Our Mission & Vision

Bartram’s Garden is many things to many people.

Jump to Mission & Vision Strategic Plan Organizational History Annual Reports

It’s a home for horticulture, the first nationally landmarked landscape, and the oldest surviving botanic garden in North America.

It is Sankofa Community Farm, an ancient riverfront, a conversation on food sovereignty, high school internship programs, and a place of untold histories.

At its core, it is a public park spanning nearly 50 acres in the Kingsessing neighborhood of Southwest Philadelphia, offering beauty, peace, and connection.

The Garden is operated by the non-profit John Bartram Association in partnership with the Philadelphia Department of Parks & Recreation.

Learn more about Our Plans and Partners.

People walking down a garden path surrounded by blooming trees and plants.

Mission & Vision

Vision

Bartram’s Garden is a place and an aspirational vision for the future, where:

Public spaces are centers of welcome, respite, and celebration.
Nature and the environment are accessible and inviting to everyone.
People decide what happens in their own communities.
Historic places seek to repair our fraught legacies.

Mission

The mission of the John Bartram Association is to co-create equitable relationships among people and nature through immersive, community-centered experiences that activate the Bartram legacy, Garden, and House, on land and on the Schuylkill River, in Southwest Philadelphia.

About These Statements

The Garden’s Mission and Vision were developed by a joint committee of staff and board members over a seven-month process in 2020 and originally affirmed by the Board of Directors in December 2020. They were reaffirmed in 2024–2025 during strategic planning.

With support from the board, the staff also developed accompanying Values statements in 2021 to serve as internal guidance for day-to-day work. Both staff and board frequently reference the Mission, Vision, and Values together, but because of their inward-facing nature, the Values are intentionally not published here.

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Tending Common Ground Strategic Plan for 2025–2033

The new strategic plan is called Tending Common Ground because a public space like Bartram’s Garden thrives thanks to shared intention, care, and commitment. The Garden is a place for everyone––and there is much to do!

Learn more about the Tending Common Ground Strategic Plan.

Strategic Plan Goals: What, Who, and How

The plan’s three goals outline what will happen, who makes it possible, and how:

Goal 1: Shared Joy, Shared Responsibility

sets the overarching priorities for what the Garden will do to strengthen personal bonds with nature, to take action for climate resilience, and to exchange multi-vocal stories about this land and the many beings—human and non-human alike—who have called it home.
Goal 2: Values-Driven Human Ecosystem

calls for greater investment in the people who power Bartram’s Garden. For the site’s ethos of welcoming and care to be invigorating and sustainable, it must be accompanied by a culture of cross-pollination, systems that ease communications, and shifts in practices that lead to more holistic and impactful solutions.
Goal 3: Abundance and Constraints in Harmony

outlines how to sustain sharpening the Garden’s position, setting priorities, and navigating uncertainty. The goal includes striking a balance between acknowledging finite financial resources as well as uncertainty in our wider world while also leaning into the abundance and shared values that the Garden enjoys and fosters with partners, neighbors, and supporters.

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Organizational History

Building on the rich history of this landscape, the non-profit John Bartram Association was founded in 1893 by descendants of John Bartram to support the City of Philadelphia’s management of Bartram’s Garden as a public park.

For much of the 20th century, the Association functioned in an advisory capacity to Philadelphia’s Fairmount Park Commission, a city agency charged with the management of all public parkland, including Bartram’s Garden. Until the 1930s, this small group was comprised largely of Bartram descendants; the Association’s work focused mostly on planting, restoration of historic buildings, and research on John and William Bartram. Beginning in the late 1970s, the Association took over active management of Bartram’s Garden while continuing to work closely with the City of Philadelphia.

Today, the Garden welcomes more than 125,000 visitors annually, sustained by dedicated volunteer leaders, talented professional staff, and visionary partners.

Learn more about our Shared Histories.

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