 | | My late good friend Georgina Mentis is seen on the right of this threesome in February 1988, at her daughter Nicol’s house in Toronto. On the left is Mary Bailey, another accomplished flower arranger and past member of the Garden Club of Toronto now living in Québec. |  As mentioned on my radio programme last Saturday, Georgina Mentis passed away on Thursday night, September 4. She had been suffering badly from cancer for the last year or more. The last time I talked to her was in June, when I suggested she come on my programme and talk about peonies--one of her fondest loves in the garden. But she declined because she wasn’t feeling well at all.
Georgina must have been born with a sense of wonder. She had passion like no one else I have known, except perhaps the late Lois Wilson, author of the 1969 Chatelaine Gardening Book. Geo, in addition to her passion, was fearless. If she saw a problem or an injustice, and she was ever so observant, she wouldn’t rest until it was fixed, no matter what had to be done.
I did talk to her on my programme of March 15 this year, at which time the topic of conversation was this year’s Canada Blooms show. She had been to the show twice and thought, like I, that it was not nearly as good as previous years. We were dubious about saying so on the air when the flower show had two days yet to run, but we decided it was only fair to say exactly what we both thought--that quality, diversity and unusual large plants in bloom were sadly missing. We decided to do that in the hope that improvements would be made.
Since that time, as I’ve reported, the general manager Ted Johnston has been let go, and now the Garden Club of Toronto has announced it is leaving the partnership effective with the end of the 2004 show. I am sure this latter decision would not have been considered a plus by Georgina.
I first got to know Geo with my annual visits and talks to her Cloverleaf Garden Club in the 60s and 70s. I seem to remember judging with her, and her friend Bette Hall, at a Garden Club Flower Show at the O’Keefe Centre about 1967. Our friendship grew each time we saw or talked to one another, but not until my trip to Holland and Belgium in 1981 when Audrey Meiklejohn, Helen Cruickshank and Geo were aboard did it really blossom as she marvelled at the gardens and plants of some of those two countries.
Then in 1983 it was Singapore, Australia and New Zealand when she came as Helen Cruickshank’s guest, and Audrey was along as well. Geo and I had just a great time running back and forth to each other commenting on different new-to-one-or-both-of-us plants!
Her knowledge of plants, and of decorative flower arranging was just superb. She started into flower arranging when she first joined the Cloverleaf Horticultural Society back in the late 50s. Here’s how she put it herself just a few years ago: “In 1950, my husband and I moved from Toronto, where I was born, to the Village of Port Credit, numbering a little over 3,000 people. We built a house that needed a garden. Cloverleaf Horticultural Society had an American Judge as President in 1956 and she gave an exciting Christmas demonstration that so intrigued me I was eager to become a member of the group. Life in a smaller community meant that the executive had to have a discussion as to whether a person with a foreign background, such as I, would be allowed to join the club. Fortunately, their decision put me on the garden path.”
She absolutely excelled at flowering arranging, and became a great teacher of it for others. She had a Greek background and found learning the plant names came very easily. And she certainly knew her plants. She was hard to stump!
Exhibiting and demonstrating flower arranging at Cloverleaf then at lily, rose, gladiolus, chrysanthemum and dahlia Societies, the CNE and the Garden Club of Toronto laid the groundwork for Geo’s further horticultural study. Taking courses and attending the Royal Botanical Gardens Judging School enabled her to become a decorative, horticulture, and rose judge. She became a lecturer in design and horticulture at the University of Guelph, four RBG judging schools, the Seneca College floral program and she traveled around Ontario for the Outreach Program of Royal Botanical Gardens. She and her best friend Bette Hall shared many rewarding and sometimes hilarious adventures in the smaller gardening communities of Ontario. Her interest in gardens led her to travel to Europe, Asia, Australia, New Zealand, Hawaii, South Africa and North America.
In 1987, she was chosen to represent Canada, by the Ontario Horticultural Society, as a demonstrator at The World Association of Flower Arranging (WAFA) held in Brussels and then invited to be a Judge when it was held later in Toronto. She competed in floral design at the WAFA show in New Zealand in 1996 and attended the 1999 South Africa and the 2002 Scotland shows as a spectator.
I asked her friend Bette Hall how Georgina came about her talent and Bette said that Geo thought it started back about grade eight when her teacher put a vase containing a single branch of a hawthorn tree on her desk. Geo was apparently enthralled. Bette also said that Geo believed her talent of using her hands had come from her mother.
But from whence came her tenacity I asked. And we’re not sure about that; but we do know she had it! Bette said, Geo was, and admitted to being, “mouthy as hell and never backed down.” Over the years she probably did more to keep the Cloverleaf Garden Club in the forefront of the horticultural societies and activity than any other person. But her efforts weren’t just on behalf of the Cloverleaf club. She worked hard for the Royal Botanical Gardens, the Civic Garden Centre, the Canadian National Exhibition horticultural show, Canada Blooms and the list goes on.
She, like me, was terribly disappointed with what appeared to be a downturn in the activities at the Royal Botanical Gardens and Canada Blooms. Now she won’t be around to encourage others to do better for both institutions.
She wasn’t just into horticulture and flower arranging. She seemed to excel at everything she did. She had won a beauty contest when she was young. She was an accomplished synchronized swimmer. And, she seemed able to get people to do things that they said they could never do.
My favourite story of Geo was one I mentioned on my radio programme when her husband Chris passed away, just three weeks before Geo did. As mentioned, Chris and Georgina were both members for many years of Cloverleaf Garden Club and Chris often donated plants for their sales table. On many occasions they were rather new introductions. What would happen is that Georgina would buy plants, often expensive ones and plant them in her garden. Chris had a habit of not asking and digging up Geo's recently purchased plants, potting them up and donating them to the Cloverleaf club for sale at the monthly meetings. Geo would go into the garden soon after a meeting and find her new plants would be missing!
Through her volunteer efforts over the years, she received the Ontario Horticultural Association Horticultural Award in 1971, the District Service Award in 1997 and the OHA Award of Merit for her contribution to the cause of horticulture in Ontario in June 2003.
Georgina and her husband Chris raised three children, Christie, Susan and Nicol and have two grandchildren. Their elder daughter, Susan, caught the horticulture bug as well, graduating as a landscape architect and becoming an International Society for Arboriculture certified arborist.
I cannot really believe that my soul spirit Georgina Mentis is gone! Ave atque Vale. Hail and Farewell gallant spirit!
The e-mail question box was light this week; just this from Jake and Barb: “Could you please tell me the best time to plant tulips, narcissus, daffodils? We live in the Toronto area. Thank you.”
That question can be dealt with in one word: NOW! If you’ve been listening to my gardening vignettes that run on AM740 twice daily in the daytime, you’ll have heard several on the topic of spring-flowering bulbs. My ad-vice is to get them asap while selection is best, buy the largest bulbs available, and get them planted this month. |
by Art Drysdale
