The Tryon Garden Club will celebrate its 90th birthday with a special program at the Lanier Library on Wednesday at 2 p.m.

Mike McCue will introduce the program with historical information about Donald Culross Peattie; and Gillian Newberry, botanist, and Ron Lance, naturalist and hawthorn specialist, will make scientific remarks.

The Lanier Library owns three volumes of the unpublished manuscript by Donald Culross Peattie “The Sylva of the Tryon Region.”

Ceille Baird Welch and Jim Welch will read sections of the manuscript (from Hemlocks, Hawthorns, and Sugar Maples), with a special song written by Welch and sung by her husband on his guitar made of sugar maple. 

A native Vermonter (and former host with Rudy Mancke of NATURE SCENE), he will tell stories of “sugaring” from his youth.  

Peattie was an early supporter of Pearson’s Falls, which the Tryon Garden Club owns and maintains. In 1932, Peattie wrote the manuscript “The Natural History of Pearson’s Falls” describing the unique plants of Pearson’s Falls Glen. In a 1962 reprinting, lists of the flora and fauna of the area prepared by botanists Oliver Freeman and C.T.Downer were added.

Peattie, a Harvard-trained botanist, was a widely read American nature writer beginning in the 1930s. Peattie and his wife, author Louise Redfield Peattie, lived in Tryon for a time.

The Lanier Library has a large collection of their books, which will be available at the meeting. In addition Joy Soderquist, Tryon Garden Club archivist, has prepared a history of the Tryon Garden Club with photos and mementos for the display cabinet.

The public is invited to the meeting, which begins at 1 p.m., with time to look at the books and displays. The program begins at 2 p.m.

The Lanier Library is located at 72 Chestnut St., Tryon. For directions, call 828-859-9353.

-Submitted by Lucy Brannon