The property that became the Tyler Rose Garden was first purchased by the City of Tyler in 1912 for a park and fairgrounds. In 1938, after years of effort and at the urging of former American Rose Society president Dr. Horace McFarland, the city applied to the Works Project Administration for funding to build a municipal rose garden. The $181,255 federal grant was considered the largest municipal park and rose garden project approved by the WPA in that era, and paid for a stone picnic pavilion, balcony, stairs, and other garden features. WPA landscape architect Keith Maxwell drew the plan for the park and rose garden, and Henry Thompson, a local nurseryman, later revised it, laid out walkways, and planted trees and shrubbery. Thompson was later killed while serving as a fighter pilot during World War II, and the garden was eventually dedicated in his memory. After the war, Robert Shelton Jr. became superintendent of the Parks and Recreation Department and made completion of the garden his top priority. The Tyler Rose Garden officially opened in 1952, and its first planting used nearly 3,000 rose bushes donated by local nurseries to create a living catalogue of roses produced by the Tyler rose industry.
