The man responsible for designing and landscaping most of the NIU campus and volunteering his landscaping skills to other organizations for the past 39 years will retire Friday.

Anthony Lorusso, Physical Plant campus planning coordinator, was hired in 1950 by former NIU President Leslie Holmes.

Thomas Anderson, Physical Plant grounds foreman, said Lorusso has “devoted his whole life to NIU.”

Lorusso began designing and developing the landscape for the NIU campus “when there wasn’t a tree west of Annie Glidden Road. He landscaped this whole area,” Anderson said.

Robert Wallace, Physical Plant grounds gardener, said Lorusso “knows everything about the university and he has grown up right with it.”

In his years at NIU, Lorusso said he has taken care of the grounds beautification as NIU has expanded.

In 1983, Lorusso won the NIU Presidential Award for his volunteer landscape work outside of the university.

Lorusso has served as a board member of the Oak Crest Retirement Center and Kishwaukee Community Hospital. He has provided free landscaping services for groups throughout the DeKalb area including DeKalb High School, 1515 S. Fourth St., and the Ben Gordon Community Mental Health Center, 12 Health Services Drive. Lorusso also has volunteered his landscaping services outside of the DeKalb area.

“I have a drafting table in my basement and, instead of watching television, I’d rather do some (landscaping) work,” he said.

While he has worked to make the campus beautiful, Lorusso said he and the other grounds workers have always taken students’ interests “to heart.”

One of his most memorable experiences at NIU was his attempt to develop an adequate skating area for students by the East Lagoon. Lorusso also helped to design the five fountains east of Davis Hall.

With Lorusso’s retirement, NIU is “losing a lot of knowledge and one of the better people that are around today,” Wallace said.

Lorusso