Gardening for women

by Viscountess Frances Garnet Wolseley

LOWTHORPE SCHOOL OF LANDSCAPE GARDENING AND HORTICULTURE FOR WOMEN, AT GROTON, MASSACHUSETTS

Founded by Mrs. Edward Gilchrist Low

LECTURERS

Landscape architecture.—Mr. J. F. Dawson, with Olmsted Brothers. The garden and its accessories.—Mr. Loring Underwood.

INSTRUCTORS

Study of trees and shrubs.—Miss Laura Blanchard Dawson. Drawing and garden design.—Miss Gertrude F. Sanderson. Surveying and engineering.—Mr. Stephen Child. Botany: Greenhouse work and gardening out-of-doors.—Miss L. L. Hetzer.

Study of trees and shrubs.—Lectures with field walks. Study of trees from winter buds, and in leaf. Study of shrubs, foliage, and flowering, with consideration of landscape value. Specimens from the Arnold Arboretum.

Botany.—Study of plant structure, function, and classification. The greater part of the time will be devoted to the flowering plants.

AVENUE LEADING TO “LOWTHORPE,” GROTON, MASSACHUSETTS, MRS. LOW’S SCHOOL FOR LADY GARDENERS.

Garden design.—Practice in making preliminary and finished plans. Designing and laying out of gardens.

Drawing.—Freehand in black and white and water colour, with autumn and spring sketching out of doors. Mechanical, simple projections leading up to elementary study of architectural details.

Surveying and engineering.—Such parts as have value to landscape work.

Greenhouse work.—Care of greenhouse. Propagation, by seeds, cuttings, layering, budding, and grafting. Carnation, violet growing, orchids, etc.

EXPENSES

Tuition $100 a year. One half to be paid on entering, the second half in January.

A limited number of students may be accommodated at Lowthorpe. Single room, $30.00 per month, and upwards; double room for two, at $30.00 per month for each. Accommodation for others may be obtained in the village near by. The full course comprises two years’ work. School year is from September 15 to June 15. Vacations at Christmas and Easter.

The avenues of work that are available are:—

Designing and planting flower gardens; care and maintenance of rose gardens and flowering shrubs; weekly supervising of greenhouses; planning and laying out small estates; planting small parks for village improvement societies.

All communications should be addressed to

Lowthorpe School, Groton, Massachusetts.

Simmons College, Boston, Mass., has, I believe, a horticultural college connected with it, but it has not been in operation long.

Smith College, Northampton, Mass., also offers courses in practical horticulture.

The following letter, written by the director of the principal school of Forestry in America, and very kindly sent to me by Mrs. Low, shows that he is of opinion that there is an opening for women in landscape gardening:

Yale University Forest School,

New Haven, Conn.,

May 22, 1907.

My Dear Mrs. Low,—

I have for a long time felt that there is an opportunity for useful work by women in landscape gardening. There is, at the present time, no place except the Lowthorpe School, where women can secure an adequate training in landscape gardening. I believe that your institution is needed, and will be appreciated.

I may say from my impressions upon visiting your school that you have chosen an exceedingly favourable location, and that you have made very fine progress in the organisation of your work.

I want to do what I can to assist your school, for I believe in it. If I can be of any service in this or any other way, I hope that you will feel free to call upon me.

Sincerely yours,

H. S. Graves (Director).

SOUTHERN ENTRANCE TO “LOWTHORPE,” GROTON, MASS. MRS. LOW’S SCHOOL FOR LADY GARDENERS

To Mrs. Low,

Principal of Lowthorpe School for Lady Gardeners.

Mrs. Low asks me to draw attention to the fact that the work of “landscape design” is the most important in her school. Garden and greenhouse work are secondary to this. She tells me that several of her former students have become supervisors of school gardens, in connection with the Public Schools or Village Improvement Societies. The highest salary is $60 per month, for five months. One former student has gone to Portland, in Oregon, on the Pacific coast, where she is told she will soon become established as a landscape gardener. Several women have already made a success of landscape gardening. Ten years hence they will be heard of all over the country. At present the largest income is £800, or $4,000.

The two photographs of Lowthorpe are attractive. Three years ago the site of the present avenue, leading to the house, was a field. The students surveyed the avenue under instruction, and then did the planting. They have to learn to read a surveyor’s plan with ease. In the oval in front of the door are Rhododendron maximum, which is hardy in Massachusetts, ferns and Rinus Strabus. At the entrance on the right are viburnums, cornus, lonicera, roses, etc. The picture of the southern entrance gives the bulb garden, between the greenhouse and verandah, where later on bloom lilies, lilacs and magnolias. On the left is a hedge of white rose rugosa. Through the arch one goes into the garden. The large tree is a “platanus occidentalis.” The place was an old farm when Mrs. Low bought it in 1900–1, and we can judge by the well-kept grounds what a success she has made of it.