Horace Hagedorn, the canny entrepreneur who developed a blue-green fertilizer he dubbed Miracle-Gro and marketed it to gardeners around the world, has died. He was 89.
Hagedorn, who also became a major philanthropist, died Monday at his home in Sands Point on New York’s Long Island, of undisclosed causes.
In 1995, Hagedorn merged his Miracle-Gro company with the larger Scotts Co. – a major lawn and garden product manufacturer based in Marysville, Ohio – gaining three board seats and 42 percent of company stock. He became a vice president of Scotts’ board of directors and by 2001 had installed his son, James, as chief executive.
With company management assured, the elder Hagedorn turned his attention to philanthropy. At the time of the merger, he and his wife Amy donated $45 million to the Long Island Community Foundation, which aids families and children’s programs.
The Hagedorn philanthropy has included medical research and treatment, libraries, scholarships, arts programs and social services.
Hagedorn happened into his true calling in 1950 when an upstate New York gardener named Otto Stern asked him to design a newspaper advertisement for his mail-order plant business. Stern also sold a fertilizer to revive plants depleted by long shipping times.
Well aware that suburban gardens were a newfound postwar hobby, Hagedorn suggested that the two men develop their own fertilizer.
Stern and Hagedorn each invested $2,000 and asked a Rutgers University orchid expert to devise a soluble fertilizer for general garden use.
Hagedorn daringly spent half of the start-up money – $2,000 – for a full-page ad in the now-defunct New York Herald-Tribune. The ad generated $22,000 in sales in three days.
Talk to us
> Give us your news tips.
> Send us a letter to the editor.
> More Herald contact information.
