7. It Used To Be The U.S. Office Of Botanic Conservation International

From 2002 to 2007, the Brooklyn Botanic Garden was the U.S. office of Botanic Garden Conservation International (BGCI). Founded in 1987, it is the largest plant conservation network in the world that connects 500 botanic gardens in 96 countries, and on every continent. They aim to “collect, conserve, characterise and cultivate samples from all the world’s plants as an insurance policy against their extinction in the wild and as a source of plant material for human innovation, adaptation, and resilience.”

In the United States, the BGCI works with gardens and conservation organizations around the country to raise awareness and increase scientific understanding of threatened plants in North America. The US office headquarters, formerly held in the Brooklyn Botanic Garden were moved to the Chicago Botanic Garden.