Guy L. Fleming (May 27, 1884 – May 15, 1960) was an American naturalist whose conservation work led to the founding of
Torrey Pines State Natural Reserve
Torrey Pines State Natural Reserve is of coastal state park located in the community of La Jolla, in San Diego, California, off North Torrey Pines Road. Although it is located within San Diego city limits, it remains one of the wildest stretches ...
, now a 2000-acre protected coastal area of La Jolla, San Diego.
The
Torrey pine
The Torrey pine (''Pinus torreyana'') is a rare pine species in California, United States. It is a critically endangered species growing only in coastal San Diego County, and on Santa Rosa Island, offshore from Santa Barbara in Santa Barbara ...
, ''Pinus torreyana'', is the rarest pine species in the United States.
As district superintendent of state parks for southern California, Fleming also worked to protect major nature preserves that extend from the U.S. border with Mexico to northern San Diego county; these include the natural areas that became
Anza-Borrego Desert State Park
Anza-Borrego Desert State Park (, '' AN-zə bə-RAY-goh'') is a California State Park located within the Colorado Desert of southern California, United States. The park takes its name from 18th century Spanish explorer Juan Bautista de Anza and ...
,
Cuyamaca Rancho State Park
Cuyamaca Rancho State Park is a state park in Southern California, United States, located east of San Diego in the Cuyamaca and Laguna Mountains of the Peninsular Ranges. The park's feature pine, fir, and oak forests, with meadows and streams ...
and
Palomar Mountain State Park
Palomar Mountain ( ; es, Monte Palomar ) is a mountain ridge in the Peninsular Ranges in northern San Diego County. It is famous as the location of the Palomar Observatory and Hale Telescope, and known for the Palomar Mountain State Park.
Hist ...
.
As a fellow of the San Diego Society of Natural History, he worked closely with scientists and staff of the
San Diego Natural History Museum
The San Diego Natural History Museum is a museum located in Balboa Park in San Diego, California. It was founded in 1874 as the San Diego Society of Natural History. It is the second oldest scientific institution west of the Mississippi and th ...
, leading public nature walks for the museum and lecturing on environmental issues.
Biography
![Pinus torreyana at State Reserve](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9c/Pinus_torreyana_at_State_Reserve.jpg)
Born in Nebraska on May 27, 1884, to Georgia Lowd and James Fleming (a carpenter), Guy L. Fleming was twelve when his family moved to Corvallis, Oregon. In 1909, he moved to San Diego and found work as a gardener for the
Little Lander Colony of San Ysidro, laying out and planting the village park. His work caught the attention of former San Diego County Horticultural Commissioner and chairman of the advisory board for the Little Landers, George P. Hall, who encouraged Fleming to study botany. In 1911 he worked in the nursery preparing for the 1915
Panama-California Exposition; during the fair, he became a guide, giving talks on plants and landscaping.
In 1921, Fleming was hired by
Ellen Browning Scripps
Ellen Browning Scripps (October 18, 1836 – August 3, 1932) was an American journalist and philanthropist who was the founding donor of several major institutions in Southern California. She and her half-brother E. W. Scripps created the E. W. ...
as the custodian and naturalist of her property of Torrey Pines; in that year, the city of San Diego also hired him to be caretaker of the city-owned portion of Torrey Pines property adjacent to the Scripps land. Working with landscape architect
Ralph D. Cornell
Ralph Dalton Cornell (January 11, 1890 – April 6, 1972) was an American landscape architect from Los Angeles, California.
Biography
Early life
Ralph Dalton Cornell was born on January 11, 1890, in Holdrege, Nebraska.
He was a Fellow of the A ...
, Fleming developed plans
to preserve the Torrey pines on both the city and Scripps properties, proposing a nature park for the area.
In 1922, they studied the only other stand of Torrey pines on Santa Rosa Island.
In 1923, Fleming became a fellow of the San Diego Society of Natural History, working throughout the 1920s to educate the public on conservation issues, leading nature walks and lecturing on the region's botanical diversity. He participated in study of pines in Baja California and of the proposed
Kings Canyon National Park
Kings Canyon National Park is an American national park in the southern Sierra Nevada, in Fresno and Tulare Counties, California. Originally established in 1890 as General Grant National Park, the park was greatly expanded and renamed to Kings ...
region and conducted a timber survey of Cuyamaca.
In 1927, Fleming married artist Margaret Doubleday Eddy;
[ Margaret Fleming's father ]William Abner Eddy
William Abner Eddy (January 28, 1850 – December 26, 1909) was an American accountant and journalist famous for his photographic and meteorological experiments with kites. The scientific significance of Eddy's improvements to kite-flying was sh ...
invented the Eddy kite. together they built a small home on the Scripps property at Torrey Pines. Their home, the
Guy and Margaret Fleming House, also known as Torrey Pines Reserve Ranger Residence, was added to the National Register of Historic Places in June 1998.
In 1932, Fleming was appointed District Superintendent for all southern California state parks (then 20 parks); during the Depression, he had responsibility for the administration of six
CCC
CCC may refer to:
Arts and entertainment
* Canada's Capital Cappies, the Critics and Awards Program in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
* ''Capcom Classics Collection'', a 2005 compilation of arcade games for the PlayStation 2 and Xbox
* CCC, the pro ...
camps.
Fleming retired from the
California State Parks System in 1948, but continued to be active in conservation efforts. In 1950, he was a founding member of the Torrey Pines Association, working to integrate the Torrey Pines City Park into the California State Park System.
Fleming died on 15 May 1960.
References
External links
Torrey Pines State Natural ReserveTorrey Pines AssociationThe San Diego Natural History Museumholds archival material on Guy Fleming's conservation work.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Fleming, Guy
American conservationists
American naturalists
Activists from California
1884 births
1960 deaths
People associated with the San Diego Natural History Museum
Natural history of San Diego County, California
People from La Jolla, San Diego
People from San Diego
20th-century naturalists