Mary Bowerman

On this day in 2005, we lost the botanist Mary Bowerman, who was the co-author of The Flowering Plants and Ferns of Mount Diablo, California.
Bowerman was responsible for the preservation of thousands of acres of Mount Diablo before she died at the age of 97.
Bowerman was the last person to record the Mount Diablo buckwheat until it was re-discovered, after 70 years, in 2005.
She was clearly an expert on the flora of Mount Diablo; she spent over 75 years studying it. Her doctoral advisor was none other than Willis Linn Jepson - the Botany Man. Bowerman was his last surviving student when she died. She wrote once,

“Little did I know, 65 years ago, that my senior project would become my life‘s work.“
Bowerman worked tirelessly toward her dream,
“that the whole of Mount Diablo including its foothills should remain open space and that the visual and natural integrity will be sustained.“

She got her wish.