A celebration of her life
Lee Somerville
1943 – 2026
Please join us in celebrating her legacy through shared memories, stories, and a tribute to her life's work and achievements.
1943 – 2026
Please join us in celebrating her legacy through shared memories, stories, and a tribute to her life's work and achievements.
Saturday, November 7th
12pm – 3pm
Dedicated speakers and eulogy from 12:30 – 1:30pm.
The Marston House at Balboa Park
3525 7th Ave, San Diego, CA 92103
This is an "open house" gathering: come when you can, stay as long as you like. We would love to hear your stories.
St. Helens, Liverpool, London, the Greek Isles, Ottawa, Green Bay, Door County, San Diego. She gardened in all of them.
A story, a memory, a garden she helped you plant, a sentence she once said that stuck. Notes appear on this page once the family has had a chance to read them.
Notes from friends and family will appear here.
It's an open house, so there's no need to stand on ceremony. A rough headcount helps us with chairs, flowers, and food.
If you would like to make a gift in Lee's memory, the family suggests two places she gave her time to, in the two cities she called home.
Balboa Park's garden society and the publisher of California Garden. Lee served as its President.
Give to the Floral AssociationThe living-history park on the Fox River, where Lee played a 19th-century Belgian colonist before becoming its Interim Director.
Give to Heritage HillIf you would rather send flowers or a card, please address them to:
The Marston House
3525 7th Ave
San Diego, CA 92103
A History of Home Gardening · Wisconsin Historical Society Press, 2011 · foreword by Arnold R. Alanen
Two centuries of Wisconsin's ornamental gardens in period photographs, seed catalogues and Lee's own prose, with plant lists for anyone who wants to grow a piece of that history at home. The nasturtiums on this page, and on the Save the Date card, are from its cover.
The Marston House sits at the northwest corner of Balboa Park, on the edge of Bankers Hill and Hillcrest, ten minutes from the airport. A few hotels nearby, closest first.
Distances are straight-line from the Marston House. Open the house in Google Maps ↗
Born in St. Helens, England, July 15, 1943. Master Gardener, pianist, EEG technician, travel agent, historian, landscape architect, author, Interim Director of a Wisconsin state park, President of the San Diego Floral Association. Took up the accordion after eighty.
“Have I told you about the flowers. They are absolutely beautiful now. Every garden has huge roses of all colours, & other enormous flowers, & the roads are lined with poppies. The smell of them is all around as soon as you go outside.”
Written home in blue ballpoint on airmail onionskin, in three sittings over one week. Her family is transcribing her letters; more will be shared here.
