Garden Club honors first "First Lady"

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A floral thank you to the Martha Dandridge Garden Club for inviting me to speak recently about monarch butterflies, a chapter in my third book: Ephemeral by Nature. 

The club was organized in 1927 and honors Martha Dandridge Washington, our very first "First Lady." The garden club is probably the longest running civic group in Jefferson County and currently has 88 paid members. 

Settled in 1783 and named county seat in 1793, Dandridge is the second oldest town in Tennessee (founded in 1779, Jonesborough is the oldest) and the only town in the USA named for George Washington's wife. Her maiden name was Dandridge.  

The club is active with many civic projects including the restoration of the courthouse grounds and maintaining the old cemetery where early settlers and patriots of the Revolutionary War are buried.

And what about the monarch butterflies? They are now migrating back north after overwintering in the mountains of Mexico. As the Journey North map below shows, as of April 11, at least one has been seen as far north as Johnson City.  

For the Standard Banner Article, Click: April 4, 2019

Thank you, President Kathleen Holmes and 
Vice President Angela Curry.

Journey North migrating monarch map: April 11, 2019

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