Lady Bird Johnson Looked Beyond Beautification to Preservation
Beautification was a term Johnson disliked, even
though it has been indelibly linked to her public
persona as the first lady who lobbied for a prettier
world. The word itself is, ironically, ungainly.
What's worse, it trivializes what she was trying to
do.
In 1982, marking her 70th birthday, the former first lady and the actress Helen Hayes, a longtime friend, founded the National Wildflower Research Center out of a small house and plot on the east side of Austin. The aim was to promote the protection and preservation of wildflowers -- or, more accurately, indigenous plants of every stripe -- along with the ecosystems in which they thrived.
Renamed the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center in 1997, the center fell under the aegis of her alma mater, the University of Texas in 2006. It includes an online native plant information network, listing and describing more than 7,200 species of native plants ( www.wildflower.org).
The wildflower center is working with the American Society of Landscape Architects and the U.S. Botanic Garden in developing standards and guidelines for certifying sustainable green landscapes in the same way that buildings now are certified by the U.S. Green Building Council.
Something far beyond beautification.
In 1982, marking her 70th birthday, the former first lady and the actress Helen Hayes, a longtime friend, founded the National Wildflower Research Center out of a small house and plot on the east side of Austin. The aim was to promote the protection and preservation of wildflowers -- or, more accurately, indigenous plants of every stripe -- along with the ecosystems in which they thrived.
Renamed the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center in 1997, the center fell under the aegis of her alma mater, the University of Texas in 2006. It includes an online native plant information network, listing and describing more than 7,200 species of native plants ( www.wildflower.org).
The wildflower center is working with the American Society of Landscape Architects and the U.S. Botanic Garden in developing standards and guidelines for certifying sustainable green landscapes in the same way that buildings now are certified by the U.S. Green Building Council.
Something far beyond beautification.
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