Bardascino Park History

Our new park history sign was installed in December, 2020. Click on the image above for a larger view. Below is information from the sign...

Bardascino Park

The site of Bardascino Park was occupied by a house and surrounding gardens until 1891, when the Hebrew Education Society purchased the land to build a community center for the area’s growing Jewish population. The house was demolished and construction began later that year on Touro Hall, named after the renowned Jewish American philosopher and philanthropist Judah Touro.

An 1845 watercolor by James Kennedy shows the house on the southwest corner of 10th and Carpenter streets that was torn down to make way for Touro Hall. (Pennsylvania Historical Society)

The Neighborhood in 1874

This 1874 ward map shows the neighborhoods around Bardascino Park and the mix of industries, cemeteries, and buildings once found here. Many street names have changed: the current names are shown in blue. (Click on map for larger image)

The Neighborhood in 1910

The G.W. Bromley 1910 Atlas of Philadelphia shows Touro Hall and surrounding industries around the site of Bardascino Park. (Click on map for larger image)

Touro Hall contained an auditorium, classrooms, a Hebrew school, and training facilities for various industrial trades.

The Hebrew Education Society moved out of the neighborhood in the 1920s and sold the building to Dr. Vincent Fabiani, who operated the Fabiani Italian Hospital on the northeast corner of 10th and Christian streets. Fabiani moved into Touro Hall and renamed it Community Hospital. It was called the Philadelphia Italian Hospital from 1936 to 1942 and then, as Community Hospital once again, served the neighborhood until it closed in 1968.

Dr. Vincent Fabiani’s Italian Hospital moved from this building on the northeast corner of 10th and Christian streets to Touro Hall (later renamed Community Hospital) in 1926.

The building stood empty until 1978, when it was acquired by the City and razed. The site was redeveloped as Bardascino Park, named for local resident Giuseppe Bardascino, who formed the Philadelphia Brass Band in 1912 and managed the Philadelphia Italian Band for 40 years.

Community Hospital, seen here shortly after closing in 1968, operated in the former Touro Hall on the site of Bardascino Park. The building was razed in 1978, when Bardascino Park was built.