Past Grants Awarded
Hillsborough Garden Club Announces Fall 2025 Grant Awards
More than $6,000 was awarded to four organizations in Orange County this month by the Hillsborough Garden Club (HGC). As part of its ongoing philanthropy effort to support organizations that promote education and protect and conserve our natural resources, the grant program will enable:
• Backyard Butterflies, Inc, to upgrade and expand its native plant production capacity with the addition of an enclosed area to protect plants from deer pressure. Backyard Butterflies donates native and pollinator plants to numerous organizations via their plant grant program.
• Friends of the Passmore Center to purchase a potting bench, pots, soil, and other related equipment to enhance its gardening programming at the Passmore Center and its back patio. It will enable better accessibility for wheelchair users and individuals with back pain.
• Orange County Library System to enhance its seed distribution program; expand the Learning Garden planting area at the Main Library, and purchase tools, soil amendments and supplies for services in this area; and create 10 Green Literacy bags/kits for use by parents and schools.
• Hillsborough Historic Commission to raise and plant an educational herb bed next to the Burwell School’s brick schoolhouse; and add other landscaping.
Hillsborough Garden Club Announces Spring 2024 Grant Awards
The Hillsborough Garden Club has named three successful applicants for community grant awards: Historic Hillsborough Commission/Burwell School will receive $750 for trees and shrubs to support refurbishment of the Carrie Waitt Spurgeon historic gardens. The Wendy Olsen Arboretum, Inc. will receive $2,000 to develop their nonprofit organizational infrastructure. The Hillsborough Community Garden will obtain $1,421 to establish a seating area near the Riverwalk to educate visitors and potential volunteers about how to get involved in improving local food security.
The Burwell School’s two-hundred-year-old gardens will be restored by volunteers under the direction of Master Gardener Sharon Billings. These gardens grew food for the Burwell family and included historic plants of the era. Mrs. Burwell is particularly associated with the white musk rose (Rosa moschata), an old and rare rose originally brought from England. Today, the Burwell School Historic Site has a musk rose plant grown from a clipping taken from Mrs. Burwell’s gravesite. The School will conduct educational programs to share these refurbished historic gardens with the community.
Wendy Olsen Arboretum, located in West Hillsborough, is a level one certified arboretum focused on native and keystone trees and plants. The property has a mix of riparian, upland, shade and sun within three acres. The demonstration gardens feature plants that support local wildlife including birds, insects and mammals, many of which are pollinators. Many local volunteers have cleared trash from the stream and have assisted in building trails and other improvements. On March 17 they held a seed exchange and plant swap and built birdhouses to be sold at the Hillsborough Garden Club Plant Sale on May 11.
Last year the Hillsborough Community Garden provided 934 pounds of produce to food-insecure families that PORCH-Hillsborough serves in the Fairview and Cedar Grove communities. That effort takes a lot of volunteer help, and, like many other community gardens, the Community Garden needs more volunteers. Visitors will soon have a shady place to learn how they can get involved. The Community Garden will create a seating area on the Riverwalk in front of the garden entrance where current volunteers will acquaint visitors with the garden and invite them to step inside for a guided tour, at which point “we hope the garden itself will perform its unique magic.”