Home > Carnegie Center > Arizona Women's Hall of Fame > Inductees > Douglas, Margaret Bell
Margaret Bell Douglas
1880 - 1963
Inducted in 1991
Used by permission from the Arizona Historical Society
"All the honors that Mrs. Douglas received can never express what
an extraordinary woman she was. Her vitality, her great ability and
knowledge and her kindness were known to all of us and…her influence
will always live and enrich [others].”
Garden Club of America Bulletin, October 11,
1963
Margaret Bell Douglas’ greatest achievements sprang from a gift
for horticulture that was recognized nationwide. Her contributions live
on in Phoenix and Bisbee, which was the Douglases' home for twenty-six
years.
Born in Montreal in February of 1890, Margaret began her life of travels
at an early age. Her father, Robert Bell, was a geologist who conducted
surveys and mapping expeditions in Canada. On one trip when he ventured
into Alaska, his young daughter traveled in a cradleboard on the back of
an Eskimo. When she was about 18, she went to study in Europe. The
highlight of the trip was a visit to Great Britain where she was presented
to Queen Victoria in ceremonies at the Court of St. James.
After her return to the United States, Margaret met Walter Douglas, a
young Canadian-born mining engineer who managed the Copper Queen Consolidated
Mining Company's operations in Bisbee. Walter's father, Dr. James Douglas,
served on the board of Phelps, Dodge and Company of New York, which owned
the Copper Queen. Walter also acted as managing director of the El Paso
and Southwestern Railroad, built by the mine to ship ore from the smelter
at Bisbee, and later from the newly created town of Douglas.
Margaret and Walter married in September of 1902, and Walter brought his
bride to Bisbee. That same year the newlyweds celebrated his promotion
to the position of general manager of the Phlelps Dodge western operations. Living
first in an adobe home at the center of town, Margaret and Walter Douglas
raised five children Bisbee. In 1908, they moved into a forty-one-room
house in Warren, just outside of town, and gave their original home to
the YWCA.
Margaret and her children escaped the summer heat by taking the train
to Santa Barbara, California, where they owned property and where she rented
out several cottages to other Arizonans heading for the beach. During
these years Margaret began to develop her interest in plants and gardening.
She supervised tile landscaping of the Copper Queen Hospital. Her next
undertaking had a broader impact. The El Paso and Southwestern (EP & SW)
Railroad had been expanding, and in 1912 finished a line from Benson to
Tucson, giving competition to the Southern Pacific, which had operated
in Tucson since 1880. Margaret knew that an attractive garden would help
promote the EP & SW's new Tucson depot, which opened in December of
1913. The Douglases hired Carmillo Fenzi, a landscape architect from Santa
Barbara, for the job. Next Margaret organized a garden contest to improve
the isolated railroad settlements along the line from Tucson to Douglas
and El Paso. She provided flower and vegetable seeds and succeeded in transforming
dreary barrenness with luster and beauty.
After Walter's promotion to president of Phelps Dodge in 1917, the Douglases
traveled constantly between Bisbee and a second home in Chauncey, New York.
In 1928, the Douglases bought a 120-acre farm in Phoenix. They supervised
construction of a house and garden and the planting of date and citrus
bees. Margaret canned dates and other delicacies as gifts for her friends.
More traveling was in store for this energetic woman when her husband's
career took a new direction. A member of the board of Southern Pacific
since the EP & SW's merger with that company in 1924, Walter retired
from Phelps Dodge in 1930. A year later he became president of the Sud
Pacifico de Mexico railroad line, and the Douglases moved to Mexico
for nine years. There Margaret broadened her knowledge of botany with exciting
results. A member-at-large in the Garden Club of America since 1921, she
now created her own agenda. Working with Sud Pacifico and the
Mexican government, she and an East Indian horticulturist established experimental
agricultural stations along the west coast of Mexico in carefully chosen
locations. The goal of this project was to improve native varieties of
corn, flax, and other crops. Margaret also imported the solo papaya plant
from Hawaii, thus introducing a new crop to Mexico.
She continued her landscape design work when the railroad built the Playa
de Cortez hotel and gardens in Guaymas. Other activities included staging
flower shows as she had in the States and hosting the Garden Club of America's
trip to Mexico in 1937.
Margaret's involvement in local, national, and international cultural
organizations increased after Walter's second retirement in about 1940.
She was a member of the New York Horticultural Society and served on the
advisory Council of the New York Botanical Gardens and the board of New
York City Memorial Hospital. As chairperson of the members-at-large of
the Garden Club of America, she entertained many club presidents in her
New York home, winning support for the American Red Cross project to landscape
the grounds of recreation halls and hospitals at army bases. In Arizona,
Margaret oversaw the landscaping at Luke, Williams, and Davis Monthan Army
Air Force Bases and at Fort Huachuca.
Margaret's outreach to the community continued after Walter's death in
1946. A member of the Phoenix Garden Club, in the late 1940s she joined
her friend Gertrude Webster in establishing the Desert Botanical Gardens
and donated 1,500 specimens to its herbarium. Preservation and conservation
were increasingly important to Margaret. In the early 1950s, she worked
with Phoenix council members Barry Goldwater and Margaret Kober to save
Camelback Mountain from development. She also participated in the movement
to save California's redwoods.
Years of study and experience had established Margaret as a well-known
botanist, respected for her extensive knowledge of the plant world and
her work in conservation. Her work garnered a variety of tributes and honors.
Three colleagues named plants for her. In 1952 Margaret received
one of her greatest honors when tile Garden Club of America created the
Margaret Douglas Award. Sculptor Rene P. Chambellan designed the medal,
given yearly to a club member for outstanding contributions to conservation
and human betterment. Two years later Margaret received the Garden Club's
Achievement Medal.
Margaret Douglas is also remembered for her support of cultural arts in
Phoenix. In addition to helping the Phoenix Symphony and art museum, she
served for more than thirty years as a trustee of the Heard Museum of Anthropology
and Primitive Art, founded in 1929 by Margaret's friend Maie Heard.
This unusually gifted woman remained active until a year before her death
at the age of eighty-three. She died on October 10, 1963, and was buried
beside her husband in Quebec, following services in Phoenix and Westchester,
New York. Throughout her long life, Margaret Bell Douglas used her talents
for her community and country. Her work with plants beautified many lives,
and her conservation efforts inspired others to respect plant life. In Phoenix she joined other prominent citizens in
founding and supporting various cultural and social organizations. As her
friend Sylvia G. Byrnes said, Margaret Douglas's "achievements will
live on for all of us."
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