The pool and bathhouse was designed by Stanley C. Brogren during a Works Progress Administration project in 1935–1936, while a playground next to the adjacent Benjamin Franklin High School opened in 1942.

[6][7][8] The northern pathway contains a steel-and-bronze sculpture, El Arbol de Esperanza (Tree of Hope), by L. Brower Hatcher.

The 18-foot-tall (5.5 m) work, dedicated in 1995, consists of a tree trunk topped by a globe with bronze figures created by local children.

[22] The recreation center, originally the bathhouse, is a U-shaped brick structure, with a main entrance facing west on First Avenue between 112th and 113th Streets.

[6] The entrance is 45 feet (14 m) wide and contains four concrete columns supporting the top of the pavilion, where bronze letters with the words thomas jefferson play center are mounted.

[24] The New York City Board of Aldermen first devised plans in 1894 for Thomas Jefferson Park, to be built in Italian Harlem.

[35] During construction, Thomas Jefferson Park hosted a ceremony in July 1904 where Archbishop John Murphy Farley, with permission from Pope Pius X, approved the Canonical coronation of an image of the Blessed Virgin Mary for the nearby Our Lady of Mount Carmel Church.

[37] The recreation facilities in Thomas Jefferson Park opened on October 7, 1905, with a ceremony attended by several thousand people.

[40][41] The New York Sun called Thomas Jefferson Park "the first playground in the world that has a running track for girls".

[42] In 1934, mayor Fiorello H. La Guardia nominated Robert Moses to become commissioner of a unified New York City Department of Parks and Recreation.

At the time, the United States was experiencing the Great Depression; immediately after La Guardia won the 1933 election, Moses began to write "a plan for putting 80,000 men to work on 1,700 relief projects".

[53][54] The pools would be built using funds from the Works Progress Administration (WPA), a federal agency created as part of the New Deal to combat the Depression's negative effects.

Moses, along with architects Aymar Embury II and Gilmore David Clarke, created a common design for these proposed aquatic centers.

Each location was to have distinct pools for diving, swimming, and wading; bleachers and viewing areas; and bathhouses with locker rooms that could be used as gymnasiums.

The pools were to have several common features, such as a minimum 55-yard (50 m) length, underwater lighting, heating, filtration, and low-cost construction materials.

To fit the requirement for cheap materials, each building would be built using elements of the Streamline Moderne and Classical architectural styles.

[4][62][b] The next month, La Guardia presided over the opening of the northern playground, which contained athletic fields, a wading pool, and children's play equipment.

[69][70] A playground in the northeast section of the park, near the Manhattan Center for Science and Mathematics (at the time known as the Benjamin Franklin High School), was completed in 1942.

[21] Caro also wrote that predominantly white lifeguards were hired at Thomas Jefferson Park,[72] although it is unclear whether Moses did this on purpose.

[74] In any case, black and Hispanic residents often faced violence if they tried to swim at Thomas Jefferson Pool or visit the park in general.

The bathhouse, used during the winter as a gathering place for elderly men, was rundown by 1966, with faulty heaters and rotting roof beams.

[74] According to landscape designer Lynden B. Miller, the park received a large number of plantings in the mid-1980s, but they died off due to a lack of maintenance.

[86] NYC Parks continued to face financial shortfalls in the coming years, and the pools retained a reputation for high crime.

[62] Additionally, in the 1990s, a practice called "whirlpooling" became common in New York City pools such as Thomas Jefferson Park, wherein women would be inappropriately fondled by teenage boys.

[88][89] By the turn of the century, crimes such as sexual assaults had decreased in parks citywide due to increased security.

[62] Thomas Jefferson Park received an extensive renovation in the early 1990s, funded by a $10.5 million capital expenditure.

[91] The grounds renovation was completed in 1994 and the two artworks were installed the following year,[5][62] In 1999, a reporter for The New York Times wrote that the pool had a "distinctly Latin flavor", with many of its visitors being Puerto Rican or Mexican.