University commemorates nation's 400th anniversary with patriotic garden

Virginia Tech joins the commemoration of the nation’s 400th anniversary with an America’s Anniversary Garden™. Virginia Tech President Charles W. Steger and Sharron Quisenberry, dean of the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, put the finishing touches on a patriotic color-themed garden located in the front of Burruss Hall, the main administration building on campus.

“Virginia Tech is proud to join the commemoration of the first English settlement in the commonwealth 400 years ago and to be part of the Jamestown 2007 events with an America’s Anniversary Garden™ on campus,” said Steger. “For many years to come, it will be a sign of how we honor the past as we celebrate and invent the future.”

Virginia Cooperative Extension and faculty in the Department of Horticulture developed the America’s Anniversary Garden™ project to help garden enthusiasts, communities, and groups mark America's 400th anniversary with signature garden plantings.

“The America’s Anniversary Garden™ program gives us an opportunity to attract new gardeners by teaching gardening skills and showing them how to use community gardening to promote local tourism. These red, white, and blue gardens will serve as a welcome to visitors to Virginia,” said Quisenberry. “The increased interest in gardening is expected to be a boost to Virginia’s green industry.”

According to David Close, state VCE-Master Gardener coordinator, more than 70 greenhouse and nursery plant producers, as well as landscapers, have already made a commitment to support the effort by providing the appropriate plant materials and by distributing educational and marketing materials for America’'s Anniversary Garden™ projects throughout the state.

As part of the America’s Anniversary Garden™ project, Virginia Cooperative Extension has developed publications detailing how to plant landscapes in public spaces, such as roadside corridors and around municipal buildings, as well as around homes and businesses. Plans for a container garden are also included.

The Burruss Hall garden features a mix of red, white, and blue annuals, perennials, and shrubs, including Amelanchier (Serviceberry), Itea virginica (Virginia Sweetspire), petunias, Phlox paniculata ‘David’ (Garden Phlox), Veronica ‘Sunny Border Blue’ (Speedwell), Hemerocallis x ‘Frankly Scarlet’ (Daylilly), Leucanthemum x superbum ‘Becky’ (Shasta Daisy), Salvia farinacea ‘Victoria,’ Bacopa ‘Snowstorm,’ Verbena canadensis ‘Taylor Town,’ Verbena x ‘Lanai Blue,’ and Dusty Miller.

Visit the America’s Anniversary Garden™ website to learn more about the project and publications.