THE BROOKLYN BOTANIC GARDEN 



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THE BEOOKLYN BOTANIC GARDEN 



By Dr. C. STUART GAGER 



BROOKLYN BOTANIC GARDEN 



THE Brooklyn Botanic Garden is a department of The BrookhTi 

 Institute of Arts and Sciences. The institute itself, an organiza- 

 tion of some 7,500 members, is the outgrowth of a movement starting 

 in -1823, for the establishment in Brooklyn of a free library for appren- 

 tices. From these small beginnings, the work has gradually expanded, 

 until now it is carried on by means of twenty-eight departments, repre- 

 senting various branches of art and science, and including courses of 

 lectures and general university-extension work. During 1893-94 the 

 establishment of a museum of arts and sciences was undertaken, and 

 this movement has steadily developed, until now there is a large Central 

 Museum on Eastern Parkway, beautifully housed in a building only 

 partly completed, and in Bedford Park a wholly unique branch, the 

 Children's Museum, described in The Popular Science Monthly 

 for April, 1908. 



The Botanic Garden movement found its first .public expression in 

 1897, when the Hon. George W. Brush, M.D., introduced into the state 

 legislature of New York a bill providing for the establishment and 

 maintenance of a botanic garden and arboretum on park lands in the 

 city of Brooklyn. The bill, which became a law on May 18, 1897, 

 names among other objects of the garden, the advancement of botanical 

 science and knowledge, and the prosecution of original research therein 



Fig. 2. Laboratory and Administration Building. Front (west) elevation, 

 lacing tlie Garden. 



