In 1804 the Elgin Botanical Gardens were opened.

By 1806 two thousand species of plants with one spacious greenhouse and two hot houses, having a frontage of one hundred and eighty feet, occupied what today is one of the most valuable real estate sites in New York, the tract being now valued without buildings at over thirty million dollars.

The financial burden of maintaining the garden was more than the doctor could carry, and he appealed to the Legislature for support.

Finally on March 12, 1810, a bill was passed authorizing the State, for the purpose of promoting medical science, to buy the garden.

The doctor sold it for seventy-four thousand two hundred and sixty-eight dollars and seventy-five cents, which was twenty-eight thousand dollars less than he had spent on it.