DREAMS IN BLOOM.

Byline: Randi Bjornstad The Register-Guard

For proof that beauty can grow out of tragedy, pay a visit to the Wallace M. Ruff Jr. Magnolia Arboretum and Neighborhood Park in the Thurston neighborhood of east Springfield.

Resplendent in spring with magnolia blossoms of every size and hue - and a restful place for walks or picnics all year long - the 10-acre park is living testimony to a young man's love of nature and his father's love for him.

While still a student at South Eugene High School, Ruff Jr. - known to family and friends as Wally - purchased the land that since has become the park, paying for it by selling flowers he grew on the land.

After high school, he studied landscape design and computer science at Lane Community College and the University of Oregon, eventually becoming one of the youngest people in Oregon to earn certification as a licensed landscape contractor.

Early in 1989, the 35-year-old Ruff left Eugene for a vacation in Mexico. Three months later, a hunter found his body in the desert, about 90 miles south of Yuma, Ariz. He had been murdered, and his silver Toyota pickup was missing.

To honor his son's wish to develop his land as a park, Wallace M. "Mack" Ruff Sr. donated the property to the Willamalane Park and Recreation District, with the goal of creating the largest magnolia arboretum west of the Mississippi River.

A group of his friends helped the elder Ruff - who taught landscape architecture at the University of Oregon for more than 25 years - get the park under way. Then, in 1999, while living in Papua New Guinea where he studied native art and architecture and taught classes, Ruff Sr. also was murdered, at the age of 87.

But his dream for the park lived on. A longtime friend of the Ruff family, Peggy Rice, heads a group called the Friends of Ruff Park, which meets monthly from March through November to plant, weed and otherwise care for the property.

"We work closely with the park district, which provides mowing, irrigation, tools and mulch," Rice said. "We (volunteers) do the planting, weeding and mulching. We never run out of things to do."

Students from Thurston High School's Key Club do work at the park regularly, and every spring, a group of Cub Scouts gets its hands dirty.

The Friends of Ruff Park get together monthly to maintain the park, which besides the magnolias features a small creek with cottonwood, maple and ash trees along its banks, flowers and a large grassy area.

While the goal no longer includes being the largest, finest magnolia arboretum in the West, it does embrace Ruff Sr.'s wish that it be a top-quality arboretum, Rice said.

"We now have 362 magnolia trees in the park," she said. "There are so many plants in the park, and so many things going on - Mack would be overjoyed."

The elder Ruff had a longtime fascination with magnolias and frequently brought them back from his travels to Southeast Asia, Australia and New Zealand, she said. The first magnolias planted in the park, in 1993, came from his personal collection.

At 100 million years old, magnolias have existed since "herds of dinosaurs stomped through green forests of conifers and ferns," according to the Willamalane Park and Recreation District Web site at www.willamalane.org. "The ancestors of Ruff Park's trees were the oldest flowering plants," the site says.

Millions of years before bees and butterflies appeared to pollinate flowers, magnolias were - and still are - dependent on beetles for pollination. The plants once flourished worldwide but now grow naturally in the southeastern region of the United States, Central America and Southeast Asia.

Ruff Park is located at 1161 N. 66th St. A chain-link gate opens to a gravel path that leads to the park, which is open from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m.

For information, call the park district office at 736-4544.

GETTING INVOLVED

Friends of Ruff Park encourages new volunteers to attend monthly work parties from March to November to care for the park.

Telephone: [phone]

E-mail: [e-mail]