As flowers begin to bloom in Thornden Park, the historical landmark prepares for its 90th summer. Throughout its history as a private home and a public park, the space has hosted everything from weddings to sinister crimes. But during this mix of light and dark times, Thornden remains to locals their neighborhood park, a place for the community to gather and make memories.

Labor of love

As the sun began to warm the bloomless stalks of the rosebushes, more than 20 volunteers trickled into the E.M. Mills Rose Garden in Thornden Park. The workers moved from box to box, weeding and cultivating in preparation for the 200 new rose bushes coming this spring.

‘I guess you could call it a labor of love,’ said former Syracuse Rose Society President Carl Blanchard. ‘You make a lot of friends. It’s kind of a family, if you will. Our rose family.’

Many volunteers who meet in the Rose Garden every Wednesday from 8 a.m. to 12 p.m. are members of the Syracuse Rose Society, which celebrated its 100th anniversary last year. Then, the All-America Rose Selections awarded the E.M. Mills Rose Garden second place out of 125 gardens in 2010’s ‘America’s Best Rose Garden competition.’

Dan Magaro started volunteering in the Rose Garden 25 years ago. He receives mail from people as far away as Texas and California, asking about the roses.

The longest-standing member of the Rose Society, Magaro frequently tells volunteers gardening is about the love.

‘This why nobody argues,’ said Magaro, who, even at the age of 90, still bustles around the garden, pulling weeds and pushing wheelbarrows. ‘Here it’s ‘the roses, the roses.’ And it’s good therapy. Peace of mind. You can’t get that too many places today.’

Rich history

Frozen in time – that’s how Miranda Hine envisions Thornden.

‘The people who created the park were visionaries, loved it and wanted to make it the most beautiful place in Syracuse,’ said Hine, a founding member of the Thornden Park Association, which formed more than 30 years ago.

Hine, who lives on Clarendon Street, loves the park for its history and unusual characters.

The 76-acre plot was originally farmland until the Haskins family bought it in the mid-1800s from Zebulon Ostrom. Nineteen years later, Maj. Alexander Davis bought the land after a tragic suicide occurred in the Haskins family. Davis, an officer in the Civil War, wanted to build an English estate in Syracuse. His house became a place for entertainment and lavish parties.

‘If you got invited to Thornden, you were ‘in,” Hine said.

The city bought the property in 1921 and later turned the great house into a community house, but it burned to the ground before opening to the community. Insurance money went into building the amphitheater, previously a trout pond.

The members recently restored the pond and carriage house. They hope to secure funding for the basketball and tennis courts. No matter what, Hine does not want to see Thornden forgotten.

‘I think we all have stories that are magical or mysterious,’ Hine said. ‘And the important thing is that you record it, share it and pass it down.’

Facing facts

John Sardino, a captain in the Department of Public Safety at Syracuse University, thinks of football when he thinks of Thornden.

‘The legend of Thornden Park for me is playing Pop Warner football,’ Sardino said.

For many officers, especially those who grew up in Syracuse, Thornden means sports. It’s where their children play on the playground or swim in the pool during the summer.

But the park has a reputation for crime. During her first semester at SU, author Alice Seybold was raped in the park and subsequently wrote her memoir ‘Lucky’ in 1999. In March 2005, the body of Darnell McMullin was found in the park. The case is one of 12 cold cases featured on the Syracuse Police Department’s Cold Case Unit website.

Despite these incidents, SPD statistics from the past five years show Thornden does not have more crime than other areas in the East neighborhood.

Crime has happened in the park during the day, the only time it’s officially open, including two incidents of off-campus robberies last year involving students. However, those who do choose to walk through the park at night are encouraged to not go alone.

Cultural magnet

Ronnie Bell, co-founder of the Syracuse Shakespeare Festival, remembers the late Syracuse Post-Standard theater critic, Joan E. Vadeboncoeur, speaking to him about combating the public’s negative perception of Thornden.

Bell, who moved to Syracuse in 1989, learned that despite its reputation, community members embrace programming in Thornden. For the past 10 years, the Syracuse Shakespeare Festival’s annual productions of Shakespeare in the Park have garnered 2,200 to 2,800 viewers a year.

Bell was inspired to start the program when he caught sight of the amphitheater during a drive through Thornden. He deemed the stage surrounded by stone circles ‘a gorgeous place to do theater.’

‘I think it’s the magnet that attracts people from all around the neighborhood,’ Bell said. Shakespeare in the Park brings visitors from both inside and outside the city.

This year’s play will be ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream,’ a revival of the festival’s first performance 10 years ago.

Sweet spot

It was not until she was in her 20s that Mary Beth Roach discovered the amphitheater.

‘There’s still a lot of pockets of Thornden Park that people don’t even know exist,’ said Roach, who grew up in Syracuse and started working for the city 26 ago.

June, when the roses are in full bloom, is the prime time for Thornden weddings, said Roach, the public information officer at the city of Syracuse Department of Parks, Recreation and Youth Programs.

It’s best to reserve the location the fall of the year prior to the more sought-after dates, she said. The organization has already issued 38 park permits for wedding-related events this summer.

Roach said the Lily Pond, a man-made waterfall surrounded by a bed of wildflowers and hidden from view by a stand of trees, is an underestimated wedding venue. The Rose Garden’s narrow walkways discourage larger wedding parties, but the Lily Pond has a large, open space with stone walkways.

Potential brides who see the Lily Pond often call Roach, saying: ‘This is it. This is where I want my wedding.’

Danny Collins remembers clearly the day his wedding photos were taken there almost 12 years ago.

‘Nobody believes it was here,’ said Collins, who started doing ground maintenance in Thornden for the city of Syracuse Department of Parks, Recreation and Youth Programs 18 years ago. ‘They go, ‘What were you – in Colorado or something? Look at that sky.”

The lifelong Syracuse native said Thornden is a park used heavily by everyone, from staff of Upstate Medical University Hospital who go to the park during their lunch hour to kids playing in the football field as part of the Sherman Park Bulldogs in the Pop Warner league.

‘It’s such a diverse park,’ Collins said. ‘Young, old, middle-aged. Everybody loves to use this park.’

Memory lane

Jerry Evensky, an economics professor, practically lived in the park between 1979 and 1992. As a graduate student, his apartment on Beech Street overlooked the park. He moved to Greenwood Place when he became a professor, and the park became his family’s backyard.

Evensky recalls long walks with his golden retriever Chelsea and watching others, from families to football players, enjoy the park.

Since moving, Evensky doesn’t frequent the park as often as he’d like. He visits every year on June 21, his birthday, when the Rose Garden is in full bloom. His favorite roses are the reds, but he loves ‘the whole shtick,’ including the vines on the trellises.

‘When I get a chance, I will walk up to the park,’ he said. ‘But it’s more like a lovely memory to me than a current experience, which is a shame because I miss it.’

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Published on April 8, 2012 at 12:00 pm