President Lyndon Johnson and First Lady Claudia “Lady Bird” Johnson created the Children’s Garden. Image credits: NPS.gov
McLaurin, President of the White House Historical Association, wrote Reflections: A Secret Garden , published on January 16, 2015, which quotes Lady Bird Johnson’s diary entry for January 19, 1969. The 2015 Historical Association article counts 19 presidential grandchildren who left prints in the garden during its first 45 years. The National Park Service now counts more than 30 castings, a figure that reflects later additions, including ten bronze handprint pavers for President Donald Trump’s ten grandchildren added in 2020, as Ivanka Trump announced and the fact that one child can have both a handprint and a footprint. The Texas and the White House website gives the garden’s size as 18 by 30 feet.
Because the garden was completed during their last days in the house, this is significant. Because they were published years apart and measure different things, the two counts differ.
The National Park Service says President Lyndon B. Johnson and his wife, Claudia Alta “Lady Bird” Johnson, created the Children’s Garden in January 1969. The agency credits the layout to Edward Durrell Stone and says it was scaled for young children.
However, the White House Historical Association’s Texas and the White House website claims that the design is by Edward Durrell Stone Jr. Stewart D. In that entry, Lady Bird Johnson wrote, “Carrying an umbrella, I went down to the Children’s Garden, which will be our departing gift to the White House. She saw the garden as a charming and very quiet place, even on a gray day. The same article includes recollections from Lauren Bush Lauren, a granddaughter of President George H. W. Bush, who was about five years old when she and her cousins made their handprints. The fresh blocks of cement were brought up to the Third Floor Solarium, making for a memorable and hectic day.
NCPC reports give its establishment as either 1968 or 1969, but the National Park Service dates its creation to January 1969 and the White House Historical Association dates its dedication to January 19, 1969. The later report in June 2019 mentioned that the next stage of the pavilion construction will involve moving the garden eastward. However, the NCPC’s July 11, 2019 decision states that the tennis pavilion is the link between the garden and the tennis court.
The National Capital Planning Commission June 2019 staff report titled”White House Grounds, Tennis Pavilion” mentions this garden being located west of the tennis courts. It is said that this garden serves as a private playground for the grandchildren of the President, which was established during the time of Lady Bird Johnson. This garden has footprints and handprints of the children and grandchildren of previous presidents embedded in the pavement.