Retirement
Following his retirement Shaw travelled extensively, and returned to St. Louis in 1851. He engaged architect George I. Barnett (who later also designed Shaw's mausoleum) to design and build Tower Grove House, which became his estate. Working with leading botanists, Shaw planned, funded and built what would become the Missouri Botanical Garden on the land around his home. As the garden became more extensive, Shaw decided to open it to the general public in 1859.
Shaw donated additional land adjoining the garden to the city of St. Louis for Tower Grove Park and also helped with its construction, including the pavilions and various works of art. He gave the city a school and land for a hospital. He endowed Washington University’s School of Botany, and helped found the Missouri Historical Society. Shaw died in 1889 and is buried in a mausoleum surrounded by a grove of trees on the grounds of the gardens he founded. He is widely remembered for his generosity and philanthropy. Over 100 years after his death, many who visit the Missouri Botanical Gardens still refer to it affectionately as "Shaw's Garden."
The standard author abbreviation H.Shaw is used to indicate this individual as the author when citing a botanical name.Read more about this topic: Henry Shaw (philanthropist)
Famous quotes containing the word retirement:
“Convent. A place of retirement for women who wish for leisure to meditate upon the sin of idleness.”
—Ambrose Bierce (1842–1914)
“Adultery itself in its principle is many times nothing but a curious inquisition after, and envy of another man’s enclosed pleasures: and there have been many who refused fairer objects that they might ravish an enclosed woman from her retirement and single possessor.”
—Jeremy Taylor (1613–1667)
“The student who secures his coveted leisure and retirement by systematically shirking any labor necessary to man obtains but an ignoble and unprofitable leisure, defrauding himself of the experience which alone can make leisure fruitful.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)