From 1805 to 1948, Harvard University operated a botanic garden under the direction of its botany department. In addition to its role in scientific research and education, the garden was open to the public and became a very popular park. Located on seven acres at the corner of Linnaean and Garden streets, the garden featured a greenhouse filled with exotic tropical plants. The structure was one of several buildings organized in a line on the northern, elevated portion of the site, including the professor’s residence, a herbarium, a library, and a lecture room.
The greenhouse was designed by Ithiel Town who also designed the professor’s residence (now located at 88 Garden Street). Known for his Greek Revival designs, Town also developed a truss system for bridges, which is named after him. The dimensions of the greenhouse are not known. The structure consisted of a semicircular central block with a pitched roof and lower wings that also had pitched roofs. Cold frames were located along the southern foundation, and a toolshed/workshop was located at the north wall. Wooden shutters slid up and down on tracks. Two cisterns inside the greenhouse were filled with water from a nearby spring, and two wood- and coal-burning stoves heated the structure. The greenhouse featured a traveler’s tree of Madagascar (Ravenala madagascariensis), Indian bamboo (Bambusa bosa), an extensive collection of cacti and palm plants, and over 200 orchids.
An article in a publication called The Century Illustrated Monthly from 1886 described the greenhouse complex:
“From the lecture room, you may pass directly into the conservatory, or what is pleasanter, you may walk out around the big hickory on the terrace and enter the rounded front of the central greenhouse, where an ambitious bamboo almost fills the doorway with masses of dark green drooping leaves … . There are several distinct compartments so as to suit the different requirements of the tropical and sub-tropical plants here brought together from all parts of the world. The 1400 species grown insure a goodly supply of blossoms at all seasons of the year, and hundreds of kinds not found in other greenhouses.”
The structure was razed in the late 1940s to make way for a new residential development for Harvard faculty and students, as well as returning military servicemen.
With the establishment of the Arnold Arboretum in Jamaica Plain in 1872, research on woody plants was moved to that location. The herbarium collection continues to be maintained by Harvard at a facility at 22 Divinity Avenue. The former herbarium building, now known as Kittredge Hall, is the home of Harvard University Press.
Below are several illustrations of the greenhouse and plants in The Century Monthly Illustrated drawn by Roger Riordan, Harry Fenn, Francis Lathrop, and E. P. Hayden.
Sources:
Ernest Ingersoll, “Harvard’s Botanic Garden and Its Botanists,” The Century Monthly Illustrated, 1886, pp.242-243.
Susan E. Maycock and Charles M. Sullivan, Building Old Cambridge, 2016.
Charles A. Hammond, “The Botanic Garden in Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1805-1834,” The Herbarist, Vol. 53, 1987, The Herb Society of America.
