Gardens Galore!

An Article by Mariana Fariña

Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens: The Passion of a Father-Daughter Duo

A visit to the Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens invigorates the soul and injects a shot of beauty into the heart every time I visit. Yet the only aquatic garden of the National Park Service remains relatively unknown to too many residents of the nation’s capital. The Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens have a rich and fascinating history of a father-daughter duo – the gardening hobby of an amputee veteran turned into a commercial success later driven by his daughter after his death. May the National Park Service, which was my source of the garden’s history, be able to preserve this horticultural treasure created by the dedication of such a passionate duo.

Walter Shaw’s Journey South

Born in Maine in 1838, Walter B. Shaw probably never imagined that his journey south for the Civil War would eventually end converting the amateur gardener into an entrepreneur and expert horticulturalist. In the middle of the nation’s Civil War, Walter Shaw served as a Private in the US Army and his company fought in engagements throughout Virginia. After promptly being promoted to Corporal, he was engaged in heavy fighting during the Wilderness Campaign, a crucial part of the Civil War and a bloody engagement where Union General Ulysses S. Grant and Confederate General Robert E. Lee clashed in dense woods in Virginia. While fighting at the Spotsylvania Court House in 1864, Walter was hit with a Minié ball in his lower right arm which resulted in partial amputation of that arm. Walter was sent to Columbia Hospital in Washington DC to recover, where he learned to write with his left arm. After being honorably discharged from the Army in 1865, Walter’s neat, self-taught writing with his left hand helped get him a job as a clerk and copywriter with the US Treasury Department.

The Establishment of a Waterlily Business

Walter’s life started to find a balance. In 1879 he and his wife, Luciana Miller, bought 33 acres of land from Luciana’s parents for $2,500 (just under $80,000 in 2025 dollars) in the Benning and Deanwood area, east of the Anacostia River. They had three children: Charlie, Lucy Helen, and Robert.

In 1888, Walter planted 12 hardy American white waterlilies from Maine in an old ice pond on his property. The lilies grew rapidly, filling the pond, so he used his one functional arm and a shovel to create more ponds. His flower hobby turned into a business in 1889, earning him $33 in profits. The following year, his profits increased to $125 (over $4,300 today), and in the late 1890s Walter created a system to circulate fresh water from the Anacostia River through the ponds. Since his hobby proved more lucrative than his position at the US Treasury Department, Walter pursued aquatic gardening full-time in 1902. Over the following years he expanded his business to include the cultivation of lotus flowers, and by 1907 the business was generating around $1,200 per acre (equivalent to nearly $41,000 today) and shipping flowers to cities such as New York, Boston, Philadelphia, and Chicago. He expanded his offerings to include 40 different varieties of water lilies and a few types of fish such as carp, paradise, and goldfish, purchased plants from Egypt, Sierra Leone, Ireland, India, England, and France, and began experimenting with cross breeding various water lilies.

Helen Took the Gardens to New Heights

Walter’s advancing age was taking a toll on him, so he transferred ownership of the aquatic gardens to his daughter Helen, but he stayed active in the business until his death at 83 years.

Lucy Helen Shaw, known as Helen, was born in 1875. She lived in Washington DC with her family while her father worked for the US Treasury, and at age 4, they moved to the family’s new property, where Helen enjoyed exploring and appreciating the wonders of nature. As a teenager, she assisted her father with his aquatic garden business, learning about plant propagation and bookkeeping. At the young age of 16, Helen married local draftsman James M. Fowler in 1891, and they lived in an old tenant house next to the gardens. Sadly, they lost their only child, Marian, to disease in 1910.

In 1912 the Shaws created the W.B. Shaw Lily Ponds and were soon the country’s largest exporter of cutwater flowers. During this time the Shaws experimented with hybridization and propagation, while marketing 63 varieties of plants, some found nowhere else in the country due in part to the unique ecology of the area. Becoming a widow only the previous year, Helen took over the business after her father’s death in 1921. By 1938, Shaw Gardens encompassed 42 ponds spread over nine acres and contained 500,000 plants.

Helen was an astute businesswoman, constantly working to expand and diversify the collection of aquatic plants at the gardens and selling 3,000-5,000 lilies daily along with 3,000 other aquatic plants a week. By 1931 Helen sold 55 different varieties of water lilies. The site welcomed as many as 6,000 visitors a day during the summer and generated profits of almost $61,000. Around 1930 at 55 years old, Helen began painting water lilies. She enjoyed this newfound hobby, and her paintings accompanied the garden catalog so customers could see what they were purchasing when the flowers were not in bloom.

Her business was progressive for its time. In addition to being woman-owned, Helen Fowler employed several local African American residents. In 1913, the Shaws built two steam-heated greenhouses to keep tropical plants alive in the winter months. Walter Shaw had purchased a truck that he called a “gas wagon” for the gardens to transport and sell flowers. Helen was the driver of the truck and became the first woman in Washington DC to hold a commercial drivers’ license, an achievement that highlights her pioneering spirit and determination to break barriers and challenge societal norms.

Not only a place of business, but the gardens were also a popular spot for rest and reflection. Washingtonians would come to the gardens in the early mornings for a picnic breakfast or to enjoy the cooler temperatures walking the gardens before the lilies close in the hot afternoon sun. President and Mrs. Woodrow Wilson, Mrs. Warren Harding, and Mrs. Calvin Coolidge were all frequent visitors, and Helen considered them all friends.

Helen became an aquatic plant expert recognized worldwide as she travelled globally to collect lilies and aquatic plants. Letters from Gilbert Haugen of the House of Representatives Committee on Agriculture and Frederick Coville – the botanist and curator of the U.S. National Herbarium – helped her gain acceptance at botanical gardens in the West Indies and South America. She frequently spoke on aquatic gardens in the District of Columbia, judged flower exhibitions, and served on the American Horticultural Society exhibition committee.

A Garden for All

Despite the success of the business, the garden’s future became uncertain when the US Government wanted to expand Anacostia Park to give the public access along the river. The government wanted to use eminent domain to take over the Shaw Gardens. In 1929 Helen and her brother Charles filed a lawsuit with the government over control of the gardens. This action delayed the purchase of the land. However, in 1933 Congress authorized a plan to fill in the marsh and swamp areas along the Anacostia River in the name of controlling malaria-bearing mosquitoes. Helen fought the takeover of the gardens valiantly for several years, but with government and political pressure weighing against her, she finally agreed to sell the gardens in 1938 for $50,000 (or over $1.1 million in 2025 dollars). The government agreed not to fill in the marsh and to keep the aquatic ponds. The National Park Service took control of the land, but Helen was able to rent her house from the government and lived on the property until her death. She helped train park service personnel on how to grow and maintain the gardens and gave occasional tours of the ponds. In 1957 Helen died at 82 years old. Her home was demolished soon after, yet her legacy lives on in the beautiful park.

Visit the Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens to be in awe of a piece of heaven in Washington D.C. that Walter and his daughter Helen created over the years. You will enjoy multiple ponds that still look very much like in the days of Walter and Helen, filled with waterlilies and lotuses where many creatures live and thrive such as red-eared slider turtles and snapping turtles, many species of dragonflies, beavers, and much more. It is a birder’s paradise, where extra-long camera lenses search for great blue herons, Eastern bluebirds, red shouldered hawks, ospreys, red winged blackbirds, wild turkeys, and occasionally lost young male roseate spoonbills that have wandered too far north. If you are agile and quiet enough you will see frogs, otherwise you will only hear them plop into the ponds as you approach. Any time of the year is ideal to visit, but viewing the lotuses in the middle of the summer is heavenly.

Born and raised in Lima, Peru, Mariana Fariña owes her love of gardening to her mother and grandmothers and is trying her best to nurture that passion with her two young adult daughters. Mariana serves on the board of the Friends of the Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens.