Mizzou Botanic Garden Turns 25

When Barbara Uehling arrived at the University of Missouri in 1978 as the first woman chancellor of a land-grant university, the campus bore little resemblance to what is now Mizzou Botanic Garden.

“It was a campus interspersed among business districts,” said Kee Groshong, who worked at MU for 37 years, 15 of which he served as vice chancellor of administrative services, retiring in 2002.  “There were pea gravel parking lots everywhere.”

Uehling noticed the disarray and launched an effort to unify and beautify the campus.

Richard Wallace, who served as chancellor from 1996 to 2004, taught at MU beginning in 1966. He distinctly remembers a circle drive on the North side of Jesse Hall and dumpsters parked right outside the doors.

“Barbara took one look and hired a consultant. She worked with him closely, and that circle drive disappeared,” he said.

Wallace was referring to master planner, Jack Robinson.

Gary Smith, with 30-plus years as MU director of admissions and registrar, said Robinson recommended eliminating excessive surface parking in favor of aesthetic multi-story parking. He advised that new construction should look like it “belonged” in context with the rest of the campus. And finally, he suggested Uehling protect existing green space and add to it, if possible.

Robinson changed the way we did planning,” Groshong said. “He believed a master plan is always a draft. He told us we were going to revise it every two years and that made all the difference.”

Robinson told Uehling that the University needed to define the boundaries of campus and that until they owned everything within those limits, they wouldn’t be able to control the flow of traffic nor upgrade the appearance of the campus.

Parking garages would eliminate the need for or improve the scattered parking lots, but the cost of the structures was daunting.

Groshong said that early in the process, MU had contracted with Coca Cola to put vending machines on campus that played a key funding role in campus unification.

“I made a successful pitch to the Chancellor to dedicate a portion of that money to purchase property in the core area of campus. It was amazing how much we made twenty-five cents at a time,” Groshong said.

Talk began in the 1960s about making Lowry Street into a pedestrian walkway. The street ran between Ninth Street and Hitt Street north of the Ellis Library tying together MU’s red and white campuses. That effort came to fruition under Uehling’s tenure: Lowry Mall was dedicated on Oct. 26, 1984.

Charles Paxton came to work as MU’s assistant supervisor of Campus Grounds — now Landscape Services — in 1987.

“When I came, there were tracks as wide as roads that cut across the lawn on Francis Quad,” Paxton said. “It was a quagmire of mud. People would use them to drive up to the buildings to take things in and out.

“After I had been there about a year, I convinced them that if we were going to have a decent lawn when we celebrated the University’s 150th anniversary, we need to start on it.

“It was a process,” he said. “We put up ‘Save the Quad’ signs as a constant reminder to keep people off the grass. I remember Kee and Gary standing on the sidewalks and passing out buttons with the same message.”

Groshong said that the campus began to look tidier but that there was no “esprit de corps” to the grounds.

“There were some older shrubs and beautiful views, but for the most part, there was basic stuff that had grown too large,” Paxton agreed.

Groshong discussed the problem with Alan Warden, assistant vice chancellor of facilities, who agreed to do a national search for a superintendent of grounds and in 1989, Tom Flood was hired.

“When Tom Flood came, the landscape changed,” Paxton said. “He understood horticulture and how to get things done.”

Flood said that when he first started at MU, he was focused on making what was there look better.

“Our funding was tied to construction and remodeling,” he said. “There was a small postage stamp garden by the Ag building. But beginning in the mid-90s, our work evolved into focused garden development as opportunities arose.

“We started developing gardens like the Butterfly Garden [behind Eckles Hall]. We asked ourselves how to deal with the opportunity to develop landscapes in a strategic way to take advantage of what was there, which resulted in the necklace of plantings around the Quad,” he said.

“Charles suggested we consider becoming a botanic garden and I began looking at botanic models like Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania with its world class gardens on the entire campus.”

Flood spent three days at the University of Nebraska Arboretum looking at how they approached botanic garden status, taking note of their friends group.

“That was something I put in my hat,” Flood said.

“We began to develop gardens that were part of the campus as a whole,” Flood said. “I hired Joan Smith as a landscape designer.”

Flood said that he suggested something that looked like a DNA double helix to Smith for the Discovery Garden on the south side of the Bond Life Sciences Center, a garden that included plants used in research that contributed to the quality of life.

“She made it happen,” he said. “She was a really brilliant plant designer.

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Flood reached out to Advancement about starting a development program, including a friends group.

“G. Frank Rothwell IV and his wife Henrietta came to campus and the development office suggested I show them around campus,” Flood said.

Frank’s great-grandfather was the University Board of Curators president who — after some fisticuffs — was persuaded to leave MU’s iconic columns standing after the catastrophic 1892 fire.

Impressed by the progress being made in the campus beautification process, the Rothwells eventually made two gifts and a long perennial garden on the northwest side of the Quad was named in their honor.

“Once the gardens started looking good and the importance of first impressions was recognized, we started hearing from donors, parents and students,” Flood said.

Gardens were added as money became available for the projects, or as projects presented themselves. What is now the Arts and Science Mall Garden became a reality when a steam tunnel was replaced.

“It was a mess with only some junipers that had been planted in the 1960s,” Flood said. “We worked to get the concept right and then broke the project up into pieces, completing it as funding became available.”

Flood said Paxton selected annual flowers for the highly visible and always impressive Memorial Union Garden, which is different every year.

“One year I asked him what his inspiration had been for that year’s theme, and he said it was a Navajo blanket. I learned a lot from Charles.”

Flood eventually pitched the idea of making the campus a botanic garden to Groshong who took the idea to Wallace, who was the chancellor at the time.

On August 26, 1999, Mizzou Botanic Garden became a reality when Wallace drafted a letter to Groshong supporting the effort.

“I was fortunate to be there during that time and part of a dynamic team with Charles, Joan, and Kee, who was the real driver of the effort,” Flood said.

Most of the current gardens were completed by the time Flood left in 2004 but, he said, gardens have a finite life expectancy and must be retained, renewed and rejuvenated over time so work is never truly completed.

“And the value of the trees on campus cannot be understated,” he added. “I’ve always said that the most important thing that gets done in gardens is the planting of trees.”

Paxton expressed appreciation for Flood’s persistence and his talents.

“It couldn’t have happened without him,” he said.

Groshong said what started in the 1980s was an “evolutionary project.”

“Once it got rolling,” he said, “people began to take pride in the campus. We got lucky. The first person we hired was experienced and had a passion for his work. He was a blessing.

“Pete has been a blessing too,” he added in reference to the recently retired Pete Millier who took Flood’s place as director of MUBG in 2005. Jackie Jones replaced Groshong as vice chancellor of administrative services in 2002. She also was a staunch supporter of the Garden.

Building on experience gained at past positions, Millier worked with donors and helped expand giving opportunities.

“With the help of Laura Lucas [in Advancement] we started doing Tribute Trees and Tribute Benches,” he said of the Garden’s naming opportunity program that remains active and vital.

Milier gives MU Senior Landscape Architect John Glenn, who was hired in 2008, kudos for some of the MU campus’ standout features.

“He took a lot of our ideas and made them workable,” Millier said. “Designers work with plants but landscape architects are responsible for formalized plans.”

Millier credits Glenn for the 8th Street Circle design and the popular Speakers Circle.

“John is responsible for the classic look that is Mizzou,” he said. “I also had the good fortune to inherit Charles and Joan. When you get to work with people like that, you come to really appreciate their abilities and their sense of aesthetic.”

In August 2009, in celebration of MUBG’s 10th anniversary, Millier and Communications Manager Karlan Seville planned and hosted an all-day series of events and activities culminating in a lecture by Peter Raven on environmental stewardship. Raven, one of the world's leading botanists and advocates of conservation and biodiversity was head of the Missouri Botanical Garden in St. Louis for four decades.

When Vice Chancellor Jones retired in 2013, Mizzou Botanic Garden launched the annual free public Jacqueline K. Jones lecture in her honor inviting nationally recognized experts in horticulture-related fields to speak on the Mizzou campus.

“My staff pushed me toward landscape sustainability. We were an early partner in Missourians for Monarchs’ efforts,” Millier said.

As part of that effort, Jenna Sommer, horticulture manager, and Blair Crosby, head of landscape operations, wrote and implemented successful grant applications to replace invasive Callery pear trees. Additionally, MDC Community Conservation Grants were used to replace mowed turf areas with “prairie-type” plantings that encourage birds and pollinators and save labor and resource intensive mowing. The pair also encouraged Millier to begin composting leaves and grass clippings into mulch materials.

In 2019, after a visit to the George Washington Carver National Monument, located in Diamond, Mo., Millier and Seville agreed that as one of Missouri’s historically important gardeners and researchers, the work of Carver should be highlighted in the campus botanic garden. The pair approached rural sociology graduate student Leslie Touzeau who spearheaded MUBG’s George Washington Carver Community Garden Project, which resulted in the 2020 launch of the Henry Kirklin Community Garden located at the former site of University student housing with garden spots for MU students faculty and staff. The Annie Fisher Community Garden, located at the Tara Apartments on the MU campus, launched the summer of 2022.

Under Millier’s leadership, the Friends of the Mizzou Botanic Garden board was formalized and has served in an advisory role. In early 2022, the board finalized a long-range strategic plan that intended to add visibility to the Garden resulting in an expanded tour program and a series of public programs, among other initiatives.

When he applied for the job, Millier was asked by Smith — who along with Flood had already discussed the reduced life spans of the trees — what he would do if he had to replace the pin oaks on the Quad. He said he didn’t think much of the question at the time, but in the last 10 years of his 19 years with the Garden, the project became a top priority, culminating in the replacement of the failing trees with white oak species that might possibly still be standing in 300 years: the Legacy Oaks of the Francis Quad initiative.

Millier believes the culmination of the successful Legacy Oaks project also served to grow the awareness of MUBG.

“There are backwater areas on this campus that have better designs than the main campuses of many colleges and universities,” Millier said.

MIllier retired at the end of March and on April 2024, a new chapter opened in MUBG’s history as Joe Kovolyan took over as the Garden’s director. Already he has made his mark implementing labor- and water-saving practices and is looking into having MUBG and its diverse collection of trees designated as an arboretum.

“President Mun Choi features the garden in his letter that is part of the MU Visitors Guide,” Millier said. “MU has come to understand that the Garden plays a significant role in the Mizzou experience.”