60 Arnoldia 78/5-6 « October 2021 
and for nearly a decade, the reso- 
lution of his estate and the fate 
of Bartram’s Garden remained 
unresolved.*! Shortly after East- 
wick’s death, Sargent, using his 
connections in Philadelphia, 
tried to organize a group of “lib- 
eral gentlemen” to purchase the 
property.*” This effort was unsuc- 
cessful because the owners of the 
estate believed that “they could 
make more [profit] by destroying 
its botanical associations, and 
turning the whole into building 
Lats. 32 
Sargent continued to pro- 
vide support on a national level 
through Garden and Forest, 
arguing in an unsigned editorial 
that “the name of Bartram’s Gar- 
den should be preserved and ... 
should be maintained in as near 
the condition as its first owner 
left it.”°* Meanwhile, Meehan 
and members of the City Parks 
Association continued the local 
campaign. Ultimately, the City 
of Philadelphia appropriated 
funds to purchase Bartram’s Gar- 
den in 1889, took ownership in 
1891, and finalized the purchase 
in 1893.°° As a result, more than 
forty years after Meehan had first 
worked at the historic garden, it 
became preserved in perpetuity. 
This achievement must have been remarkably 
gratifying for Meehan, seeing the preservation 
of the place that helped to launch his career and 
that had such horticultural significance in his 
adopted city. 
Once the future of Bartram’s Garden was set- 
tled, Meehan’s foresight in creating open space 
throughout the city was acknowledged with 
another Garden and Forest editorial: “The fact 
that the people of Philadelphia are securing a 
series of small parks is largely due to the public- 
spirited and tireless efforts of Mr. Thomas Mee- 
han, the well-known horticulturist ... Many 
generations of Philadelphians will have a good 
Partridgeberry (Mitchella repens) 
“It is remarkable that a plant so attractive in so many ways should 
not have become more attached to the public mind, or received 
more attention from polite writers, but the author can recall no 
instance in American poetry or general literature in which the 
Partridge berry plays a conspicuous part.” 
MEEHAN’S MONTHLY (VOL. 3) 
reason to remember with gratitude his disin- 
terested efforts for the improvement and hap- 
piness of his fellow men.”*° 
Meehan’s Legacy 
As a coda to his life, Meehan was awarded the 
Veitch Memorial Medal in 1901, a few months 
before he died. He followed Sargent and Liberty 
Hyde Bailey as the third American to win this 
honor. In conferring it, the Royal Horticultural 
Society recognized his “distinguished services 
in botany and horticulture.” Seeing Meehan 
in the company of these two towering figures 
of late nineteenth and early twentieth-century 
