Since 1959 Our story
It started in a dining room. In 1959 Polly Logan, an avid gardener, gathered a group of friends interested in starting a community garden club at the Logan Estate on Jerusalem Road. They met at her table. They made pine cone wreaths in her barn. We have moved on from the wreaths, but members still spend the fall making things by hand for the Yuletide Marketplace, which is the same habit under a different name.
We federated in 1960 and incorporated in 1979. The membership reached a hundred quickly and has stayed there: gardeners and floral designers, horticulturists and master gardeners, crafters, photographers and people who simply like to be useful.
What the Club does has grown with it. Junior Gardeners in the elementary schools. Floral design each month for our neighbors at Willcutt Commons. Academic awards for graduating seniors. Gardens kept around town, the largest of them the Lightkeeper's Cottage Garden on Government Island, ours since 1993.
Every garden begins with someone willing to tend something beyond themselves. That is still the whole idea.
From the PresidentSay yes to one thing
A member told me last year that she had joined the Club to meet three people — and stayed for the other ninety. Thirty-some years on, much to her delight, she is still meeting someone new every season.
It is the thing I keep coming back to. Over the past year I listened to members across the Club, and one message came through clearly: we hold on to our traditions, and we are restless for new ways to learn, create and connect.
The programs that anchor us carry on — Junior Gardeners, senior floral design at Willcutt Commons, town beautification, the Speaker Series. Around them we keep adding. Workshops through the season. Books in Bloom at the Paul Pratt Library. Art in Bloom at the Museum of Fine Arts.
Longtime member or brand new, gardener of fifty years or someone who has never grown a thing: there is a place here, and it starts with one activity. A workshop. A committee. A morning at the Lightkeeper's. Say yes to one, and the rest follows.
Deirdre M. Coyle, Jr.
President
How the club is organized
Elected by the membership. The Board meets on the first Tuesday of the month.
President · Deirdre M. Coyle, Jr.
Co-First Vice Presidents · Kristen Allaire and Holly Hess
Second Vice President · Astrid Peisch
Recording Secretary · Regina Church
Corresponding Secretary · Diane Benson
Treasurer · Jean Hefner
Deputy Treasurer · Kara Greenwood
Board Directors · Kelly Conetta and Carol Groebel
Executive BoardCommittees are the core of the Club, and every member is encouraged to join at least one. These are the ones that most often need hands:
Membership
Hospitality
Publicity
Website
Horticulture
Floral Design
Conservation
Junior Gardeners
Town Beautification
Plant Sale
Yuletide
A few standing committees — Nominating, Parliamentarian, Historians — are appointed by the Board rather than joined. The full list of standing committees and their chairs is in the yearbook and the member room.
CommitteesOne membership, three organizationsYour membership reaches further than Cohasset. When you join the Community Garden Club of Cohasset, you also become a member of the Garden Club Federation of Massachusetts, New England Garden Clubs, and National Garden Clubs. It happens automatically, and it is included in your club dues.
The Garden Club Federation of Massachusetts is our state federation and our closest tie. GCFM awards scholarships — among them the Helen Freidberg Scholarship — along with civic and historic grants, and runs flower shows and workshops across the state. We belong to its South Shore District. → gcfm.org
New England Garden Clubs covers all six New England states. Members receive Northern Exposure, its quarterly newsletter, and can join its photography club and classes. Its quarterly meetings are open to any member.
National Garden Clubs is the parent organization. Members receive The National Gardener, and NGC’s awards, grants and scholarships reach us through GCFM. Its meetings are open to members as well.
Most of what these three organizations offer goes unused simply because members don’t know it is theirs. Their calendars are on our Calendar page — flower shows, workshops and annual meetings worth the drive.
Organized 1959, federated March 1960, incorporated May 15, 1979.
Stay in the knowThe newsletter
Nine issues a year, plus a summer edition — the month's calendar, what the committees are up to, and photographs from what we've just done. Open meetings and Plant Sale dates land here first.
Back issues live in the member room.