Marion “Timmy” Gallagher, Leaves a Horticultural Legacy 1919-2019

August 20, 2019

Honored in 1982 with the GCA Medal of Achievement

The Garden Club of America mourns the loss of Marion “Timmy” Gallagher, an accomplished horticulturist, mentor, author, conservation activist, and a longtime member of the Woodside-Atherton Garden Club. Timmy was 99 years of age. She was awarded the GCA Medal of Achievement in 1982 for her work at the Filoli estate in Woodside, CA. Her medal citation read, “For her boundless energy and enthusiasm, her great knowledge and love of horticulture, and for her many creative talents.”  

Timmy earned additional GCA awards, including the Certificate of Excellence in Horticulture, the Medal of Merit, the Catherine Beatty Medal, the Ann Lyon Crammond Award, the Zone Conservation Award, and twice won the Elizabeth Platt Corning Medal. As a GCA horticulture judge, Timmy is remembered as a mentor to many in the judging program.

In the 1970s, Timmy began to focus on protecting endangered wildflowers, including a rare native lily in Woodside and suggested using photographs and drawings of flowers as a national Garden Club of America project, coordinating the project for 145 clubs. She established the California Native Plant Garden in Woodside fifty years ago to showcase plants that are adapted to the local climate, a garden that continues to be maintained and supported by the Woodside-Atherton Garden Club. When the Filoli home in Woodside became a property of the National Trust for Historic Preservation and opened to the public in 1975, Timmy planned and taught the docent volunteer program. The first knot garden at Filoli was a GCA Bicentennial project in 1976, under the guidance of Sally MacBride, Timmy Gallagher, and Trudy Talbot. She also wrote the text for a coffee table book called "The Gardens of Filoli," and between 1982 and 2004 raised money for Filoli with the Filoli Traveling Program that took members to several showcase gardens worldwide. Timmy leaves a legacy of her love of the natural world to her family, the Woodside-Atherton Garden Club, and The Garden Club of America. 

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