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30-673: The name of the park, drawn from the French " creve coeur ," is said to have originated from the shape of the lake. Folklore has it that it formed into the shape of a broken heart after an incident of unrequited love between a French fur trader and a local Native American woman. Brokenhearted, she cast herself into the lake, thus causing its reshaping, according to the tale. The park has facilities for picnicking , tennis courts, multi-purpose athletic fields, and an archery course. Creve Coeur Park includes Crystal Springs Quarry Golf Course, an 18-hole course opened in 2001. In December 2003, construction for

60-564: A Millennium celebration , France created "l'incroyable pique-nique" (the incredible picnic), which stretched 1000 km from the English Channel to the Mediterranean, along the Méridienne verte . Various religious denominations hosts annual church picnics for their congregation and local community. These picnics traditional take place from August to mid-October when church members and

90-454: A park , lakeside, or other place affording an interesting view, or else in conjunction with a public event such as preceding an open-air theater performance, and usually in summer or spring. It is different from other meals because it requires free time to leave home. Historically, in Europe, the idea of a meal that was jointly contributed to and enjoyed out-of-doors was essential to picnic from

120-497: A potluck , where each person contributes a dish for all to share. The food eaten is rarely hot, instead taking the form of sandwiches , finger food , fresh fruit, salad and cold meats. It can be accompanied by chilled wine, champagne or soft drinks. The word comes from the French pique-nique . However, it may also have been borrowed from the German word Picknick , which was itself borrowed from French. The earliest English citation

150-583: A continuation of Johnson's Rasselas in which Rasselas becomes ruler of Abyssinia, marries, and finds happiness. Following its success, she published Marcus Flaminius in 1792, a historical epistolary novel. The Knights were living in Naples in 1798 when word came of Nelson's victory at the Battle of the Nile . They participated in the ecstatic celebrations of that victory when Nelson arrived in Naples, and became good friends of

180-535: A field, was connected with respite from hunting from the Middle Ages ; the excuse for the pleasurable outing of 1723 in François Lemoyne 's painting ( illustration) is still offered in the context of a hunt. In it a white cloth can be seen, and on it wine, bread and roast chicken. While these outdoors meals could be called picnics there are, according to Levy, reasons not to do so. 'The English', he claims, 'left

210-605: A peaceful social activity can be used for political protest. In this context, a picnic functions as a temporary occupation of significant public territory. A famous example is the Pan-European Picnic held on both sides of the Hungarian/Austrian border on 19 August 1989 as part of the struggle towards German reunification ; this mass meal led indirectly to the collapse of the Soviet Union . On Bastille Day 2000, as

240-784: Is in 1748, from Lord Chesterfield (Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield) who associates a "pic-nic" with card-playing, drinking, and conversation; around 1800, Cornelia Knight spelled the word as "pique-nique" in describing her travels in France. According to some dictionaries, the French word pique-nique is based on the verb piquer , which means 'pick', 'peck', or 'nab', and the rhyming addition nique , which means 'thing of little importance', 'bagatelle', 'trifle'. It first appears in 1649 in an anonymous broadside of burlesque verse called Les Charmans effects des barricades: ou l'Amitié durable de la compagnie des Frères bachiques de pique-nique : en vers burlesque (The Lasting Friendship of

270-478: The 1904 Summer Olympics ), and it was the site where local sculler Jacob Gaudaur often competed, including his victory over John Teemer in a sculling match in 1884. Gaudaur was married to a resident of Creve Coeur, Cora Coons. A smaller, 66-acre (0.27 km) lake, called Mallard Lake, was constructed with the bridge project. Picnic A picnic is a meal taken outdoors ( al fresco ) as part of an excursion , especially in scenic surroundings, such as

300-497: The Creve Coeur Lake Memorial Park Bridge , which is part of Missouri Route 364 , was completed. The concrete bridge connects St. Louis County to St. Charles County and crosses over the southern end of the park. The project also included Creve Coeur Lake being dredged and the addition of a siltation lake to prevent the need for later dredging. Creve Coeur Lake Memorial Park has an asphalt walking trail around

330-661: The Band of Brothers of the Bacchic Picnic). The satire describes Brother Pique-Nique who, during the civil war known as the Fronde , attacks his food with gusto instead of his enemies; Bacchus was the Roman god of wine, a reference to the drunken antics of the gourmand musketeers. By 1694 the word was listed in Gilles Ménage 's Dictionnaire étymologique, ou Origines de la langue françoise with

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360-664: The Hamiltons and Lord Nelson. After her mother died in 1799, Knight was invited to accompany the Hamiltons and Lord Nelson on their return journey to England. During this trip she became increasingly uneasy about the warmth of the relationship between Lady Hamilton and Lord Nelson, though she also witnessed her ode to Nelson on the Battle of the Nile sung by Emma with a musical setting by Joseph Haydn . Once back in England, Knight settled independently, writing and making frequent visit to friends. She

390-749: The Pic Nic Society lasted until 1850. The group's intent was to offer theatrical entertainments and lavish meals followed by gambling. Members met in hired rooms in Tottenham Street. There was no kitchen so all food had to be made elsewhere. Each member was expected to provide a share of the entertainment and of the refreshments, with no one particular host. Mrs Beeton's picnic menus (in her Book of Household Management of 1861) are 'lavish and extravagant', according to Claudia Roden . She lists Beeton's bill of fare for forty persons in her own book Picnics and Other Outdoor Feasts : The image of picnics as

420-734: The Regent fired her in 1814 for imagined lapses of judgement. In 1818 she became a teacher of English, literature, science and fine arts to the young Massimo Taparelli, the Marquis d'Azeglio , who was an important Italian writer, painter, patriot and politic. He mentioned Cornelia in his d'Azeglio's Memoirs (1867), in chapter XIV where d'Azeglio met Knight in 1818 at Castelgandolfo. The last twenty years of her life were spent outside England, and she died in Paris . Knight published five works in her lifetime: At her death she left behind an incomplete autobiography and

450-616: The acquaintance of many prominent figures in her lifetime, from members of the circle of Samuel Johnson and Sir Joshua Reynolds in her girlhood; Cardinal de Bernis , Sir William and Lady Emma Hamilton , and Lord Horatio Nelson during her Italian sojourn; and members of the British Royal Family during her service to Queen Charlotte and Princess Charlotte Augusta of Wales . She corresponded with or met other writers of her time including Frances Burney , Germaine de Staël , Lady Charlotte Bury , and Jane Porter . Knight's father

480-847: The community socialize over food, conversation and games. In 1937, the Congregational Church of New York hosted 2,000 for its 41st annual event. American psychologist and newspaper columnist Dr. George W. Crane once wrote that Christ held the first church picnic when he asked his disciples to feed the 5,000 who gathered to hear him speak. Contemporary picnics for many people involve simple food. In The Oxford Companion to Food , Alan Davidson offers hard-boiled eggs, sandwiches and pieces of cold chicken as good examples. In America, food writer Walter Levy suggests that 'a picnic menu might include cold fried chicken, devilled eggs , sandwiches, cakes and sweets, cold sodas, and hot coffee'. Picnics are traditionally eaten at Glyndebourne Opera during

510-549: The early 19th century. Picnickers like to sit on the ground on a rug or blanket. Picnics can be informal with throwaway plates or formal with silver cutlery and crystal wine glasses. Tables and chairs may be used, but this is less common. Outdoor games or other forms of entertainment are common at large picnics. In public parks, a picnic area generally includes picnic tables and possibly built-in barbecue grills , water faucets (taps), garbage (rubbish) containers, restrooms (toilets) and gazebos (shelters). Some picnics are

540-481: The eating area. After it is consumed, the seed or stones of fruit like cherries may be used for a spitting contest game or marbles. If a large crowd is expected for picnic because it is a community event then some organisation will be required. A schedule of events will be drawn up and events will be organised for different levels of ability and types of participant: men, women, adults and children. Handbills, notices and tickets may be used to publicise and administer

570-642: The events. From the 1830s, Romantic American landscape paintings of spectacular scenery often included a group of picnickers in the foreground. An early American illustration of the picnic is Thomas Cole 's The Pic-Nic of 1846 ( Brooklyn Museum of Art ). In it, a guitarist serenades the genteel social group in the Hudson River Valley with the Catskills visible in the distance. Cole's well-dressed young picnickers having finished their repast, served from splint baskets on blue-and-white china, stroll about in

600-399: The favour of their employees. The black community was segregated at this time but to gain respectability, games such a baseball were organised by black politicians at picnics in municipal parks and fairgrounds. Games played at a picnic may use the food which has been brought. Heavy food such as a watermelon may be used in a relay race which also serves the purpose of transport the food to

630-453: The hunter's meal unnamed until after 1806, when they began calling almost any alfresco meal a picnic'. The French, Levy goes on to say, 'refrained from calling anything outdoors a pique-nique until the English virtually made the word their own, and only afterwards did they acknowledge that a picnic might be enjoyed outdoors instead of indoors'. The French Revolution popularized the picnic across

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660-558: The interval and Roden proposes a Champagne Menu, as made by the Argentinian pianist Alberto Portugheis : Mousse de Caviare , Chaudfroid de Canard , Tomatoes Farcies and Pêches aux fraises (caviare mousse, cold duck, stuffed tomatoes and peaches and strawberries). In the mid 19th century, picnic games were organised by charities in the US to raise funds. In the 1880s, companies started to sponsor such picnic events for publicity and to gain

690-586: The lake, which was constructed by the Missouri Department of Transportation alongside the bridge project. The trail also connects to a separate lane on the bridge leading across the Missouri River to connect to the Katy Trail . A large portion of the park and surrounding area is also wetlands , and the park has been used for conservation purposes, particularly the study of various waterfowl . The park

720-454: The meaning of a shared meal, with each guest paying for himself, but with no reference to eating outdoors. It reached the Dictionnaire de l'Académie française in 1840 with the same meaning. In English, "picnic" only began to refer to an outdoor meal at the beginning of the 19th century. The practice of an elegant meal eaten out-of-doors, rather than an agricultural worker's mid-day meal in

750-460: The rock, with golden yolks Imbedded and injellied; last, with these, A flask of cider from his father's vats, Prime, which I knew; and so we sat and ate And talked old matters over; who was dead, Who married, who was like to be, and how. Cornelia Knight Ellis Cornelia Knight (27 March 1757 – 18 December 1837) was an English gentlewoman, traveller, landscape artist, and writer of novels, verse, journals, and history. She had

780-499: The woodland and boat on the lake. A book of verse beneath the bough, A loaf of bread, a jug of wine, and thou Beside me singing in the Wilderness – Ah, wilderness were paradise enow! There, on a slope of orchard, Francis laid A damask napkin wrought with horse and hound, Brought out a dusky loaf that smelt of home, And, half-cut-down, a pasty costly-made, Where quail and pigeon, lark and leveret lay, Like fossils of

810-420: The world. French aristocrats fled to other Western countries , bringing their picnicking traditions with them. In 1802, a fashionable group of over 200 aristocratic Londoners formed the Pic Nic Society. The members were Francophiles, or may have been French, who flaunted their love for all things French when the wars with France lulled between 1801 and 1830 . Food historian Polly Russell however suggests that

840-692: Was Sir Joseph Knight , a career Royal Navy officer knighted by King George III, who attaining the rank of Rear Admiral of the White. Her mother Philippina Deane was his second wife. She was carefully educated, and taught to dance by Augustin Noverre. Upon her father's death in 1775, Knight and her mother were left with only a small income and no pension, inducing them to leave for the Continent in 1776, where they settled in Italy. In 1790, Cornelia anonymously published Dinarbas ,

870-580: Was appointed companion to Queen Charlotte (1805) and to a similar position, later, in the household of Princess Charlotte Augusta of Wales (1813). In 1805 her reputation as a learned author of highly respectable character earned her an invitation to join the household of Queen Charlotte. Knight was with the Queen as the King's mental capacity declined and a Regency was established. In 1812 she became Companion to Princess Charlotte Augusta of Wales , holding this post until

900-727: Was the first in the St. Louis County Park system and was dedicated in 1945. Originally a resort , Creve Coeur Lake, which is 320 acres (1.3 km), had hosted many boating events decades before the park officially opened. In June 1882, the Mississippi Valley regatta was held at the lake. It also hosted the Creve Coeur Regatta and the Annual Races of the National Association of Amateur Oarsmen in 1904 (the rowing competition for

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