Mount Lemmon’s Namesake: A Trailblazing Botanist

Sara Plummer 1865 (Wikipedia)

In 1880, on Thanksgiving Day, Sara Allen Plummer, the woman for whom Mount Lemmon was named in 1881, married fellow botanist John Gill Lemmon. Sara, a courageous woman, had journeyed west alone for health reasons and blossomed into a self-taught botanist and gifted artist. Together they discovered new plant species, and Sara’s detailed illustrations carried their findings far beyond the desert, delighting scientists and audiences wherever she presented her works and exhibits.

want to learn more about Sara Plummer-lemmon?

The Forgotten Botanist: Sara Plummer Lemmon’s Life of Science and Art, by Wynne Brown (Paperback, November 2021)

Life stories: Mt. Lemmon’s namesake was female explorer, by Kimberly Matas Arizona Daily Star, Oct 31, 2011, Updated Oct 24, 2014

Sara Plummer Lemmon, Wikipedia

Untold Stories: Sara Allen Plummer Lemmon, by Moez Rahman, California Academy of Sciences

Sara Plummer Lemmon: Pioneering Botanist, by Erin Blakemore, JSTOR Daily, March 11, 2015

Gertrude Pusch-Zipf (right) on horseback in front of Lemmon Rock Lookout Tower by Hank Soldier’s Camp.

Gertrude Pusch in Bonnet on Ladder on Lemmon Rock Loookout Tower