Sara Williams - Winner of The 2008 Prairie Garden Award for Excellence

							                             Sara Williams - Winner of
                    The 2008 Prairie Garden Award for Excellence
                                                      by Linda Pearn

                   Linda Pearn is Chair of The Prairie Garden Awards Board. Information for this article
                             was excerpted from the nomination papers for Sara Williams




T
       he Prairie Garden Award for Excellence is awarded        written many
       annually to an individual or group making a sig-         newspaper and
       nificant contribution to the advancement and/or          magazine arti-
promotion of horticulture on the Northern Great Plains.         cles and estab-
This is the ninth year that The Prairie Garden Commit-          lished herself as
tee has presented this award.                                   a well-known
     At a luncheon in September, 2008, The Prairie Gar-         radio and televi-
den Award for Excellence was presented to Sara Williams.        sion presence.
Members of the nominating committee in attendance                    Hundreds
were Gwenna Moss, Charlotte Caron, Violet Vogt and              of horticul-
Hugh Skinner. Also in attendance were family and friends        ture related
and members of The Prairie Garden Committee.                    workshops and
     Sara Williams was born in Washington, DC and               talks have been
graduated from the University of Michigan with a                presented by
BA. She taught as a Peace Corps volunteer in Tanzania           Sara to both
and as a volunteer with the United Nations Associa-             home gardeners                    Sara Williams
tion of Great Britain in the Amazon basin of Peru. It           and professional
was in Tanzania that Sara had her very first plot of land       groups throughout the Prairie Provinces, B.C., Ontario,
on which to grow a garden. She emigrated to Saska-              North Dakota and Minnesota.
toon, Saskatchewan, Canada where Sara received both                  She has led garden tours to Great Britain, Ireland,
Bachelors and Masters degrees from the University of            Costa Rica and Hawaii organized under the auspices of
Saskatchewan. She worked as the Horticulture Exten-             the University of Saskatchewan and the Saskatoon Per-
sion Specialist with the Extension Division, University of      ennial Society. As well, she has been involved in garden
Saskatchewan in Saskatoon from 1989 until her retire-           tours in Saskatchewan, Alberta and BC.
ment in 2001.                                                        Volunteer work and organizations include Saska-
     Through her employment and personal love of horti-         toon’s Forestry Farm Park; Gardening at the Zoo; Peren-
culture, Sara brought horticulture to many Saskatchewan         nial Plant Association; Saskatchewan Perennial Society;
gardeners. Some of her major projects were: founding            Skinner Arboretum Corporation; Saskatchewan Horti-
editor of The Saskatchewan Gardener / The Gardener for          cultural Association, to name a few. In addition Sara has
The Prairies; initiation and managing the Saskatchewan          received many awards and honours over the years.
Master Gardener Program; and was a member of the team                Sara currently resides on five acres of sandy soil near
which developed the Prairie Horticulture Certificate.           Saskatoon where she has developed a beautiful and ex-
     Sara is the author or co-author of a number of books       tensive garden – a popular garden tour destination.
and articles on a wide range of horticulture topics. Books           Congratulations to Sara Williams for her contribu-
titles include Creating the Prairie Xeriscape, Best Trees and   tion to the advancement and promotion of horticulture
Shrubs for the Prairies (co-authored with Hugh Skinner),        on the Northern Great Plains.
Best Groundcovers & Vines for the Prairies (co-authored              For more details on The Prairie Garden Award
with Hugh Skinner), Perennials for the Plains and Prairies      for Excellence and previous winners see www.
(co-authored with Edgar W. Toop), and In a Cold Land:           theprairiegarden.ca/award.html.
Saskatchewan’s Horticultural Pioneers. In addition Sara has