, and were also a way to beautify the city and producing places for recreation and amusement.
Japanese settlers in Korea had wanted to reshape the their settlement into another Japan. So first, when sites were acquired they built shrines. After that, they decorated the shrine compounds with trees and facilities such as benches, pavilions etc. These served as parks for the settlers.