Dear Friends,

This late winter season has seemed extra long for many of us, and we look forward eagerly to the coming of spring. In addition to all the usual delights of the vernal season, we can anticipate with special relish the renewed landscape around our historic Lily Ponds. Thanks again to Emerson and the Anheuser-Busch Foundation for making possible the major infrastructure work on the masonry, drainage, irrigation, and new lighting systems.

But special thanks and congratulations also to you the Friends, whose successful Year End Appeal will help fund the installation of an almost completely new plantscape. Well done!

I want also to personally thank the Friends for your generous and thoughtful gift in connection with my 20th anniversary as Park Director. The silver julep cups are very beautiful and very much appreciated. It has been a high honor and great pleasure over these years to have worked so hard with you for the revitalization of this wonderful Park and community asset. It has been an exciting and challenging time for those of us who care deeply about this place and this city.

Of course the work is not completed, and I dare to hope that we have more years of mutual effort and accomplishment ahead of us. If they can be as rewarding as the years just past, we will be able to look back with great satisfaction. As always, you have my pledge to work as hard as I can on behalf of our shared goals.


Sincerely,
John Karel
Park Director