Theodosia B. Shepherd

Horticulture

Double Petunias Described as having "a wizard's touch in the treatment of plants and flowers," and developed new varieties of flowers, including begonias,

The work of developing a new flower began with the identification of potentially interesting "sports" of a flower, each of which was carefully raised. Then, "When the flower goes to seed, she gathers the seeds, sows them, watches and tends the resulting plants till they fructify and in like manner gathers the seeds of this second generation and garners them for planting." In addition,"hybridizing is an intensely interesting part of Mrs. Shepherd's work. She carefully selects the flowers she wishes to cross, then takes upon the tip of a little camel hair brush some of the pollen of one flower and deposits it upon the pistil of the other flower."

Shepherd was encouraged to consider hybridizing as a business by nurseryman Peter Henderson of New York, around 1881. By 1884, she had formed the Theodosia B. Shepherd Company in Ventura, California.

In addition to growing and hybrizing flowers and running a company, Theodosia wrote and lectured about plants and flowers. Shepherd was favorably compared to Luther Burbank, a hybridizer of vegetables and fruits, Her gardens were considered "to have put Ventura on the map". Visitors to her gardens included Susan B. Anthony, Julia Ward Howe, and Washington Atlee Burpee of Burpee Seeds.

Later life

Theodosia Burr Shepherd died on September 6, 1906, in Ventura, California. She was cremated and interred in the Rosedale cemetery in Los Angeles. On December 7, 1907, William Edgar Shepherd married Theodosia's widowed sister Ella Hall Enderlein. Her second husband, Willard H. Francis, acted as manager.

In 1946, Myrtle Shepherd Francis wrote a biography of her mother, entitled Theodosia: The Flower Wizard of California. Manuscript copies were left in the archives of UCLA and UC Berkeley. There have been attempts to reclaim some of the areas that were once part of Shepherd's garden as community gardens.

Materials relating to Theodosia Burr Shepherd are located in the archives of the Charles E. Young Research Library at UCLA

Gallery