He was on the first Board of Managers for the institution, along with Andrew Carnegie, J. Pierpont Morgan, and Cornelius Vanderbilt II.

He engendered substantial financial support for the botanical garden by naming plants after wealthy contributors.

Much of his field work was done in the Caribbean, where he visited frequently when the winter weather in New York City became too severe.

He wrote Illustrated Flora of the Northern United States, Canada, and the British Possessions (1896) with Addison Brown, and The Cactaceae with Joseph Nelson Rose.

[7] The house he lived and worked in, the Britton Cottage, is preserved at Historic Richmond Town on Staten Island.