Planned Giving

Create your legacy at the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum

Child walking amongst tulips

Legacies are the heart of the Leon Snyder Heritage Society.

The Society honors people who have made commitments of future estate gifts to the Arboretum. A gift of any size, in your estate or other planned gift, is a meaningful way to support the Arboretum beyond your lifetime. 

You can leave a legacy in several ways:

  • Include a gift in your will or trust.
  • Name the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum Foundation as a beneficiary of a retirement plan, life insurance policy or other account.
  • Make a gift that provides lifetime income to you or loved ones.
  • Give a remainder interest in a home or farm.

As with any gift to the Arboretum, you may direct your gift to what is most important to you.

Donors of planned gifts are recognized as members of the Leon Snyder Heritage Society as well as the University of Minnesota Heritage Society. Members are invited to special events at both the Arboretum and the University of Minnesota.

Photo by Robert Evans Imagery

About Leon Snyder

Dr. Leon C. Snyder joined the University of Minnesota staff in 1945 as an extension horticulturist, traveling throughout the state. He was promoted to head of the Department of Horticultural Science and superintendent of the University Fruit Breeding Farm in 1953, and also appointed the first director of the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum in 1958.

Under Snyder's leadership, the Arboretum blossomed to include public gardens featuring thousands of species evaluated for cold hardiness and landscape value. He wrote a weekly gardening column for the Minneapolis Star and Tribune and was the author of several gardening books.

Snyder nurtured the Arboretum into a place for research, education and public outreach and his legacy lives on today. The Leon Snyder Heritage Society honors those who, like Snyder, have committed to leave their own legacies to ensure the Arboretum's work for generations to come.