History of The Ashland Garden Club
Excerpt from History of The Ashland Garden Club, written by Miriam Green
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 (Mrs. Charles Stebbins), at the corner of Center Street and Stebbins Street.
Their goal was to stimulate the knowledge and love of gardening among amateurs. They decided to meet monthly at the homes of members, and to limit the size of membership to thirty. Club officers were to be President, three Vice-Presidents, Treasurer, and Recording and Corresponding Secretaries. Officers were elected, and the meeting was adjourned.
The Ashland Garden Club Today
The club promptly began to engage in activities that are familiar to The Ashland Garden Club members today, one hundred years later:
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 displayed 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
The education of members through timely programs on a variety of gardening topics
Garden Club of Virginia
In May 1948, The Ashland Garden Club was admitted into membership in the Garden Club of Virginia.
To learn more about the Garden Club of Virginia, view this video “We are the Garden Club of Virginia.”
Mary McDermott Beirne
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 twelve to fourteen acres surrounding her home, Rhodeen, at 304 North Center Street and for at least fifteen years she issued a small catalog and sold daffodil bulbs to customers up and down the east coast.
Mary Beirne began hybridizing and naming daffodils but never felt that hers were good enough to register them with the Royal Horticultural Society. White daffodils were her favorites. C.G. van Tubergen, one of the big Dutch growers, introduced an all-white daffodil in 1937 and named it ‘Mary Beirne.’
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.