
She Put Her Head Down and Persevered
My great-grandmother was a woman who persevered in the face of family tragedy and challenging economic circumstances. Frances Vaughan Gardiner Finletter was born on September 16, 1892, and became one of the first women to be accepted into membership in the American Society of Landscape Architects (ASLA). She managed her own private practice, and was active in the profession for 55 years. Widely respected, when she was in her early 80s, she was named chairman of an at-large co