Charles E. Sparkes Memorial Rose Garden - Oklahoma City, OK
Posted by: 
hamquilter
N 35° 30.382 W 097° 34.760
14S E 628838 N 3930127
This rose garden is part of the Will Rogers Park Gardens and Arboretum. It was originally known as the Municipal Rose Garden.
Waymark Code: WMEZK2
Location: Oklahoma, United States
Date Posted: 07/28/2012
Views: 8
This rose garden was designed by City Horticulturist Henry Walter. The Rose Garden was a combined effort by the Oklahoma Rose Society and the Oklahoma City Park Department. The garden comprising 1.67 acres was created in 1938, and “modernized” by the Rose Society in 1950. It was renamed in 1986 after the Parks Department supervisor who worked on the garden. Until the 1970s, this rose garden was considered the second largest in the United States.
The Garden contains over 250 varieties and about 3,000 roses displayed in a formal design. The Garden is planted with an “island” feel, between two small lakes. There is a formal entry on the south which has two sandstone pillars with a metal gate, which replaced the original wood gate. A bronze plaque on the pillar reads:
Municipal Rose Garden
Will Rogers Park
Oklahoma City, OklahomaTo the Citizens of Oklahoma
and
To All Lovers of the Rose
This Garden is Dedicated
Oklahoma Rose Society
1940
On the northwest side of the garden, a redwood Rose Arbor is built on native sandstone piers. This was constructed by the WPA during the 1930s. At the south end, a small sandstone structure called the “Temple of Love” stands at the edge of the garden, offering views of the garden and the west lake through openings in its half-walls.
At the center of the garden is a walled pool containing a large bronze sculpture, which is also a fountain. This sculpture is of a nude mother and daughter. The mother is holding a fish just above the daughter’s reach, symbolizing life’s ideals worth striving for. The fountain sculpture was donated to the City of Oklahoma City by Mr. and Mrs. John Culbertson in 1930, and relocated to this garden in 1955.
The garden is bisected with wide grass panels, and contains numerous curbed gravel paths, forming elongated free-form rectangular rose beds. An aerial view in the photo gallery shows this formal arrangement.