Two years ago, Brian Welborn, director of the Belton Parks and Recreation Department, was headed down to Branson to play a round of golf when he got a call. “I normally don’t take phone calls that I don’t recognize when I’m away from the office,” he says, “and for some reason that day I took the call and it was Jack. It was Mr. Dryden.”
Ninety-five-year-old Belton resident Jack Dryden donated 69 acres of land to the Belton Parks and Recreation Department to be developed into an arboretum. “It is very unique to have an individual donate this size property,” Welborn says.
Dryden was born in Lee’s Summit but raised in Belton. “I just thought it was a good opportunity to give something to the village that helped raise me,” Dryden says.
The land is located south of Belton High School and adjacent to Cleveland Lake Park, which, until about a year ago, Dryden also owned. Dryden sold the lake to the city and then donated much of the surrounding land to create the Cleveland Lake Park.
Dryden’s most recent land donation will extend the recreational area. Dryden, who has been farming the land for half a century, did not want to see it developed into commercial spaces or subdivisions. “Environmentally, I think we’re gonna need more trees [and] we’re on a path where we need to do things like this,” Dryden says.
Over the years, Dryden and his wife have enjoyed Powell Gardens and the Overland Park arboretum, and he was inspired by those spaces. “I wanted something that would be used by people and enjoyed by people,” Dryden says.
Before discussing land plans with the city, Dryden sought advice on his own and consulted with landscape architects at SWT Design, creating a base plan. Welborn and the Parks Department are now also working with SWT Design and SFS Architecture to develop final plans. Currently the project includes several miles of nature trails, an amphitheater, an events center and a visitors center. The visitors center will be modeled after a 100-year-old round barn that was on the property but had to be demolished because it was too far gone to be renovated and used. The land will also include a botanical garden, greenhouse, pumpkin patch and sunflower field.
The arboretum, which Welborn and Dryden hope will be a regional draw, is estimated to cost around $20 million. The project’s funding will come from various sources, including sales tax and grants, and is projected to be finished by 2027 or 2028.
The arboretum will also have an educational component, borrowing from Dryden’s personal family history. For four generations, the Dryden family owned and operated Dryden Drug (401 Main St., Belton), a pharmacy in Belton. Dryden’s father opened the original store in 1931. Although the store closed in 2010, Dryden still maintains a small museum near the old Main Street location. On display are various pharmaceutical objects from years past, such as vintage scales, mortars and pestles and old vials of medicine. The museum is not currently open to the public, as daily operation became difficult, but Dryden does open the museum to interested parties upon request.
When it came to designing the visitors center and deciding what should go inside, Dryden’s pharmaceutical artifacts were a natural fit. There are also plans to grow many of the same plants that are used to make medicines on the property, Welborn says. Dryden is excited about the concept and to share his artifacts with a wider audience.
“The value is we have a local dignitary from Belton in Jack Dryden, and we are keeping his dream alive,” Welborn says.
