2025 NPSO Fellows Award Jennifer Lippert Profile Leadership, collaboration, and innovations have been Jenny’s strengths and emphasis over her 40-year service at NPSO. Emerald Chapter has been the recipient of these endeavors that have elevated our Chapter’s presence locally and benefited NPSO state wide as is evident from her leading the Emerald Chapter website development…
WILLOW ELLIOTT– 2026 NPSO Fellow Willow’s early interest in plants began on a farm in Tennessee where she could observe nature alone for hours and started learning the names of plants and trees from her forest ranger father and homesteading mother. Her high school and college years were spent in southern California where she majored…
Jason Clinch grew up on a rural farm outside of Castle Rock, Washington in the shadow of Mount St. Helens. He caught his first fish from a boat on Spirit Lake with his grandparents while camping at age three, then watched the mountain erupt at age five. From an early age, he spent his time…
Making botanical connections The move from California to Oregon in the early 1980s landed Gail in her ideal botanical landscape and climate zone, between the northeastern North America of her childhood, a place with distinct seasons, and California’s Mediterranean climate, where she was introduced to and fell in love with plant ecology and botany as…
Tanya grew up in New England, the daughter of avid gardeners. She’s been in love with nature, especially plants, as long as she can remember. As a child, she spent as much time out of doors as possible, driven to learn all she could about the natural world. She particularly recalls going on a nature…
As the son of missionary parents, David Wagner spent his childhood in Landour, India, in the foothills of the Himalayas. There David attended Woodstock School, exploring the mountains and collecting specimens of all kinds, including beetles, butterflies, birds, mammals, and snakes. About the age of eleven, he became particularly curious about ferns that, along with…
Lisa Blackburn was born and raised in southern California. As a child, she enjoyed numerous camping vacations with her family all over the western United States. These trips and her mother’s interest in gardening sparked her interest in botany and geology. When Lisa attended the University of California, Davis (UC Davis), her broad interests led…
When Linda was just a baby, her parents bought 34 acres on Lopez Island, the perfect setting to learn about the natural world around her. She started by helping her mother in the garden, then expanded to surrounding natural areas. Her parents taught her the names of the native plants and gave her art supplies…
Barb Mumblo’s family lived in five different states (never more than five years at any location) during her father’s US Air Force career. In 1975 she found her forever home in Oregon when she and her 6-year-old daughter visited Oregon. She was inspired to go back to school after participating in a plant hike on…
Frances Stilwell was born in Cincinnati, Ohio. She attended Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts, and received a BA in botany from the University of Cincinnati, specializing in taxonomy of plants of southwestern Ohio. She received an MS in botany/biophysics at the same institution under a Public Health Service grant in radiation biology. She worked two…
Esther Helen Gruber McEvoy earned a BA in Art from Lewis and Clark College in 1974 and a BS from Portland State University (PSU) in 1978. During the late 1970s she worked as a teaching assistant in two locations: a botany class at PSU and field botany and soil invertebrate classes at the Malheur Field…
Bruce Newhouse has had a lifelong love affair with Oregon’s native plants, animals and habitats. As a long-time member of the Native Plant Society of Oregon, Bruce has made major contributions to the conservation of Oregon’s flora while also helping to raise awareness of the importance of other native species and ecosystems. Bruce’s early years…