Bebe Miles
Native Plants and Bulbs!
I first wrote about Bebe Miles on my blog after I purchased a copy of her first book, The Wonderful World of Bulbs (1963) at a local antique mall. I had never heard of her, but I thought her book would be a good addition to my growing collection of “mid-century modern” gardening books.
Once I had that book, I did my usual research for more information about Bebe via online searches, ancestry.com, newspapers.com, and Google Books. I also looked for her in other books.
And the story could have ended there with that book on bulbs, but then I purchased another book she wrote in 1969, Bluebells & Bittersweet: Gardening with Native American Plants. In this relatively slim book—just 168 pages—Bebe wrote:
“I happen to believe our natural history is quite as important as our political history. But somewhere in the course of growing up as a nation we were botanically side-tracked. Our gardens do not feature the wonderful world of plants which are our natural heritage.”
And here we are 54 years later, thinking that the pleas to plant more native plants in our gardens is a relatively recent trend. Bebe was ahead of her time!
But who was she?
Her Biography
The covers of the two books I have included short biographical sketches, which gave me enough clues to figure out some basic information.
Bebe was born Louise Priore in Brooklyn, New York, on March 18, 1924, and attended Syracuse University in the early 1940s, where she majored in journalism and served as an editor for the student newspaper. She was in the Alpha Chi Omega sorority and married Robert T. Miles in 1946.
She passed away on June 21, 1980 in Doylestown, Pennsylvania. In addition to writing several books about gardening, she also wrote articles for gardening magazines and spoke to garden clubs on various topics.
I never found records of any children online, but in Bluebells & Bittersweet, her biography mentions “daughters” so she had at least two children.
“One of her daughters, Victoria, is a student of landscape architecture and did most of the drawings for the book.”
From her books, I also know that she had considered becoming an entomologist, botanist, or naturalist before deciding on journalism.
After graduation from college, she worked for the Binghamton, New York, Sun newspaper. I briefly searched that newspaper’s archives for anything written by Bebe but came up empty-handed. There was an actress, Bebe Daniels, whom I’d never heard of, who kept coming up in all my searches instead of this Bebe.
Why did I search for Bebe and not Louise? It seems as though she always went by the name Bebe rather than Louise, and that’s the name I found on all her books and articles.
Finally, her alma mater, Syracuse University, thought enough of her to include in their archives “Bebe Miles Manuscript, Special Collections Research Center, Syracuse University Libraries:”
“Manuscript of Bebe Miles, a practiced gardener, for her book entitled "The Wonderful World of Bulbs". Collection includes a tentative outline, early chapter drafts, a first draft, a carbon copy of the first draft, a galley proof, color page proofs, and a bibliography in the form of index cards.”
Her Books
As mentioned, Bebe wrote The Wonderful World of Bulbs (D. Van Nostrand Company, Inc., 1963) and Bluebells & Bittersweet: Gardening with Native American Plants (Van Nostrand Reinhold, 1969). I have both of these books.
Online, I also found two other books written in the 1970s: Designing with Natural Materials: Flowers, Leaves, Seeds, Nuts, Cones, Fruits, Shells (1975) and Wildflower Perennials for Your Garden: Bloom From America's Long-Neglected Native Heritage (1976). There’s that “plant native” theme again!
Several other books written by Bebe were published in the late 1970s, but they appear to be refreshed versions of her original two books.
I found another reference to Bebe on my own library shelves. In 10,000 Garden Questions Answered by 20 Experts, Edited by Marjorie J. Dietz (copyrights 1944, 1959, and 1974), Bebe answers all the questions about Bulbs, Tubers, and Corms in the 1974 edition.
Questions
I think if I spent enough time searching newspapers.com, I could probably come up with more information about Bebe, but it would be mostly about her books and where she spoke. I found one topic that sounded interesting, “Three Months of Tulips.” I’m sure there are many more topics, if one had the time to find them.
I never found an obituary online for Bebe or a grave. Is there an obituary hidden somewhere in a newspaper that has not yet shared its archives online?
Did Bebe have more than two daughters? Try as I might, I couldn’t find any information about Bebe in ancestry.com beyond the 1940 census when she was still in college
I wonder what became of her garden after she died? It would be around Wayne, Pennsylvania, I think.
Plant More Native Plants
Bebe was ahead of her time with her book on using more native plants. I didn’t have to read too far into the book before I added at least one more plant to my “Oh, I want that!” list.
It’s the native bleeding heart, Dicentra eximia, also called fringed or plumy bleeding heart. I’m familiar with the species that comes from China, D. spectabilis, but now, thanks to Bebe, I want that native one!
I think she’d be pleased that fifty-plus years after she wrote her book, gardeners are still picking it up and thinking, “Yes, we should be planting more native plants in our gardens.” Or maybe she’d think, “Why didn’t you all listen to me fifty years ago?”
I found this one especially interesting. Thanks, Carol.