Pioneer Information
Born in Cuba, New York, Tabor was one of the first women to self-identify as a landscape architect. She studied at the Art Students League in Buffalo and New York City, as well as the New York School of Applied Design for Women. Her horticultural training was acquired at the Arnold Arboretum in Boston. Tabor preferred to design gardens for persons of average income rather than for the wealthy. As a result, her gardens were not recorded in publications as extensively as more extravagant landscapes. In addition to her design practice, she also taught at the University of Illinois in 1922.
Tabor is best known as an author on the subjects of landscape design and horticulture. In 1905 she began writing and drawing plans for such publications as The Garden Magazine and Country Life. A regular contributor to the Woman’s Home Companion, Tabor began a garden column which ran from 1920 to 1941. She also authored ten garden books, most being published between 1910 and 1921. These included The Landscape Gardening Book (1911), Old-Fashioned Gardening (1913), Come into the Garden (1921), and Making a Garden of Perennials (1951). She was also an editor of The National Plant, Flower, & Fruit Guild Magazine. Tabor spent most of her adult life in the New York City region. Upon retiring, she moved south, residing in various states. Tabor died at the age of 97 in Virginia and was buried in Huntington Rural Cemetery in Huntington, New York.
