At the March 20, 2018 GBHS board of directors meeting, four members of the former Great Barrington Garden Club presented a check for $2,178 to the Society for new colonial gardens to be installed at the Wheeler Farmstead.

Club members Michelle Gilligan, Rebecca Namislo, Ginny Race, and Hilda Banks Shapiro presented the check to Great Barrington Historical Society President Barbara A. Syer. The amount represented the total in the Club’s bank account at the time of its dissolution.

The donors requested that the funds be used for the installation and maintenance of Colonial-style kitchen and ornamental gardens at the Farmstead. As an example, local historian Jim Parrish has designed a “goosefoot” garden to be placed on the north side of the Dutch Wagon House next to the privy building.