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even if not all chapters or locales have a chance to respond in time for each issue. What do you think - would you like to see this type of article as a regular feature?

 

2. We would also like to create a Horticulture Program presence on the state website - simple to begin with but easy to find and easy to navigate. One of the primary items we need for this is drop-dead beautiful images of native gardens (not just plants). If any of you have and would be willing to submit a photo we would love to consider posting it. All images will be credited with photographer's name, CNPS chapter, month/year or season taken, and location but we will unfortunately not be able to protect it from being copied off the Internet. If you can & would like to watermark the photo that's fine. Please let me know if you would like to submit something and we'll arrange for a workable transmission.

 

Thanks so very much and please feel free to send any further thoughts and ideas.

 

Peigi Duvall,

CNPSHort@comcast.net, (650) 704-3926

 

Minerva Hoyt California Desert Conservation Award

Call for Nominations

 

Joshua Tree National Park Association 74485 National Park Drive , Twentynine Palms, CA 92277, www.joshuatree.org

For further information, call Nancy Downer, 760-367-5537 at Joshua Tree National Park Association.

 

Twentynine Palms, CA, April 22, 2005 – Joshua Tree National Park Association is pleased to announce a call for nominations for the Second Annual Minerva Hoyt California Desert Conservation Award. Created in 2004, the purpose of this award is to recognize annually individuals or organizations that have made notable achievements in the areas of leadership, protection, preservation, research, education, and stewardship leading to a significant and lasting contribution on behalf of the deserts of California. Minerva Hamilton Hoyt (1866-1945) was a South Pasadena socialite whose persistent campaign to preserve the deserts of Southern California persuaded President Franklin Roosevelt and Congress to create Joshua Tree National Monument in 1936. 

 

Any person or group is eligible to receive the award except for Joshua Tree National Park Association (JTNPA) board of directors or staff and members of their immediate families. Non-residents of California are eligible but nominations must be for conservation accomplishments in the California deserts. Candidates must be at least 18 years old.

 

Nominees will have made a notable achievement to the deserts of California in one or more of the following areas: Provided leadership resulting in legislative action, public policy, or advanced research leading to improved conservation knowledge, techniques or strategies, or fostered partnerships and collaborations, or created a stronger public stewardship through education and outreach activities. Nominations will be accepted from any interested individual or organization. Nomination guidelines and forms are available on the association’s website at www.joshuatree.org and must be received by JTNPA by August 1, 2005.

 

JTNPA will oversee the annual nomination and selection process. Joshua Tree National Park Association is a non-profit organization, incorporated in 1962 to assist with preservation, education, historical and scientific programs for the benefit of Joshua Tree National Park and its visitors.

 

Minerva Hamilton led a genteel early life attending finishing schools and music conservatories. Her marriage to Dr. Sherman Hoyt led her away from the Deep South to New York and eventually to the Pasadena area where she immersed herself in southern California high society and civic causes. She demonstrated talent as an organizer of special charity events and developed a passion for gardening. Gardening introduced her to some of the native desert vegetation commonly used in southern California landscaping. Trips to the desert instilled in Ms. Hoyt a strong appreciation for the austere beauty and wonderful inventiveness of desert plants that somehow managed to thrive in the harsh climate. She also saw widespread wanton destruction of native desert plant life by thoughtless people who dug up, burned and other wise destroyed so many of the cacti and Joshua trees that Minerva found beautiful.

 

Following the deaths of her son and husband, Minerva dedicated herself to the cause of protection of desert landscapes. She organized several successful exhibitions of desert plant life that were shown in Boston, New York, and London, She founded the International Deserts Conservation League, became its first president, and adopted a goal of establishing parks to preserve desert landscapes. Ms. Hoyt was tapped by noted landscape architect, Frederick Law Olmstead, Jr. to serve on a California state commission formed to recommend proposals for new state parks. She prepared the commission’s report on desert parks and recommended large parks be created at Death Valley, the Anza-Borrego Desert, and in the Joshua tree forests of the Little San Bernardino Mountains north of Palm Springs.

 

However, Ms. Hoyt became convinced that the best option for preservation of a large park to preserve desert plants was through the National Park Service. She began a carefully organized campaign to achieve her goal. Ms. Hoyt hired well-known biologists and desert ecologists to prepare reports on the virtues of the Joshua Tree region. She was introduced to President Franklin Roosevelt whose New Deal administration became active in the establishment of national parks and monuments as a jobs-creation initiative. Ms. Hoyt soon developed an ally in Secretary of the Interior Harold Ickes.

 

Minerva had a major success when President Roosevelt asked the National Park Service to prepare a recommendation on the site. Problems with the inclusion of certain railroad lands forced a reduction in the size of the proposed park from over one million acres to a more modest 825,000 in the final proposal. On August 10, 1936, President Roosevelt signed a presidential proclamation establishing Joshua Tree National Monument. Minerva finally had her desert park. Almost 50 years later, on October 31, 1994, President Clinton signed the Desert Protection Act adding 234,000 acres to Joshua Tree National Monument and promoting the Monument to National Park status.