User:Hjal/Elizabeth Terwilliger

Elizabeth Cooper Terwilliger (September 13, 1909–November 27, 2006) of Mill Valley, California, was an American environmentalist, naturalist, and pioneering outdoor educator known to three generations of San Francisco Bay Area families as "Mrs. T".

Born on a sugar plantation in Hawaii, she was educated there and on the mainland, receiving degrees in nursing and nutrition. Her environmental career was spurred by her exposure to nature on Oahu, on hikes with her mother and brothers, and by her efforts to introduce her own children to the outdoors in Marin County, California.

Terwilliger led school trips for more than 40 years, as well as canoeing, bicycling, and hiking trips for all ages - teaching children and their families about wildlife and plants. She led field trips until she was in her mid-80s.

As an environmental activist,conservationist, and advocate for outdoor education and recreation, she helped to establish playgrounds and trails and to preserve wetlands, butterfly groves, and parklands in Marin County. She received numerous awards for her work, locally and nationally, including the President's Volunteer Action Award, awarded to her at the White House in 1984. Several natural areas she helped preserve have been named in her honor, as have two non-profit organizations established to continue her work.

Early life and education
Terwilliger's fondness for the outdoors began in her childhood in Hawaii, where she was born on 1909-09-13.

She was the daughter of Dr. Harry Bryant Cooper and Florence Thomas Cooper. The Coopers had come to Hawaii from Carrollton, Missouri in 1905 when he became the physician at the Koloa Sugar Plantation on Kauai. In 1907, Dr. Cooper went to the Honolulu Plantation at Aiea where he served until 1928. During his 21 years there he was physician for Palama Settlement from 1919 to 1923 and from 1922 to 1930 he also served Waianae Plantation. The Coopers had four children: Dr. John William, Harry Bryant, Jr., Elizabeth, and Lawrence Thomas, who died at the age of two. Terwilliger's love for nature has been atributed to hikes and trips around the island, which her mother took with her and her two brothers.

Terwilliger attended Punahou School and the University of Hawaii and became a registered nurse in 1939 after studying at the Stanford University School of Nursing (then located in San Francisco).

While studying orthopedics, she met Calvin Terwilliger, an orthopedic surgeon. They married in 1939 and moved to New York, where he studied at New York Orthopedic Hospital and she earned a master's degree in nutrition from Columbia University.

After World War II, they moved to Sausalito in Marin County, California in 1946 and joined a nature group. They moved to Strawberry and, in 1957, to Mill Valley.

As their children were growing up, Mrs. Terwilliger led field trips for their schools, and for their Girl Scout and Boy Scout troops.

Outdoor educator
By the late 1960s, Mrs. Terwilliger led volunteer trips five days a week for a growing number of teachers and environmental and wildlife organizations from across the Bay Area.

She led mothers on field trips with their children, often telling them, "Spend the day at home and you'll never remember it. Spend the day outdoors with me, and you'll never forget it."

Mrs. Terwilliger's romps frequently began with "Mrs. T's Circle Time," in which she gathered participants in a circle and with poems and pageantry had the group act out the flight patterns of birds and mimic animal noises.

Mrs. Terwilliger would call out the words, "something special," when she spotted a flower or an insect, prompting children to come running to see her discovery. She championed interactive participation and commonly used taxidermic birds and mammals.

"She used multi-sensory teaching techniques that involved children so they remembered what they learned," said Joan Bekins, a friend since 1969. "She was exciting in the field and children followed her like the Pied Piper. We had children using words like 'isopod' and 'amphipod' and telling the difference between a buttercup and suncup."

Her teaching style got President Ronald Reagan and an entire White House audience flapping their arms during a quick lecture on "Mr. Vulture," when Reagan presented her with the national Volunteer Action Award on 1984-05-07. Terwilliger's meeting with President Reagan was featured on NBC Evning News that day.

That day she stepped to the podium to instruct the nationwide viewing audience to repeat her favorite doctrine for children, "This is my country. Wherever I go, I will leave it more beautiful than I found it." She never passed a piece of trash without picking it up. She picked up trash at the East Gate of the White House that day.

Jack Golan of San Rafael knew Mrs. Terwilliger for more than 30 years in his role as supervising ranger at Stafford Lake County Park. He said she visited so frequently, officials named a trail after her. Whenever he found a dead animal, he would take it to her house so she could have it stuffed and put on display.

"She was the most amazing human being," Golan said. "I called her Mrs. Nature."

Terwilliger led school trips for more than 40 years, as well as canoeing, bicycling, and hiking trips for all ages - teaching children and their families about wildlife and plants. She led field trips until she was in her mid-80s.

Conservationist
She helped create the Pixie Playground in Ross, preserve Angel Island and boosted the Audubon Richardson Bay Wildlife Sanctuary in Tiburon. She was instrumental in helping create countywide bike paths (including the bike trail from Sausalito to Mill Valley), install small boat docks, establish the Butterfly Grove at Muir Beach, build a bridge at Muir Woods and preserve wetlands.

Terwilliger Nature Education Center (WildCare)
"I started hiking with Mrs. T. when my children were toddlers, and became entranced with her teaching style and enthusiasm," Bekins said. "Before I knew it, I was hooked and became involved with leading field trips."

Bekins said volunteers formed the Terwilliger Nature Guides in 1970.

In 1975, the Elizabeth Terwilliger Nature Education Foundation was established to continue her interactive methods of teaching nature. It changed its name to the Terwilliger Nature Education Center in the late 1980s. In 1994, the center joined the California Center for Wildlife to form WildCare.

"Joan Linn Bekins, FN’86, has won the 2002 ChevronTexaco Conservation Award for her environmental programs de-signed for children. Joan’s field trips, as she joined naturalist-teacher Elizabeth Terwilliger (Marin’s Mrs. ‘T’) inspired a 35-year volunteer commitment to broadening children’s environmental education programs nationwide. For this effort to teach youth about conservation, Bekins was named one of eight winners of the 48th annual ChevronTexaco Conservation Awards. Joan is best-known for producing five award-winning “Tripping with Terwilliger” educational-habitat films that have been seen by 60 million youngsters throughout the United States! To expand the number of children benefiting from outdoor experiences, she also formed the Terwilliger Nature Guides in 1970. The program has recruited and trained over 600 docents to lead school field trips using Mrs. T’s unique teaching techniques that emphasize environmental responsibility. “Mrs. T was right in focusing on younger children”, says Bekins. “If you introduce children to the outdoors when they’re young, they develop an awareness and love of nature for the rest of their lives.” In 1975, she founded the non-profit Terwilliger Nature Education Center, a resource for the public and educators. The books and tapes she has published as well as classroom kits, trips and nature vans have served 65,000 school children each year in seven San Francisco Bay Area counties."

"Joan Linn Bekins, Educating Youth about Conservation. Inspired as a young mother by a nature walk with naturalist Elizabeth Terwilliger, Bekins has done her best to spread the legacy of "Mrs.T's" hands-on approach to environmental education. Producing films, providing resources through her Terwilliger Nature Education Center, and training Terwilliger Nature Guides, Bekins has ensured that the environmental philosophy of her heroine, experiencing and protecting nature, will never cease. The books and tapes she has published as well as Classroom Kits, trips and Nature Vans serve 65,000 school children each year in seven San Francisco Bay Area counties."

Life in retirement and death
Terwilliger and her husband moved from their Mill Valley home to The Redwoods retirement community in 1987. Calvin Terwilliger died in 1990.

Terwilliger was reported to have continued picking up litter as long as she was able to walk. In 19XX, the Redwoods began the Elizbeth Terwilliger Award for excellence in environmental education, which they award annually to a Southern Marin teacher. REF?

On 2000-10-14, as one of 16 honored as "trailbazers who have made significant contributions to Marin County’s quality of life," Terwilliger participated in the first Sustainabiity Workshop to help plan the future of Marin County, as part of the Marin Countywide Plan Update.

Terwilliger died at The Redwoods of old age on Monday, 2006-11-27. More than 300 people attended a celebration of Terwilliger's life on 2006-01-13, filling the Mill Valley Community Center.

At the time of her death, Terwilliger was survived by her son, John Terwilliger of Fresno, California, daughter Lynn Ellen Terwilliger of Coeur d'Alene, Idaho, and three grandchildren.

Awards and recognition

 * President's Volunteer Action Award, 1984 Honoree
 * President's Volunteer Action Award, 1983 Citation
 * California Department of Parks and Recreation "Trailblazer in the World of Conservation and Teaching"
 * Marin Conservation League Peter Behr Award
 * Marin Women's Hall of Fame, 1988 - first honoree in education
 * San Francisco Examiner "Ten Most Distinguished Persons of the Bay Area"
 * Daughters of the American Revolution "National Conservation Award"
 * Chevron Conservation Award, 1987
 * Terwilliger field trips appeared as a segment on ABC News 20/20 news magazine following her White House award
 * Elizabeth Terwilliger Marsh, Mill Valley, California, was dedicated on 2004-03-27
 * Elizabeth Terwilliger Trail, Stafford Lake County Park, Novato, California
 * Terwilliger Grove, Muir Beach, California, monarch butterfly overwintering grove
 * Terwilliger WildCare Center, San Rafael, California

What others have said about Elizabeth Terwilliger

 * Barbara Salzman, president of the Marin Audubon Society: "She introduced me to the environment. It was more than 30 years ago that my young son, who was in diapers then, and I went on her walks. That's how I got interested in the environment. She was a wonderful person."


 * Mary Jane Burke, Marin County Superintendent of Schools, said Terwilliger was an effective teacher because of her unrivaled passion for children and the outdoors: "Oh, she was incredible. When you were in her presence, it was humbling, it was inspiring and it changed you forever."


 * Lynn Ellen Terwilliger, on growing up in the Terwilliger home: "There were always natural history surprises waiting for us... Before we found someone to do the taxidermy she would keep the dead birds and animals in the freezer. People learned she collected them and constantly dropped things off. I remember going to the mailbox one day and there was a big dead pigeon in there. This seemed perfectly normal growing up..."


 * Karen Wilson, executive director of WildCare: "We teach in Mrs. T's inspiring educational style and reach 40,000 Bay Area school children a year... We are all fortunate that her enthusiasm and energy will live on in the generations of children she has inspired."


 * Joan Linn Bekins, founder, Terwilliger Nature Education Center: “Mrs. T was right in focusing on younger children. If you introduce children to the outdoors when they’re young, they develop an awareness and love of nature for the rest of their lives.”

Quotations

 * "Spend the day at home and you'll never remember it. Spend the day outdoors with me, and you'll never forget it."
 * "This is my country. Wherever I go, I will leave it more beautiful than I found it."
 * "Teach children to love Nature - We take care of what we love!"

Bibliography and filmography

 * Author of Sights and Sounds of the Seasons, Elizabeth Terwilliger Nature Education Foundation, Tiburon, California, 1976, 1979 (Third printing, revised) ISBN 0-935472-00-2; illustrated by Barbara Pollach; designed and edited by Joan Linn Bekins. (Based on columns originally published in the Marin Independent Journal, San Rafael, California)
 * Subject of Elizabeth Terwilliger, Someone Special: A Biography of the Celebrated Naturalist, Phyllis M. Stanley, 1997, Mayhaven Publishing, ISBN 1-878044-54-0.
 * Subject of Tripping with Terwilliger films. Produced by Joan Linn Bekins; cinematography by Sam Lopez; directed and edited by William E. Cohen; music and lyrics composed and performed by Dan Whittemore; sound by Will Harvey.
 * Bay Tidelands - 15 minutes (Winner of the CINE Golden Eagle Award)
 * Redwood Forest. Stream. Ocean Beach & Monarch Butterfly Trees - 15 minutes
 * Grassland, Chaparral and Fresh Water Pond - 15 minutes (Winner of the John Muir Award at the National Educational Film Festival)
 * Oak Woodland - 15 minutes
 * Sights & Sounds of the Seasons - 22 minutes