Clubs, Societies & the ACS

The American Camellia Society celebrated its 55th Anniversary in 2000. The society was founded in Macon, Georgia, following a conceptual meeting the previous year in Savannah, Georgia. From a humble start with headquarters in a two-room laboratory on the University Campus at Gainesville, Florida, the society moved to donated space at the Coastal Plain Experiment Station at Tifton, Georgia. In 1968, through a generous gift of 160 acres by the late Dr. Dave Strother, the Society moved to the location it now occupies, at Massee Lane Gardens in Fort Valley, Georgia.

The American Camellia Society is a national membership organization.

Since 1968, gifts to the Society have made possible a headquarters building, a library filled with the finest collection of camellia literature in the world, a residence for the garden's horticulturist, a large landscaped greenhouse, a small research greenhouse, the Scheibert Rose Garden, the Abendroth Japanese Garden, the Helen Teeter Garden, the Stevens-Taylor Gallery, the Annabelle Lundy Fetterman Museum and Educational Building, the Brown & Hall Environment Garden, and a fine porcelain collection which includes the nation's largest collection of Boehm porcelains open to the public.

Of particular note is the fact that the greater part of the assets of the Society have come from within the membership. There is not now, and never has been, debt of any kind. We can take justifiable pride in the strides of the Society during its first years, and we look forward to continuing our progress.

See the ACS Video



American Camellia Society Production by Ted Liedle.