TERRACED PLOT HOME TO PLAYS, PICNICS, STUDY

Even in the dead of winter, the Kelso Arboreta grabs the attention of passing motorists.

There is still something majestic about the brick and stone terraced, sunken garden and its gazebo on the west side of Old Sprigg Road.

The garden was once part of the sprawling estate of Judge I.R. Kelso. His grandson, Richard Renfrow, still lives there, in a house perched just up a steep driveway from the garden.

Renfrow, 68, is visibly proud of the arboreta, built in the 1920s to solve a sinkhole problem. His mother, Ruth Renfrow, who was Kelso's daughter, designed it. She died in 1975.

The stone used in creating the terraced landscape came from the rubble of a quarry site, where Houck Stadium is.

The garden became a center for picnics, plays and nature study.

The place served as an outdoors stage in the 1930s. Everything from Greek tragedies to Bible stories were performed there. There also were some more modern productions.

"I was in the Wizard of Oz down there. I was a munchkin," Renfrow said.

Church and service club picnics were held at the garden.

In the summers, students from preschool to college learned about nature and the performing arts at the Shadybrook School, which Renfrow's mother operated in the late 1920s and early 1930s.

The school was housed in a two-story, cedar-sided home, which still stands near a creek just west of the stone pillars along Old Sprigg Road, a short distance south of the garden.

"We had an old wooden station wagon for those who didn't have cars and we would pick them up," Renfrow said.

"You had milk and graham crackers in the middle of the morning and it sure was good."