[1] The park was created as a result of a movement among working-men's clubs in Macclesfield for a memorial to the former Prime Minister Robert Peel, who had died in 1850.

John May, a councillor who had organised the first works outing to Blackpool from Macclesfield, proposed that money collected should be used not to erect a statue but to create a public park.

It was designed by William Barron; he had redesigned the gardens of Elvaston Castle, residence of the Earl of Harrington who owned land near Macclesfield.

[1] Three early medieval cross shafts, formerly at Ridge Hall Farm in Sutton Lane Ends, were moved to the park by 1864.

[5] The main entrance is on Prestbury Road; from here there is a driveway through the park towards the location where once stood Westbrook House, now demolished.