From Muckraker to Garden Maker: Ida Tarbell at Twin Oaks

Ida Tarbell portrait with flowers colorized and enhanced

This botanical history post was featured on The Daily Gardener podcast: Click here to see the complete show notes for this episode. November 5, 1857  On this day, Ida Tarbell was born – a woman who would become known for exposing Standard Oil’s monopolistic practices but who found her greatest peace tending to her beloved…

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The Gardener’s Pen: Remembering Mary E. Wilkins Freeman

Mary E. Wilkins at her home (colorized and enhanced) from the inside cover of The people of our neighborhood (1898)

This botanical history post was featured on The Daily Gardener podcast: Click here to see the complete show notes for this episode. October 31, 1852 On this day, Mary Eleanor Wilkins Freeman, one of America’s most remarkable chroniclers of New England garden life, was born in Randolph, Massachusetts. ]Though primarily known for her fiction, Freeman’s…

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Seeds of Mystery: Sara Paretsky’s Garden of Words

Sara Paretsky

This botanical history post was featured on The Daily Gardener podcast: Click here to see the complete show notes for this episode. June 8, 1947 On this day, dear gardeners, we celebrate the birth of Sara Paretsky, an American mystery writer whose words have blossomed in the literary world like the most exquisite of perennials.…

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Literary Gardens: How Edith Wharton Designed with Words and Flowers

A very proper Edith Wharton with Miza and Mimi, 1895

This botanical history post was featured on The Daily Gardener podcast: Click here to see the complete show notes for this episode. June 1, 1937 My dear readers, on this most peculiar day, the eminent American authoress Edith Wharton suffered a rather inconvenient heart attack while gracing the country estate of her friend and co-author…

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