64 ESTABLISHMENT OF A NATIONAL BOTANIC GAEDEN. 



grouped as in a wood, and when grown singly as lawn or street trees. 

 The great numbers of native shrubs, the equally important and inter- 

 esting trees and shrubs which have been introduced and will be 

 introduced from all over the world, require an outlying area run- 

 ning into some hundreds of acres. It presents a wholly different 

 problem from that of a place limited primarily to the exhibition of 

 garden flowers in the usual sense of the term. " It calls not only for 

 a large tract of land but for one of diversified soil and varied 

 exposure. 1 



SITES FOR AN ADEQUATE BOTANIC GARDEN. 



An exhaustive search has been made of areas available for garden 

 purposes in the District of Columbia. The commission has sought 

 a location on which a botanic o-arden might be established with such 

 area and such diversity of soils as would enable it to take rank as a 

 great institution. Examinations were made of tracts at Rock Creek 

 Park, Brightwood, 2 Foundry Branch, 2 Mount Hamilton, on the east- 

 ern side of the Anacostia River, 2 and in Virginia. 2 



Rock Creek Park. — Of the sites suggested, the one at the head of 

 Rock Creek Park is given first consideration, because it has been fre- 

 quently mentioned as available at no cost for land. 



The entire park comprises 1,606 acres, most of which is in steep 

 wooded hillsides. 



If Rock Creek Park shall be given up as a park and used solely 

 for a National Botanic Garden and Arboretum, much can be said 

 in favor of this area, in spite of the predominance of excessively 

 steep slopes. There are scattered areas of moderate slopes on the 

 uplands and strips of level land subject to overflow in the bottom 

 of the valley. There is a considerable variety of soils and expo- 

 sures, and if every piece of land in the park physically adaptable to 

 botanic garden purposes were to be regarded as available for such 

 use. the total area would be ample. It is a serious practical objec- 

 tion, however, that the most available areas are so scattered and so 

 separated from each other by deep ravines and steep hills as to make 

 the layout and administration of a great botanic garden and abo- 

 retum on this site inconvenient and in the long run unduly costly. 



Again, it is not possible to disregard the value of the land for 

 other purposes. Congress did not authorize the acquirement of 

 Rock Creek Park simply in pursuance of a general theory that a 

 growing capital city ought to have a large general reserve of land 

 available for public recreation and for kindred uses, to be "im- 

 proved " and made available from time to time as the need for 

 various specific uses might become apparent. 



The land was bought because the valley of Rock Creek within the 

 District of Columbia had certain peculiar and extraordinary char- 

 acteristics, which gave it a special value for one particular purpose, 

 a value unattainable elsewhere, a value which would be destroyed 



1 Dr. X. L. Britton of the New York Botanic Garden very aptly terms botanic gardens 

 museums of living plants which are treated as museum objects, labeled and installed to 

 Illustrate not only tin objects themselves but their relation to other objects: highly spe- 

 cialized parks are immediate factors in public education, imparting visual information in 

 a positive and direct manner while serving as places of public recreation. 



F..r the practical application of the theory of a botanic garden, see also the list of 

 courses of instruction by the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, in Appendix, pp. 114—119. 

 Appendix, pp. 67-68. 



