Maine’s most beautiful gardens started as a desperate midnight plant rescue

Savage and Rockefeller’s Rescue of Farrand’s Botanical Collection

In 1955, Maine saw a plant rescue that saved a piece of history.

Beatrix Farrand, the only woman among the founding members of the American Society of Landscape Architects, had to give up her prized Reef Point Gardens at age 82.

After her husband died and the 1947 Bar Harbor fire hit the local economy hard, she couldn’t keep up with costs.

Charles Savage, who owned the Asticou Inn, stepped in and bought her entire plant collection for $5,000 with help from John D. Rockefeller Jr.

The team then moved over 250 azaleas, 175 rhododendrons, and countless other plants by truck from Bar Harbor to Northeast Harbor.

Today, these rescued plants bloom in two stunning Maine gardens where visitors can walk among living pieces of botanical history.

An 82-Year-Old Gardener Faced a Heartbreaking Choice

In 1955, Beatrix Farrand had to tear down her beloved Reef Point Gardens in Bar Harbor, Maine. At 82, this pioneering landscape architect couldn’t keep up with costs after her husband Max died in 1945.

Bar Harbor refused to give her educational center tax-exempt status. The town needed to rebuild after a devastating 1947 fire and raised property taxes.

Though Reef Point survived the fire, Farrand couldn’t turn her childhood home into the public garden and research center she dreamed of.

Charles Savage Stepped Up With a Bold Plan

Charles Kenneth Savage owned the Asticou Inn and sat on the Reef Point Foundation board. He got one year to move whatever plants he could save.

Savage returned home at 17 after his father died to help his mother run their family hotel. Over time, he built friendships with landscape experts on Mount Desert Island, including Farrand.

Since 1929, he worked as trustee of Joseph Curtis’s Thuya property, learning about landscape design and native plants.

Money From a Rockefeller Made the Rescue Possible

Savage asked his neighbor John D. Rockefeller Jr. for help. Rockefeller, whose own garden Farrand designed 25 years earlier, gave $5,000 (about $51,000 today) to buy and move the entire plant collection.

Farrand worked with the Rockefellers for ten years on the Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Garden, where Abby copied the pink wall around Beijing’s Forbidden City.

Time ran short as Reef Point’s new owner, Robert Patterson, wanted the plants gone before selling the land.

The Perfect Spot Sat Right Across From His Inn

Savage picked an alder swamp across from his family’s Asticou Inn for a Japanese-style garden. The 2.3-acre spot at the corner of Route 198 and Route 3 offered room for a garden and pond visitors could enjoy.

Though Savage never went to Japan, pictures of temple gardens reminded him of pitch pines growing over granite on Mount Desert Island.

He also planned to use Curtis’s Thuya property nearby for an English garden with Farrand’s perennials.

Thousands of Plants Needed New Homes Fast

Reef Point’s plant list read like a treasure map. Farrand collected over 250 azaleas and 175 rhododendrons from her tests with exotic plants that could handle Maine winters.

Yews, cedars, spruce, hemlock, and hundreds of flowering and native Maine shrubs grew across Reef Point’s garden plots.

The collection also had perennials, ground covers, rare willows, and many other plants listed in Farrand’s collection of about 2,000 plant records.

Star plants included a huge Sargent’s weeping hemlock and Alberta spruce.

Tree Experts Brought Special Equipment for the Big Move

White & Franke Tree Service from Brookline, Massachusetts came with special tools and local helpers, including Savage’s young kids.

Workers dug up the largest plants by hand and wrapped them in burlap for their 11-mile trip from Bar Harbor to Northeast Harbor.

The team used converted tow trucks with crane lifts to load heavy root balls onto moving trucks. Old photos show the company name on truck doors and workers guiding plants with steel cables.

Winter Storage Protected Plants During Construction

Plants stayed in temporary spots covered with mulch at Thuya during winter 1956 while Asticou construction moved forward.

Workers brought truckloads of soil and stones to the former swamp to create the framework for a Japanese scroll garden.

Savage worked quickly because Patterson needed to sell the Reef Point property and pay growing tax bills.

Records of exactly which plants moved remain incomplete, as even Farrand didn’t know her full inventory after decades of collecting.

The Japanese Garden Took Shape By 1958

Workers finished the Japanese stroll garden in 1958, complete with winding paths, a great pond, lily pond, and garden rooms.

Fine-gravel paths got regular raking in patterns looking like flowing water, with a sand garden featuring rocks meant to be islands.

The huge Sargent’s weeping hemlock found a home in a key spot just north of the main bridge. Savage designed the garden to seem bigger than it was, mixing azaleas, rhododendrons, conifers, and Maine-hardy plants.

Thuya Garden Became Home to English-Style Borders

Savage built the English-style flower garden at Thuya after finishing the Asticou plantings, picking different plants from the Reef Point collection.

He made a long north-south path crossed by a shorter east-west path, with terraced areas holding wooden benches and wicker chairs.

Farrand’s perennials, including filipendula, astilbe, and delphiniums, bloom against a backdrop of evergreen forest.

An old apple tree planted by Curtis and a dawn redwood planted by Savage joined items from Reef Point to complete the garden.

Plant Detectives Still Work to Identify the Rescued Specimens

Mary Roper started working at Asticou in 1989, thirty years after the moves finished, and spent over three decades identifying relocated plants.

Since Farrand transferred her herbarium vouchers to the University of California Berkeley, creating consolidated records of moved plants became nearly impossible.

Garden managers now assess nuanced details of flowers, leaves, and stems to develop proper identifications, just as Farrand did before them.

Some specimens like Kalmia latifolia and old rhododendrons still carry a quiet, distinguished presence from Farrand’s original collection.

Two Gardens Still Showcase Farrand’s Green Legacy

The Mount Desert Land & Garden Preserve, formed in 1970 by Peggy and David Rockefeller, now manages both of Savage’s gardens.

Asticou Azalea Garden and Thuya Garden welcome visitors from May through October, showcasing Farrand’s rescued plants and their offspring.

These hidden gems burst with spring azaleas and cherries in a spectacular display of blooms that reflects Farrand’s love of beauty.

Savage’s democratic vision created spaces where today’s visitors can find quiet enjoyment among plants once destined for bulldozers, with teenagers taking prom photos and tourists experiencing calm contemplation in these rescued botanical treasures.

Visiting Thuya Garden, Maine

Thuya Garden at 15 Thuya Drive in Northeast Harbor showcases plants rescued during The Great Plant Rescue of 1955-1956, when Charles Kenneth Savage and John D. Rockefeller Jr. saved hundreds of rare specimens from Beatrix Farrand’s dismantled Reef Point estate.

You can visit June 14 through October 13 from dawn to dusk with a $5 suggested donation.

Access the garden via the granite-stepped Asticou Terraces Trail or Thuya Drive, and explore Thuya Lodge’s horticultural library.

This article was created with AI assistance and human editing.

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