Polly Hill Arboretum, in collaboration with the state's Department of Conservation and Recreation (DCR), is taking the next step in creating sustainable, on-site housing for permanent staffers and interns.
When Emily Ellingson, the new curator and assistant director of Polly Hill Arboretum, began work this fall it was something of a homecoming. In 2013, she worked there as a curatorial intern.
Dr. Murphy Westwood, director of the Global Tree Conservation Program at the Morton Arboretum in Lisle, Ill., has joined the board of Polly Hill Arboretum in West Tisbury.
He is a doctor whose pioneering research and development work helped to eliminate an infectious disease that once struck thousands of children each year. She is a four-decade resident of the Vineyard and a pioneer in her own right, an avant garde horticulturalist whose work in her North Tisbury arboretum has received national recognition.
State environmental affairs secretary Trudy Coxe this week contributed the state’s share of $300,000 towards the preservation of the Polly Hill Arboretum Inc.
Before an audience of 60 people at the Barnard Inn Farm in West Tisbury on Tuesday, the state environmental affairs secretary praised the efforts of Polly Hill and the unusual partnership that has arisen with David H. Smith and his foundation.