Highlighting the History of Fourteen Gardens in Cambridge, MA
Cambridge Plant & Garden Club Published Cambridge Community Gardens Today

The Cambridge Plant & Garden Club recently completed a two-year project titled Cambridge Community Gardens Today, documenting and celebrating the diversity of the fourteen community gardens located throughout the city of Cambridge. The publication includes a brief introduction highlighting the history of the gardens in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Four pages are dedicated to each garden, with a short history, plot layout, description of the gardeners and what is grown. Numerous photographs include a drone shot showing each garden in its neighborhood location.

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Botanist, Botanical Artist, and Conservation Leader
The Heavy Mettle Behind the Eloise Payne Luquer Medal

Since The Garden Club of America’s inception in 1913, many of its strong leaders have shown their mettle while adapting to the times and staying true to the organization’s mission of education, conservation, and civic improvement. One such leader, Miss Eloise Payne Luquer, left a legacy as a botanist, a botanical artist, and a conservation leader. A founding member of the Bedford Garden Club (one of the founding clubs of the GCA), Luquer was honored by her club when it established and endowed a national medal in her memory in 1949.

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The GCA Celebrates National Pollinator Week
Bees, Birds, Bats, and Beetles

National Pollinator Week 2022 will be celebrated during the week of June 20-26. The annual event was initiated and is managed by The Pollinator Partnership. In 2006, the U.S. Senate’s unanimous approval and designation of a week in June as “National Pollinator Week” marked a necessary step toward addressing the urgent issue of declining pollinator populations.

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PARKS: Where Nature Meets Community
The GC of Aiken Creates a Garden at Banksia

The “Winter Colony” cottage Banksia, now known as the Aiken County Historical Museum, is a place where nature meets community. The grounds are a public park and the museum is a space to share the community's history. Together, they embody the philosophy of Frederick Law Olmsted - that parks should function to serve our mental, social, and physical health. The Garden Club of Aiken, through collaborative efforts and long-range planning, has worked to enhance the property for greater community enjoyment.

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Building Long-term Relationships with Diverse Community Groups
GCA Announces Five Common Ground Collaborative Grant Recipients

In 2021, The Garden Club of America created the Common Ground Collaborative (CGC) grant to support GCA member clubs in building long-term relationships with diverse community groups to develop, improve, and maintain public land and programs. Each year, the GCA will award five CGC grants at $10,000 each. This year, GCA is proud to announce the following five winners of the CGC grant: Green Spring Valley Garden Club, Little Garden Club of Columbus, Piedmont Garden Club, Albemarle Garden Club, and Little Rock Garden Club. Each of these applicants proposed projects that embraced the purpose and intent of the new CGC grant.

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From Trash to Treasure: Cleveland Lakefront Nature Preserve
The GC of Cleveland Helps Restore a Natural Habitat

In the late 1970s until 1999, an area on the Lake Erie shoreline Ohio, originally named 'Dike 14', was a repository for dredging material from the Cuyahoga River, covering eighty eight acres along the shoreline just east of the city. Over time, nature took over and the area became recognized as an important migration stop along Lake Erie. In 2004, it was named an Important Bird Area by the National Audubon Society for the sighting of over 290 species currently recorded.

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PARKS: Where Nature Meets Community
The Garden Workers Care for Sharpe Park Bird Sanctuary in Haverford, Pennsylvania

In 1963, Catherine Dixon Sharpe willed her 2.7-acre property in the heart of a busy residential neighborhood in Haverford, Pennsylvania to the township. She stipulated that it be used as a public park and bird sanctuary. Just as Frederick Law Olmsted intended with his parks, Ms. Sharpe granted public access to this small oasis in a densely residential neighborhood. In early 1979, The Garden Workers formally adopted the park and promised to care for it as a low-maintenance woodland park which would attract both people and wildlife.

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