The Kelsey Arboretum 

18 Kelsey Road, Boxford, MA

December 6, 2013

Dear Members and Friends,

Greetings from the Board of Directors of the Horticultural Society of Boxford! We again want to thank you for your ongoing support of the Kelsey Arboretum and wish you good tidings for this Holiday season.

As you know, the Arboretum was planted by Harlan P. Kelsey as his show garden after moving his North Carolina nursery to the Boxford location in 1929. Among his many contributions, Kelsey served on the President’s Commission which saved the Great Smoky National Park and the Blue Ridge Mountains, made important contributions to the field of horticulture, and was an early and important member of the Appalachian Mountain Club.

We are delighted this December to announce that Loren Wood, founder of the Kelsey Arboretum, has recently completed his biography on Harlan P. Kelsey and the book is now available both via the Horticultural Society of Boxford and on the Internet. As a Friend of the Kelsey Arboretum, we hope that you will take the time to learn much more about Kelsey, his life, and his contributions. Part of the proceeds from books purchased through the Horticultural Society of Boxford will go to the continuing work of the Arboretum.

Here is a brief synopsis of the book from the author, Loren Wood:

Beautiful Land of the Sky: John Muir’s Forgotten Eastern Counterpart, Harlan P. Kelsey: Pioneering our Native Plants and Eastern National Parks.

The subtitle, John Muir’s Forgotten Eastern Counterpart, Harlan P. Kelsey, is purposely provocative. It suggests that Harlan P. Kelsey is in the same league with the supreme icon of western wilderness and preservation—John Muir.

This is the John Muir who helped father four national parks, whose name adorns three mountains, a glacier, three trails, a section of a state highway, a woodland, a wilderness area, a beach, countless schools (including a college), numerous buildings and parks, a national historic site, a US postage stamp, and the 2005 California state quarter. He was awarded three honorary doctoral degrees from Harvard, Yale, and Cal/Berkeley. Even this impressive list is incomplete, but you get the idea. In contrast, Harlan P. Kelsey is an obscure, forgotten figure. Ask anyone, “Who is the preservation hero of the East?” One person in ten thousand might give you a name and would probably be wrong. I contend it is Kelsey and have the evidence to demonstrate it.

Muir helped found four national parks in the West. Kelsey helped birth four national parks in the East. Kelsey’s forte was horticulture, which is what sets apart the eastern national parks. In the West the emphasis is on geological marvels (e.g., Yosemite National Park, which has three million visitors per year). In the East the marvels are horticultural (e.g., Great Smoky Mountains National Park, which has nine million visitors per year).

Beautiful Land of the Sky chronicles Kelsey’s journey from the humblest of beginnings to a national prominence that bordered on near adulation. Step by step, we find remarkable parallels in the odysseys of Muir and Kelsey. Beautiful Land is the inspiring and entertaining story of how horticultural preeminence established Kelsey as America’s natural leader in selecting our most-visited National Parks. It demonstrates Kelsey’s role in pioneering native plants for America’s gardens. He lived among us, here in Boxford, thirty years until his death in 1958.

Beautiful Land is history for the millions of backyard gardeners who may wonder about the issues between native and exotic plants. It is history for the millions of conservationists who may wonder why the western parks get all of the attention, while the eastern parks have so many more visitors. An eminent professor of history was asked, “What good is an historian, anyway?” He said, “I suppose the historian has about the same function as the artist, the novelist, or the actor – he sometimes inspires people, but mostly he entertains them.” Beautiful Land does both. If our National Parks are “America’s Best Idea,” as claimed by one celebrated television series, then here is the story of how the idea was implemented for our parks east of the Mississippi.

“Thank you for the opportunity to read and comment on your manuscript, Beautiful Land of the Sky. … I feel that I have come to know Harlan Kelsey as though he had told me his story in person; indeed, when I reached the inevitable end of his life I was brought to tears, and at the end of the manuscript I felt somewhat bereft for having stepped back out of Kelsey’s world.”     (Erin Perry, MFA in Creative Writing, Professor of Writing. New Hampshire Technical Institute, Concord, NH.)

Details were gathered from over 50,000 letters in Kelsey’s personal files, uncovered and preserved by the author. Books are available through all commercial channels and the Horticultural Society of Boxford.

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As we say every year at this time, we are fortunate to have the Arboretum, this small gem of Kelsey’s legacy, here in Boxford, and we need your ongoing support to keep it vibrant and improving. Please help us do so by either continuing your membership for the coming year or by electing to join the Horticultural Society of Boxford at a membership level that is appropriate for you.

While our annual budget is small, we do need to pay basic expenses to keep the Arboretum open to the public every day of the year. Our expenses include care for and replacement of the wide variety of plants that Kelsey introduced as well as the liability insurance which allows public access. Your contributions will allow us to maintain and protect this important historical and horticultural public venue for the residents of as well as visitors to Boxford, the Essex National Heritage Area and the North Shore.

We look forward to seeing you often at the Arboretum and ask for your financial support via a tax-deductible contribution.

Sincerely yours,

Nancy Merrill

President & Treasurer