Will Raap
Will Raap
2014 Medal of Honor

Proposed by: Akron Garden Club, Zone X
Will Raap has made a lifetime commitment to our land and water through restorative farming and gardening as professions or hobbies. As his first project, Mr. Raap restored the historic Intervale in Burlington, VT, a municipal dump site on the banks of the Winooski River, by removing trash and composting the soil returning it to its’ agricultural roots. The Gardener's Supply, a business created by Mr. Raap at the Intervale, teaches people to control pests organically, start seeds, restore top soil, recycle waste and garden comfortably with proper tools. Raap’s intent is to assist the average gardener to use his land optimally without adverse environmental impact: demonstrating sustainable action at the local level the business potential of integrated ecological waste treatment and positive use of limited natural resources. When Gardeners Supply was turned over to his 350 employees, Will Raap, armed with a degree in Economics and an MA in Business and Urban Planning, founded a non-profit organization called Intervale Center. The Center develops enterprises that generate economic and social opportunity while protecting natural resources. In Costa Rica, Mr. Raap is creating two projects in the Restoring Our Watershed program to restore economic development, wildlife habitat, and education. Mi Terra, cooperative of organic farms, nurseries and food processors produces and distributes products. Tierra Pacifica, a ten acre organic farm in Costa Rico uses Mayan “chinampas” and sunken beds to optimize harvest in the monsoon season while capturing rain and retaining water for the dry season.

The Medal of Honor is awarded for outstanding service to horticulture.
The medal was designed in 1920 by sculptor John Flanagan who also designed the U.S. quarter dollar coin, first issued in 1932. The Medal of Honor was endowed in 1963 by the Bedford (New York) Garden Club in memory of their member, Mrs. Arthur Marvin Anderson. Previous winners include Henry Francis DuPont (1956), Judith D. Zuk (2000), and P. Allen Smith (2006).
See other winners of this medal