The Ashland Garden Club

March 22, 2022

theashlandgardenclub.org

The Ashland Garden Club was founded on October 12, 1922, when thirty ladies, all known to be active gardeners, met at the home of Rebekah MacMurdo Stebbins at the corner of Center Street and Stebbins Street. Their goal was to stimulate the knowledge and love of gardening among amateurs. The club promptly began to engage in activities that are familiar to The Ashland Garden Club members today, one hundred years later.

The club’s objectives today include: conservation of Virginia’s natural resources and beautification of the community through plantings in public places; providing expertise and guidance to encourage attractive and appropriate plantings by individuals and businesses; flower shows that display the most beautiful blooms grown by members and others in the community and artistic arrangements created by both adults and children; support of the restoration of historic gardens through participation in the Garden Club of Virginia’s Historic Garden Week; and the education of members through timely programs on a variety of gardening topics.

Community Involvement

The Ashland Garden Club has designed, planted, and maintained the beautiful gardens surrounding the 100-year-old Ashland Train Station and Visitor Center for many years. Club fundraising proceeds, grants, and gifts from local businesses have contributed to the project’s extraordinary success.

Roots & Shoots Intergenerational School Garden at Henry Clay Elementary School was begun by the club in 1998 and continues to be supported by the club with funding, hands-on participation, assistance with individual classroom lessons, and support for an outdoor classroom. The project is an extremely successful public effort that receives additional support from the Kiwanis, members of the school faculty, and numerous volunteers. In the process planting, maintaining, and harvesting the garden’s vegetables, students learn “where vegetables come from.”

Additionally, AGC supplies decorations each year for the Hanover Arts & Activities Christmas Tour of Homes; provides inside and outdoor holiday arrangements and decorations at Scotchtown, the home of Patrick Henry; *preserves Miss Mary Beirne’s white daffodils, planted on the campus of Randolph-Macon College; creates floral designs for events at historic Hanover Tavern; participates in Adopt a Spot to beautify and maintain landscaping at an Ashland park entrance; and continues to offer support during city and county initiatives. The club has recently begun granting a scholarship to a local high school senior who will be pursuing a degree in botany or horticulture or agricultural studies.

*In 2008, Randolph-Macon College allowed the club to dig up many of the daffodil bulbs planted on what used to be the property of the late Miss Mary Beirne, a renowned AGC and GCV daffodil hybridizer. Members planted the bulbs in their own gardens with plans to identify each specimen.

“Mary McDermott Beirne was a member of The James River Garden Club in Richmond, one of the eight founding clubs of the Garden Club of Virginia. Mary’s work with the James River club must have sparked her interest in starting a garden club in Ashland. When The Ashland Garden was founded on October 12, 1922, she was elected president and served until 1923.

Mary Beirne became a widely recognized grower and hybridizer of daffodils. She corresponded with English and Irish hybridizers who were just beginning to bring exciting new daffodils to the market, and she ordered bulbs from them. She grew these new daffodils on the 12-14 acres surrounding her home, Rhodeen, at 304 North Center Street and, for at least 15 years she issued a small catalog and sold daffodil bulbs to customers up and down the east coast.

Although van Tubergen is listed as the hybridizer in the Royal Horticultural Society’s Classified List of Daffodil Names, there is some indication that Miss Beirne may have hybridized the daffodil. Miss Mary became well-known as a daffodil expert and was in demand as a speaker and judge.”

~theashlandgardenclub.org/about

ACG continues to communicate within its membership to determine levels of interest in changing meeting times, ideas regarding programs, and new categories of membership. It played an important role in sponsoring and mentoring the newest GCV club, Three Rivers Garden Club in New Kent and Charles City counties, and remains committed to that club’s success.

Fundraising Activities

AGC holds an annual sale of holiday greenery and a fall-planting bulb sale; has provided flower-arranging services for private weddings and Randolph-Macon College events; has held luncheons and sales during its HGW tour, with sales including including plants dug from members’ gardens, flower carriers, Saboten pruning shears, and gently used horticulture and floral-arranging books, containers, and vases; has sold note cards made with reproductions of original watercolors created by Fredericksburg artist Sara Irby that illustrate informal floral presentations found in private gardens of AGC members; has held silent auctions with items provided mostly by members, including a popular statewide HGW pass, and new, old, unused, and recycled items, as well as food offerings, promises for fixing food, etc.: and has hosted fundraising events with luncheon, speakers, and demonstrations. The club also has received grants and gifts from local businesses, particularly in support of the Ashland Train Station and Visitor Center.

Club Activities and Programs

The club’s programs have varied widely and have included hands-on workshops, speakers, and field trips. James Seward of James River Nursery presented, A Lesson on Pruning;  James Diggs offered Roses; Nicole Schermerhorn presented, Cooking with Herbs; GCV Landscape Architect Will rieley offered, Colonial Meets Revival; Arthur Chadwick of Chadwick Orchids in Richmond presented tips on buying and caring for orchids — he also brought some stunning orchids to sell; and Mike Lockatell presented a talk on irises and sold some stunning specimens to club members. Through a personal friendship with an AGC club member, the club was fortunate to have a personal visit from Andre Viette of Viette Farm & Nursery.

Members have enjoyed learning how to do quick arrangements from Carolyn Helfrich and how to make hypertufa planters. A popular hands-on, flower-arranging workshop was led by noted floral designer David Pippin.

Members have learned about witches’ britches (plastic bags hanging in trees) and the benefits of eliminating single-use plastic; the historic Lee Park restoration in Petersburg; Massey Cancer Center’s rooftop garden; and the care of boxwood. Members have taken walks through private gardens around the state and participated in guided walking tours through Virginia State Parks. They have visited VMFA Fine Arts & Flowers and have enjoyed HGW tours around the state. They once gathered at a local restaurant for a lunch meeting and the chef discussed recipes and uses for spring vegetables and herbs.

A perennial favorite meeting is making Christmas arrangements for a local convalescent center and delivering them. Very uplifting!

2005 GCV Board of Governors

The Ashland Garden Club hosted the Garden Club of Virginia’s Board of Governors meeting on October 11-13, 2005, at historic Hanover Tavern, chaired by Anne Cross and Pettus Miller.

Board members were invited by Diana Carter for lunch at her home on Tuesday. The board meeting followed at the home of Linda Magovern where parliamentary business required more time than usual.

The Dutch treat dinner Tuesday night was hosted by Mary Anne and Gerry Pugh at their historic home, “Shrubbery Hill.”

Ashland Garden Club President Martha Wingfield welcomed attendees to Hanover County at the start of business on Wednesday morning, and to the Town of Ashland, revealing the now friendly relationship between the two was not always “friendly.” Twice in the 1850s the up-and-coming town of Ashland tried unsuccessfully to wrest the county seat from Hanover Courthouse. The last unsuccessful attempt was 1916.

Martha introduced Rhu Harris, Hanover County administrator, who proudly pointed out that Hanover County is one of only 200 counties nationwide to have received the “Preserve America” designation from the White House.

Club historian Betty Roane Kendrick described the club’s obsessive tree planting over the years — dogwood, Bradford pear, hemlock, Centennial oak and magnolia, all for a variety of projects and celebrations. She added, “The town should look like a forest, but time takes its toll.” In 1996, The Ashland Garden Club hosted a GCV Lily Show that took place just as the North American Lily Society was meeting in Washington. Lily growers from the national meeting descended on Ashland, bringing lilies from all over the world. Wanting to keep the lilies in perfect condition, they were put in the cafeteria refrigerator. Imagine the dismay when the refrigerator doors were opened, and the lilies were frozen. “No hard feelings – good intentions.”

The awards banquet was held at the Hanover Arts & Activities Center that night where the Common Wealth Award ($5,000) was presented to The Huntington Garden Club for the Virginia Living Museum’s Virginia’s Botanical History, 1607 to Today. Runners up were Albemarle Garden Club ($1,000) for Morea – A Living Classroom and The Nansemond River Garden Club ($1,000) for the Cedar Hill Cemetery Project.

GCV President Sally Guy Brown delivered a tribute to the Ashland Garden Club, standing before a PowerPoint presentation of candid photos taken throughout the meeting. As the photos scrolled through slide after slide, attendees were delighted to see themselves in candid moments, bringing peals of laughter and shrieks that nearly drowned out Sally Guy’s tribute.

2005 BOG Photos

AGC Presidents 1995-2021

1995-1997	Pettus Miller
1997-1999	Betty Shanburger
1999-2001	Anne Cross
2001-2003	Lauren Thompson
2003-2005	Brenda Gilman
2005-2007	Martha Wingfield
2007-2009	Lyn Hodnett
2009-2011	Venetia Redd
2011-2013	Linda Macdonald
2013-2015	Janet Rosser
2015-2017	Buffy Bickford
2017-2019	Mary Anne Griffin
2019-2021	Michelle Hamner