Dan Hinkley, born in the zone 4 highlands of North Central Michigan, has had a lifelong interest in plants, leading him to receive his B.S. in Ornamental Horticulture and Horticulture Education from Michigan State University in 1976, and his M.S. in Urban Horticulture from the University of Washington in 1985.
In 1987, while teaching horticulture at Edmonds Community College north of Seattle, he and his partner, Robert L. Jones, began Heronswood Nursery, near Kingston. Devoted to introducing rare and unusual plants to gardeners of North America, this endeavor has led Hinkley into the wilds of China, South and Central America, Mexico, New Zealand, South Africa, Nepal, Vietnam, Taiwan, Sikkim, Bhutan, Tasmania and Canada numerous times a year for the past 16 years. Heronswood Nursery previously listed nearly 3000 plant species, and has shipped to 48 states as well as England, Europe and Asia. When W.A.Burpee closed the nursery in May of 2006, Dan independently focused his attentions on continued plant hunting, writing and speaking.
Hinkley has written for a number of periodicals, including Pacific Horticulture, The American Gardener, The Gardener, Gardens Illustrated, and Martha Stewart Living, as well as having regular columns in Northwest Garden News, Horticulture Magazine and Garden Design, and an occasional horticulture feature for the Seattle Times. He is a contributing editor to Horticulture Magazine and has appeared many times on Martha Stewart Living television as a gardening correspondent. On April 17, 2007 Dan appeared in a PBS NOVA program, The First Flower, exploring the flora of remote mountains of China. His first book, Winter Ornamentals, was published in 1993 and his second, The Explorers Garden: Rare and Unusual Perennials, received the 1999 Book of the Year Award from the American Horticultural Society.
In 2003, Hinkley was honored with the Scott Arboretum Gold Medal from Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania for his lifetime achievements in horticulture. He has been awarded the Marcel Le Piniac Award from the American Rock Garden Society, The Medal of Honor from the Garden Club of America, The Garden Communicator of the Year award from the American Nurserymen and Landscape Association, the White Gold Medal from the Greater Cleveland Horticultural Society, and in 2006, the Liberty Hyde Bailey Award from the American Horticultural Society for a lifetime of achievement in education, writing and plant exploration. His most recent awards, received on June 21, 2007 and July 2, 2007 respectively, are the George Robert White Medal of Honor from the Massachusetts Horticultural Society for the advancement of interest in horticulture in the broadest sense; and from the Royal Horticulture Society of Great Britain, the Veitch Memorial Medal for his outstanding contribution to the advancement of the science and practice of horticulture.
Dan Hinkley currently resides in Indianola, WA where he is in the process of realizing his latest endeavor, the Gardens of Windcliff, on a south-facing bluff overlooking Puget Sound.
|
Daniel J. Hinkley
