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The Peirce family’s trees
The Lenni Lenape lived, fished and farmed in this part of the Brandywine valley for thousands of years. In 1700 the Quaker farmer George Peirce bought 402 acres here from William Penn’s commissioners, and in 1798 his descendants, the twins Samuel and Joshua Peirce, began planting an arboretum that grew to cover 15 acres.


Saved from the sawmill
On 20 July 1906 the industrialist Pierre S. du Pont bought the farm, mainly to save the Peirces’ trees from a lumber mill operator who was about to cut them down. Over the next decades he added the Open Air Theatre in 1914, the great Conservatory in 1921, the Italian Water Garden in 1925–1927, the Chimes Tower in 1929 and the Main Fountain Garden in 1931.
A public garden
Du Pont created the Longwood Foundation in 1937 and died in 1954. The gardens now cover more than 1,100 acres and hold more than 13,500 kinds of plants. The Main Fountain Garden reopened in 2017 after restoration, and in November 2024 the Longwood Reimagined project opened the West Conservatory.
