Show Notes
Gertrude Jekyll could turn her hand to anything; deeply involved with the Arts and Crafts movement, she mastered dozens of specialties in her quest to explore the relationship between human lives and their environments.
As her eyesight failed, she turned to large scale endeavors, and changed how the world thought about gardens; turning them from formal displays into living, breathing works of art. She used color, texture, and shape like a painter on a large, ever-changing canvas.
Gertrude’s innovations within her finished gardens - and decades of written work - made her an inspiration for generations of gardeners and landscape architects. And she became one of the most influential garden designers of all time.
Registration is now open for both our September 2027 Field Trip to San Francisco, and the final night Dinner Cruise! For more information and to register, please visit Like Minds Travel! We hope to see you there!
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
More from The History Chicks : A Women's History Podcast
We just got back from a brand new field trip that we have nicknamed “Helleaux Chateaux!”
In this revisit from 2019, we wonder: was Annie Londonderry a flim-flam artist or a true pioneer? Maybe both? Her trip around the world on a bicycle may have been controversial - but she was always up for both an adventure and a tall tale.
Virginia Hall wanted to be a diplomat, but the State Department kept shutting doors in her face …and then she lost her leg in a hunting accident, which seemed like she’d reached a dead end. Never one to accept defeat, she learned how to walk again on a wooden leg nicknamed “Cuthbert,” and headed straight into the world of espionage.Once she got to France, she ran circles around the Nazi intelligence services during WW2. The Gestapo actually called her “the most dangerous Allied agent in France”; her actions, and those of her compatriots, changed the course of the war.
Rosa Bonheur was a wild, animal‑obsessed kid who drew before she could read, and knew she was meant for the world of art from an extremely young age.
Mercy Otis Warren’s life is one long argument for the idea that political courage isn’t just found on battlefields or in legislatures; it’s found in writing, in conversations, in friendships, and in the willingness to speak plainly (and loudly) when power grows dangerous. She believed deeply that liberty required constant vigilance, and that ordinary people, especially women, have a role to play in creating the nation’s conscience.