The woodland that now forms most of Carpenter Park was a wooded intrusion into the tallgrass prairie that covered most of central Illinois during early historic times.

The local Indians used the Sangamon River as a transportation route for their canoes and used this woodland, with its plentiful supply of firewood, as a campground.

While the war as a whole was a draw, the frontiersmen won control of central Illinois Territory and opened it for fur trading and settlement.

[3] After being heavily used in the early 19th century, the Carpenter Park woodlands have regained sufficient quality to enable them to be listed as a State Natural Area.

The aging but high-quality oak-hickory forestland produces a significant quantity of mast to feed whitetail deer and other wildlife.

[4] Closer to the Sangamon River, Carpenter Park's wet-mesic forest supports old growth sycamore, silver maple, cottonwood, and boxelder trees.

[3] The park district also hopes to construct an improved trail with a railing along the Sangamon River's sandstone bluffs, which are crumbling with erosion.