Ballard, Ernesta Drinker

Horticulturalist, feminist, and civic leader, Ernesta Drinker Ballard was the daughter of Henry S. "Harry" and Sophie Hutchinson Drinker. Her father was a prominent lawyer in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, her mother a feminist and author. Not encouraged to attend college, she graduated as an adult from the Pennsylvania School of Horticulture for Women in 1954, when she started her own greenhouse business. From 1963 to 1981 Ballard was executive director of the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society (PHS) and was credited with transforming a then-faltering annual indoor flower show into the largest in the world. With funds generated by the show, she started the PHH's community gardening program, Philadelphia Green. Ballard was also instrumental in saving public monuments in Philadelphia, and in restoring the buildings and grounds of the Fairmount Waterworks (she served as Fairmount Park commissioner for 21 years, until 2002).

A convenor of the Philadelphia chapter of the National Organization for Women in 1967, Ballard was also a co-convenor of the Pennsylvania International Women’s Year committee (1977) and served as treasurer (1986-1988) and chair (1989-1991) of the National Abortion Rights Action League. She was active in the Republican Party, running as a candidate for Philadelphia city commissioner in 1983, and serving on the executive committee of Pennsylvania Republicans for Choice, 1988-1994. Ballard was married to lawyer Frederic L. Ballard, who died in 2001; they had four children. She died in Philadelphia at age 85 in 2005.

From the guide to the Papers of Ernesta Drinker Ballard, 1958-2005, (Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe Institute)