Awards Banquet

Horticulturist of the Year 2007

Tom Carruth

Our Society’s 2007 Horticulturist of the Year was Tom Carruth. Tom has been a member of the Society for 18 years but for far longer than that he has been renowned for his work: discovering, breeding and cultivating roses. After completing undergraduate and graduate degrees at Texas A&M, Tom headed west for California and landed at Jackson and Perkins in Orange County where he worked with Bill Warriner. The former Armstrong Roses was the next stop for Tom and while there he collaborated with another legendary plantsman, Jack Christensen. In 198 8 Tom became Director of Research at Weeks Roses where his incredible talents are utilized in their breeding program, which creates and sorts through some 200,000 seedlings annually. But there’s so much more to Tom’s tale, as you’ll discover when you listen to Tom himself, talking about “Not Just Roses” at the banquet honoring him.