The Old Arboretum of Furman University

Gardening culture spread across Europe, up through Charleston and into Greenville in the 1920s. Here in Reedy Falls Park, you can still see its effects as it transformed this area from a mill area with eroding soil, polluting dyes, and denuded landscape, to a beautiful arboretum. Much of what you see today of the old aboretum along Furman College Way (to the left and right) was made possible because of Furman University, located on this bank of the Reedy River.

The Greenville Gardening Club was founded in 1926, as described by Albert N. Sanders and Alfred S. Reid in Botanical Gardening In Greenville. The Greenville Gardening Club entered the Better Homes and Garden’s “Most Beautiful America” contest and won the second-place prize of $500 for their landscaping of Rock Quarry Park. With the prize money, the club proposed partnering with the Greenville Park and Tree Commission and Furman University to create a beautiful arboretum. Furman’s Sumner Ives, who specialized in biology and botany, helped with the project and encouraged Furman to join (Alfred S. Reid’s Furman University: Toward a New Identity). Furman’s President at the time, Bennette Geer, thought this project not only would provide a place of beauty, but would also serve as an educational tool and a unifying symbol of Furman’s ties to the community. Furman obtained 5 acres of land near the Reedy River and construction began. Both Furman students and W.P.A workers completed the labor. With the combined efforts of Mrs. H.T. Crigler, John Alexander McPherson, Sumner Ives, and Bennette Eugene Geer, South Carolina’s first arboretum was completed with over 260 species of trees and 25 species of other plants (Reid).

During the 1930s, the arboretum was a major tourist attraction for Greenville, providing a place for Furman students to actively study botany and a place for the community to enjoy. However, during WWII the arboretum began to fall into disrepair after the community focused its attention elsewhere. The Gardening Club gave what remained of the arboretum to Furman in 1948, and because of its choice to relocate, gave the land to the city in its move. Furman decided to revive the arboretum at their new campus on Poinsett Highway, by replanting remaining seeds and clippings from the old arboretum. Today, specimens from the old arboretum still exist on the new campus near Travelers Rest, unifying Furman and Greenville botanically.

The famous “Medusa tree” down to your right (on the way to the next sites) is a remaining beech tree from the arboretum planted 70 years ago. It gets its iconic roots from the construction of Furman College Way (the road), which caused the soil around it to erode. According to the Greenville Picture Project, Julie Moir Messervy was hired by the city to revive the old site as “Little Falls Park.”

Be sure to get a photograph with those roots! And now that you know the history, feel free to smile and say Furman's famous cheer, "FU ALL THE TIME."

Sources Used:

Alfred S. Reid, Furman University: Toward a New Identity, 1925-1975. Duke University Press, 1976.

Albert N. Sanders and Alfred S. Reid. Botanical Gardening in Greenville. Furman University, 1962.

“Falls Park - Greenville, South Carolina.” South Carolina Picture Project, South Carolina Picture Project, 2018,