Sunday 10 A.M. Flora Abundance at the Hospital Gardens
The Hospital Gardens at the Pennsylvania Hospital
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The Hospital Gardens at the Pennsylvania Hospital
Photo by B. Krist for GPTMC
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Eighteenth-century hospital herbal gardens were virtual drugstores. Physicians used the plants, both those introduced by European settlers and those native to the area, to prepare "physics" for their sick patients.
Five physicians signed a letter in 1774 requesting that a medicinal herb garden be planted
The Physic Garden at Pennsylvania Hospital, the nation's first, founded by Benjamin Franklin,
boasts central curved beds and walled borders contain labeled plants representative of the herbs, trees and shrubs grown for medical uses in the 18th century.
The adjacent Pine Street garden is simply brilliant in the spring, when 100-year old wisteria vines and azalea bushes bloom anew.