History
Initial sections of the RBG were built during the Great Depression in the 1930s as a make work project, under the impetus of Thomas McQuesten. It beautified derelict or undeveloped land in west Hamilton and east Burlington. For instance, a disused gravel pit was turned into the Rock Gardens, by using stone relocated from the Niagara Escarpment. The original vision of the RBG was a mixture of horticultural displays and protected natural forests and wetlands. Formal permission was obtained in 1930 from King George V to call the gardens "Royal Botanical Gardens".
The first Director of RBG, Dr. Norman Radforth, was appointed in 1947 and was a Professor of Botany at nearby McMaster University. In the early 1950s, Dr. Leslie Laking was appointed as Director and served until the early 1980s. Under his guidance, the institution developed into the major entity it is today. With approximately 1,100 ha (2,700 acres) of property, Royal Botanical Gardens is one of the largest such institutions in North America. In 2006, the Auxiliary of RBG published Love, sweat and soil: a history of Royal Botanical Gardens from 1930 to 1981 authored by Dr. Laking.
Read more about this topic: Royal Botanical Gardens (Ontario)
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“You that would judge me do not judge alone
This book or that, come to this hallowed place
Where my friends’ portraits hang and look thereon;
Ireland’s history in their lineaments trace;
Think where man’s glory most begins and ends
And say my glory was I had such friends.”
—William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)
“The history of progress is written in the blood of men and women who have dared to espouse an unpopular cause, as, for instance, the black man’s right to his body, or woman’s right to her soul.”
—Emma Goldman (1869–1940)
“the future is simply nothing at all. Nothing has happened to the present by becoming past except that fresh slices of existence have been added to the total history of the world. The past is thus as real as the present.”
—Charlie Dunbar Broad (1887–1971)