Tulips are blooming at Riversdale House Museum’s historic garden.

When Henri Stier first built the Riverdale Park landmark in the early 1800s, he had thousands of tulip and hyacinth bulbs planted around the property. Stier was a native of Belgium, which is second to the Netherlands in tulip production.

His daughter, Rosalie Stier Calvert, later took over the garden’s planning, and frequently mentioned the tulips and other plants in her letters.

In recent years, Riversdale museum gardner Amy Winkler worked with volunteers to plant 2,000 heritage tulip bulbs around the property at 4811 Riverdale Rd. in Riverdale Park. A small plaque on site gives the historical background and honors the enslaved workers who labored to create the gardens.

The museum has hosted “Tulipmania” events, but technically the mansion’s tulips came after the heyday in the Netherlands in the 17th century, but tulips remain popular in Belgium to this day.

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