The Plains of Abraham

Frederick Todd arrived in Montreal, Quebec in 1900. He was a young apprentice sent to Canada by the renowned Massachusetts firm of Olmsted, Olmsted, and Eliot to work on the look-out of Mont Royal Park, designed by Fredrick Law Olmsted twenty-five years before.

He quickly established residency and a professional office in Montreal, and by the time he was commissioned to work on the Battlefields Park he had either initiated or completed a comprehensive plan for improving and beautifying Canada’s capital city (1902), the plan for Assiniboine Park in Winnipeg (1904-06), and the design and planting of Wascana Park in Regina (1906-08).

By 1909, however, Frederick Todd had re-defined his professional role.  Todd resigned his membership in the American Society of Landscape Architects (ASLA). He now believed, contrary to the by-laws of the ASLA, that he should be involved in the implementation process as well. Consequently, Todd supervised the construction of the parkland project, supervising the costs, the labour, the technical requirements of grading and planting, and the detailed siting of monuments.

Over time, the Plains of Abraham Park proved a popular focus for the population of Quebec City and an important tourist attraction as well.  Not surprisingly a number of changes to the initial project occurred in the ensuing years as the needs and desires of the population evolved. By 1931, the Park had added an underground urban reservoir, a multi-use trail for pedestrians and cyclists weaving its way through the steep slopes, and automobile access from the lower city (1931) by way of the Gilmour Hill road. By 1938, renowned Quebec landscape architect Louis Perron had designed the graciously formal Joan of Arc Garden. The garden structure reflects the French landscape tradition, while the planting reprises the British flower beds most famously associated with the influential British horticulturist and garden designer Gertrude Jekyll.

Landscape restoration has often been necessary: the park hosts ever-larger-scale celebrations on its historic grounds. Yet throughout its history, Battlefields Park has retained its openness and grandeur, its respectful care for its historic monuments, sustaining the visual integrity of Frederick Todd’s plan.

Today, a bust of Frederick Todd graces the landscape, erected in 2008 by the National Battlefields Commission, in celebration of Quebec City’s 400th anniversary. In addition, the Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada and Parks Canada designated Frederick Gage Todd as a National Historic Person in 2020.

The Plains of Abraham Park is a source of immense pride to Quebec City, a welcoming open space in an increasingly dense urban fabric, a major tourist attraction, a symbolic, almost sacred space in Quebec’s cultural ecosystem.

Todd created a park very much in the spirit of the early twentieth century central parks that emerged throughout North America. The Plains of Abraham serve as the green lungs of the urban core of Quebec City. The heavily treed slopes and numerous wooded areas on the plateau shelter 90 different species of some 6,000 trees. Since its inception, thousands of annuals, biennials, and perennials, displayed in strategic corners and along heavily traveled paths, have all been grown and nurtured in greenhouses on the site.

The cachet of the parkland landscape is an immensely powerful tourist magnet admired for its flowing and varied vistas, the strategically located monuments, and the careful conservation of its military heritage. Today, The Park welcomes over four million visitors a year with activities organized in all four seasons, at day and at night. In winter, visitors explore groomed cross-country skiing trails, all manner of walking paths, two winter sliding trails, and a skating rink.  By night, an intimate warming center is lit with 850 solar lanterns suspended in the branches of the elm trees.

In sharp contrast, in the summer a dizzying variety of cultural activities center on the Edwin-Belanger bandstand, treasure hunts are organized on the grounds, and exhibitions held within the Plains of Abraham Museum that features historical and archeological exhibits. Thousands and thousands of people flood the plains when the park hosts major community celebrations such as Quebec’s summer festival and the St. Jean Baptiste national festival. A network of paths, rest areas, and interpretive panels explore the natural and cultural history of the site while military parades in historical dress take place in the shadow of the Martello towers.

Yet it was Todd’s 1909 planning that set key boundaries: Maintaining the visual integrity of the plan, the sense of openness and grandeur of the parklands, and visitor attention on the monuments and historic structures that punctuate the landscape will continue well into the future. Frederick Todd’s plan and the National Battlefields Commission’s continuing commitment to its conservation constitutes an exemplary model of sustainable landscape design and management.