b'From the Main Terrace, visitors step down a gracious staircase to the Reflecting Pool Terrace. It contains a D-shaped pool where original lead dolphins delightfully spout water. Surrounding the pool is a mix of perennial and annual flower garden classics that bloom in rich hues of yellow, blue, and purple. In the spring, the dogwoods billow with pink and white blossoms. Photo credit: Vicki Johnson.moreconsidered,lesshurriedexis- fossilsweredonatedtothemuseum, tence is not the only way he seems outand his longtime home on Long Island of step with our busy, technologicallyis also now a county park. So there is a obsessed world. There is also the ques- long history of public donations.tion of this gift of the garden, of giv- Blanchardsays,however,thatit ing away something of such incrediblewashisfather,PeterBlanchardJr., value to a public he doesnt even know. whowantedthelandpreservedfor-Blanchardsmother,Adelaide,wasever.Duringhislifetime,theelder the granddaughter of Henry Clay Frick,Blancharddonatedthelargefield theturn-of-the-centuryindustrialistwhere the horses and sheep had grazed whose mansion in Manhattan became ato Millburn, a gift that was opposed by museum displaying the familys collec- some. Actual friends of ours were re-tion of European masters. Blanchard isally incensed, Blanchard recalls, ask-on its board. His mothers father, Childsing Who the heck are the Blanchards Frick, was a paleontologist, and an earlyto take land off the tax rolls.andimportantpatronoftheNaturalThe pressure to develop the property History Museum. At his death all hiswas relentless. In his book Blanchard re-Tucked discreetly behind plantings, the Summerhouse, circa 1920, is an octagonal pavilion constructed of local sandstone with copper coursings around cone-shaped roofs, surrounded by four granite water basins. The gardens along this axis provide an attractive contrast to the formality of the terraced gardens and are the most intact feature of the Day period gardens. Photo credit: Vicki Johnson.20/ matters magazine / hearth + home 2022'