(Vero Beach, FL – January 23, 2025) Rochelle Wolberg, Executive Director of McKee Botanical Garden, today announced it is the recipient of the esteemed Jean and John Greene Prize for Excellence in American Gardening. This prestigious award, accompanied by a $45,000 grant, will support the development of a comprehensive, five-year strategic business plan to ensure McKee’s continued growth and long-term financial stability. 

McKee Botanical Garden joins an elite group of Greene Prize recipients, following Wethersfield Estate and Garden in Amenia, NY, and Lotusland in Santa Barbara, CA.

The prize has been made possible by a transformational estate gift of nearly $3 million to the Garden Conservancy in Garrison, NY from John Kaul Greene, who passed away in 2019, after expressing his intention to create an award to recognize excellence in American gardening. Greene, a former Garden Conservancy board member and a lifelong advocate for exceptional gardens, is survived by his wife, Jean, who shared with him an appreciation for the ways gardens enrich our lives, an appreciation that deepened during the four years the couple lived in Europe. The Greenes enjoyed gardening at their Lake Forest, IL home and were longtime supporters of the Chicago Botanic Garden where John served on the board of trustees for more than half a century.

When asked about the significance of recognizing McKee Botanical Garden with the prestigious Award, James Brayton Hall, President and CEO of the Garden Conservancy, said, “I am immensely proud to have advanced McKee’s candidacy! The history of the garden is remarkable, and the work they are doing there is an outstanding model for other public gardens.”

McKee Botanical Garden was founded in 1932 by Cleveland industrialist Arthur McKee and Florida pioneer developer Waldo Sexton, who commissioned William Lyman Phillips, an associate of the Frederick Law Olmsted firm with turning the jungle into a preeminent tropical garden. Award-winning collections of waterlilies and orchids, including cool-growing orchids, flourished in the world’s first mechanically driven air-conditioned greenhouse, engineered and patented by Arthur McKee. Theme-park attractions in central Florida led to the demise of the tropical oasis; it closed and was sold to developers in 1978.

Twenty-years later, with the help of the Indian River Land Trust and the Trust for Public Land, the heart of the original garden was reclaimed. In 1996, the Garden Conservancy recognized the garden’s significance and endorsed the Trust’s preservation efforts.

When she accepted the award recently in New York, Wolberg noted that “the Garden Conservancy’s original recognition of McKee’s preservation efforts helped us to secure National Historic Landmark status and recognition and funding from state, national and international agencies.”

“For the Garden Conservancy to recognize McKee once again, with this prestigious national award, is an unequivocal affirmation of our respective missions,” she added.

When McKee Jungle Gardens opened in 1932, The New York Times positioned it as “among the most important gardens in the world.” This was long before anyone worried that an organization would be necessary to help preserve gardens for future generations. However, a wise plantsman named Frank Cabot saw this need in 1989, which ironically was the same year McKee was in the clutches of a developer with permits for a 375,000-square-foot shopping center and 875 parking spaces. Mr. Cabot’s vision became The Garden Conservancy, the country’s preeminent gardening organization intent on preserving public and private gardens throughout the country.”

McKee Botanical Garden is located at 350 US Highway 1 in Vero Beach (32962). For more information, visit www.mckeegarden.org or call 772.794.0601.

About the Garden Conservancy:

The Garden Conservancy's mission is to preserve, share, and celebrate America's gardens and diverse gardening traditions for the education and inspiration of the public. Through its programs and outreach, the Conservancy champions the vital role that gardens play in our history, our culture, and our quality of life/ To learn more about its work, please visit

gardenconservancy.org.

Attached Image:

(Photo Credit: J. Patrick Rice)

The Stone Bridge at McKee Botanical Garden

Media Contacts:

+ McKee Botanical Garden

Rochelle Wolberg, Executive Director

772.794.0601

[email protected]

+ The Garden Conservancy

Cliff Weathers, Director of Communications

845.445.8257

[email protected]