James Cothran

Mr. Cothran serves as an adjunct professor at Georgia State University and the University of Georgia, where he teaches graduate classes on Southern Garden History, Landscape Preservation and Historic Plants.  He has served as a Member of the Atlanta Urban Design Commission, the Atlanta Tree Preservation Review Board, the Atlanta Tree Preservation Commission and the Atlanta Botanical Garden. He currently serves as a board member of the Cherokee Garden Library, the Alliance for Historic Landscape Preservation, and recently served as President of the Southern Garden Historic Society. Mr. Cothran was a founding member of Trees Atlanta and has been a member of its Board of Directors since its inception in 1980.
 
Mr. Cothran is the author of two award winning books, Gardens of Historic Charleston (1995) and Gardens and Historic Plants of the Antebellum South (2003). He has recently completed a forthcoming book (2010) entitled Charleston Gardens and the Landscape Legacy of Loutrel Briggs to be published by the University of South Carolina Press. He was instrumental in establishing the Garden Club of Georgia’s Historic House and Garden Pilgrimage/Grant Program, which has awarded over 40 grants for various landscape preservation projects in Georgia since 1996. Mr. Cothran has lectured widely throughout the southeast on various landscape/garden, preservation, design, and planning topics.  In addition to being the recipient of many professional awards, he has also been recognized and honored for many civic and public service activities. He was elected a Fellow in the American Society of Landscape Architects in 2002, and received the University of Georgia’s School of Environmental Design Distinguished Alumni Award in 2006.