Univeristy Bridge.The Sherwood Fox Arboretum
HISTORY AND OBJECTIVES
In 1916, the University bought the Kingsmill property, approximately 150 acres known as Bellvue Farm, to be the site of the new campus. The house stood on the present wooded area in front of Middlesex College (L12, see UWO map). The London Hunt Club already occupied part of the property and continued to rent it for a number of years. Additional land was purchased in 1917, 1922 and 1932 to complete the grounds. The University moved to the present campus in 1923 with the building of the Arts Building (now University College). At that time, the entrance to the campus was from Western Road; experts later advised the Board to build a bridge over the Thames and have the main approach from the East. The right of way from Richmond Street to the river was purchased in March, 1922 and the bridge was completed in November, 1923.
Access to the Kingsmill farm was from Western Road via a lane flanked by two rows of Black Walnut trees; the double row of trees in front of Middlesex College (K11, see UWO map) stood at the Eastern end of this lane. One or two remnants of this avenue also persist near the McIntosh Gallery.
The preservation of the natural beauty of the new campus was a priority with the Board of Governors; a beginning was made with a gift of 10,000 trees from the Forestry Department of Ontario. During the academic year, 1929-1930, Col. J. B. Maclean, president of the Maclean Publishing Company in Toronto, while looking over the grounds from the Board room in the (University College) tower, saw possibilities in landscape development arising from the contours of the campus as well as the remaining forest areas. He offered to finance a plan to fix the location of future buildings and set forth landscaping details in the English style; a Canadian pupil, Gordon Culham, of the preeminent American firm doing this sort of landscaping was hired. The unemployment relief system then in place was used to carry out the landscaping program, the costs of which were equally shared by the municipal, provincial and federal governments. Old wood lots were cleared of dead trees, the river bank was improved to prevent erosion and the main approach from Richmond Street was altered to give one of more pleasant lines. By 1936, 12,000 trees had been planted at a cost of less than $2000. Col. Maclean continued to provide support for landscaping consultation and design until 1947, after which time Mr. Culham was retained as a consultant by the Board. In 1966, the University conferred the honorary degree, doctor of laws, upon Mr. Culham in recognition of his contribution to the physical development of UWO.
A series of photos of the two original buildings on campus can be seen which show the early progression of some of the plantings. There is also a photograph showing several people golfing on the present site of Talbot College.
Dr. W. Sherwood Fox had been hired to teach in the Classics Department in 1917. In 1919, he was appointed Dean of Arts and Science; he was inaugurated as President in 1928 with a celebration that jointly celebrated Western's Golden Jubilee.
The Sherwood Fox Arboretum was established in 1981 by Dr. George Connell, then President of Western, who appointed Dr. J.B. Phipps as the Arboretum's first Director. The memorialization of Sherwood Fox is a logical one; he was an inveterate botanist, adding numerous specimens to the Herbarium which he collected during personal and professional trips to many places. In his Reminiscences, he noted that the abundance of tulip trees in Southwestern Ontario helped lure him to Western's Classics Department in 1917. He remarked that the tulip tree, which he first recalled seeing when he was a boy of nine in Erie, Pa, was the also the first tree he was able to identify. After his retirement, Dr. Fox wrote (1948-1950) approximately three dozen articles about the trees of Southwestern Ontario for The London Free Press. These are collected in a scrapbook which is held in the J.J. Talman Regional Collection in the Weldon Library.
The fundamental objective of the Sherwood Fox Arboretum is to have growing on campus as many as possible of the several thousand kinds of trees and shrubs that can survive in this climate. In order to effect this, there is an accession policy involving three separate programs:
- First, there is the Donor Program whereby trees are donated to commemorate people or events.
- Secondly, there is a regular accession program in which seeds, or occasionally cuttings, are started in the greenhouse of the Department of Biology until they are large enough to plant out on campus. This program greatly extends the range of species beyond those commercially available.
- Finally, the Roads and Grounds section of the UWO Physical Plant & Capital Planning Services Department is responsible for most of the campus landscaping and, to this end, has its own program of planting.
These three components generate a living collection that the Arboretum curates.
A Guide to the Sherwood Fox Arboretum gives an overview of the Arboretum and provides the latest printed list of its collection. To obtain a guide or for further information please contact The Director, Dr. Jane Bowles
Much of the historical information was obtained from:
"Western"-1878-1953 by James J. Talman and Ruth Davis Talman, which was published by the University of Western Ontario in 1953.
This page was last updated on
June 6, 2005
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