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Article ID: CBB001200808

“To be pursued at all spare times”: Thomas Jefferson's Botanical Garden at the University of Virginia (2012)

Studies in the History of Gardens & Designed Landscapes: An International Quarterly
Volume: 32
Pages: 302--311
Publication date: 2012
Language: English

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Botanical gardens Academically sponsored science Botany Science education and teaching 18th century 19th century United States Virginia (U.S.) Jefferson, Thomas University of Virginia

A little over two months before his death in 1826, Thomas Jefferson wrote a letter to the University of Virginia's newly appointed Professor of Natural History, John Patton Emmet, giving details for a botanical garden to accompany the university's fledgling `school of Botany'. 1 This letter, composed on 27 April, set the wheels in motion for one of Jefferson's final campaigns as founder and rector of the university. Jefferson intended the botanical garden to be a significant and integral component of his Academical Village, both helping to make the University of Virginia a complete educational experience for well-rounded young American men, as well as providing useful plants for the improvement and independence of the nation. Jefferson's plan for a botanical garden at the university was the culmination of his lifelong interest in plants and unending support of botanical study. Around 1800, Jefferson succinctly stated his opinion regarding the importance of plants: `The greatest service which can be rendered any country is to add an useful plant to its culture'. 2 Jefferson diligently worked towards providing this service, taking part in many plant and seed exchanges with a number of fellow enthusiasts, both amateur and professional, at home and abroad. While Minister to France from 1784 to 1789, Jefferson wrote to correspondents in America explaining the benefits of plants cultivated by Europeans including Piedmont rice, olive trees, and the cork oak, shipping specimens and seeds of each to America on multiple occasions. 3 If grown successfully, these valuable plants could improve American agriculture and therefore reduce dependence on foreign imports.

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