Mt. Pleasant?s VanAllen House gets a flora facelift

BY BROOKS TAYLOR

Mt. Pleasant News

A project six years in the making is finally taking root at the VanAllen House.

The house, which is located just northwest of the Howard and Helen Hills Henry County Heritage Center, is also known as the former Saunders Elementary School.

Board members of the Henry County Heritage Trust have completed the first two phases of a six-phase landscaping plan around the VanAllen House. ?We?ve been planning this since the house was moved here in 2009,? said board member Pat White.

Funding has been the reason the plan did not take off earlier. However, this past year with funds in hand, the board met in August with Tim Egli, of Egli Landscapes Inc., in Wayland, to draft a landscaping plan.

The first two phases of the plan, completed just recently, include the planting of a maple and an elm tree north of the house and landscaping on the south side of house.

?Thus far, the landscaping was made possible through generous donors,? White said. ?We have been extremely pleased with the donations,? echoed Waunita Gibbons, another trust board member.

White is hoping other phases of the plan can be added in 2016. ?We have to have funding before we can continue,? she said. ?If we had the money, we could have it done in the spring.?

The price tag on the first two phases of the plan was about $4,500, White said.

Included in the landscaping surrounding the VanAllen House will be 147 perennial flowers, shrubs and trees. The six trees include elm, lilac, oak and maple, with roses, irises, spirea and hydrangea among the flowers that will be planted.

?It will be nice once it is done,? White predicted. ?Tim (Egli) planned it so there will be a lot of variety the year around,? she said.

Donations for the project may be made by contacting White, or sending them to the Henry County Heritage Trust, P.O. Box 333, Mt. Pleasant, Iowa 52641.