Guy Nearing, born January 22, 1890, can be considered a renaissance man. He was an authority on wild mushrooms, the author of "The Lichen Book", which he also illustrated, a poet who published six books, a landscape painter, a chess master, an inventor, and an active folk dancer into his 80s.

However, it was his proficiency as a horticulturist that we honor. After coping with the onset of blindness in his senior year, he graduated from the University of Pennsylvania in 1911 as a member of Phi Beta Kappa and did graduate work in Botany at Harvard and Columbia Universities. His subsequent career was a testament to succeeding in spite of numerous severe physical and natural setbacks.

He began his first nursery experience in 1929 with the Guyencourt Nurseries where he did much early experimentation. In 1935, he became an independent rhododendron grower and opened the Guy Nearing Nursery in Ridgewood, New Jersey.

He was successful in developing many rhododendron hybrids, especially hardy small leaved lepidotes. In 1945, his nursery was destroyed by floods, causing many valuable specimens of rhododendrons to be lost. In 1947, he began a nursery in Ramsey, New Jersey, where he rose to prominence as one of the premier hybridizers and growers in the East.

Mr. Nearing was a member of the American Rhododendron Society, a founding member of the New York Chapter (1951), and a member of the New Jersey Chapter. The Tappan Zee Chapter was founded by Mr. Nearing as a spin off from the New Jersey Chapter.

On March 22, 1986, Guy Nearing died at the age of 96, leaving a legacy of hybrids that meet high standards of good bloom, good growth habit and reliable hardiness.