This section is reserved for future use.

Located in the Riverdale community, Carver Park totals 19.24 acres and features a gymnasium, indoor swimming pool, fitness center, boxing ring, and multi-purpose clubrooms. Outside, the park offers a playground, baseball diamonds, batting cage, sand volleyball court, basketball courts and 3 picnic grove. Many of these spaces are available for rental including our multi-purpose clubrooms and fields.

Park-goers can participate in seasonal sports, boxing, Inner City Basketball, Inner City Baseball, swimming, and Jr. Bears Football. After school programs are offered throughout the school year, and in the summer youth attend the Chicago Park District’s popular six-week day camp.

In addition to a menu of programs, Carver Park hosts special events throughout the year for the entire family including holiday-themed events.

This section is reserved for future use.

Carver Park lies adjacent to the Chicago Housing Authority's Altgeld Gardens housing development and the Chicago Board of Education's George Washington Carver School. When the C.H.A. constructed Altgeld Gardens in between 1943 and 1944, the project quadrupled the housing stock in the Riverdale Community Area.  Several years later, the Chicago Park District, recognizing the increasing need for recreational opportunities, began to purchase land for park development and acquired land from the C.H.A. in 1950 and in 1956.  Today, in addition to maintaining extensive outdoor recreational facilities at Carver Park, the Chicago Park District jointly operates the Altgeld Garden Homes Community Center with the Chicago Housing Authority.

George Washington Carver (c.1861-1943), for whom both the park and the neighboring school are named, was a highly influential African American scientist. Born to a slave mother, Carver had to support himself from an early age, but managed to obtain bachelor's and master's degrees from Iowa State Agricultural College once he reached his 30’s. In 1896, he moved to Alabama to direct the newly organized department of agriculture at the Tuskegee Institute. Carver urged southern farmers to plant alternative crops - peanuts, soybeans, sweet potatoes - to replenish soil devastated by years of uninterrupted cotton production. When there proved to be little commercial demand for these crops, Carver embarked on extensive research to develop marketable derivative products. Carver's work at Tuskegee dramatically altered agricultural production in the south and greatly stimulated the region's economy.