"A
Conversation with Miss Elizabeth Gamble"
Adapted
from an article written by Joanne Elders, probably for the
Palo Alto Times in the late 1950's or early 1960's. Miss Gamble
granted this rare interview the day before she was honored
at a luncheon by the Palo Alto-Stanford Hospital Center Auxiliary.
She worked for 35 years with the auxiliary's patient loan
fund and had recently been given an honorary membership.
Miss
Gamble reminisced about the first time her family came to
Palo Alto in 1901 and built the sturdy home she still shares
with her brother, George. The modest, retiring woman now spends
many hours working in her famous flower garden. As she talked,
her affectionate English Cocker Spaniel hopped up on her lap
and tried to gain attention. Miss Gamble laughed at the dog's
shenanigans and petted her contentedly throughout the interview.
Palo Alto was a little town of 3,000 when the Gamble family
first came here. Waverley Street was a dirt road. "When
we built our house, it was outside the city limits,"
Miss Gamble reminisced. "We had to ask the city if we
could get electricity. They said yes, but if there was a heavy
call for it somewhere else, they'd have to cut us off."
The
Gambles had a cow and horse in their spacious half-block lot,
the first home in the neighborhood. Their backyard backed
up to Palo Alto's first hospital. On any rainy night, she
recalled, you could find a doctor stuck in the muddy street
outside her home as he rushed to the hospital. Horses and
buggies were the mode of transportation for a few years. In
1911, Miss Gamble said, her family bought its first car.
Miss
Gamble went to The Harker Day School in Palo Alto. When she
finished high school at 16, "my mother thought I should
go to Ireland to visit relatives for a year." She did
and still has memories of the trip. She and her "Aunt
Fanny" went to Germany and visited the King of Prussia.
"I was trying to learn German. I can still hear that
old gentleman (the King) yell to his servants, 'Where are
my trousers?'," she said using her still excellent German
to emphasize the King's words.
Her
philanthropic nature came out in many ways. Some friends asked
her to join the newly-formed hospital auxiliary and she worked
with the social service committee handling loans to hospital
patients. All of the monthly board meetings of the auxiliary
were at her home. She was active in Red Cross work as well
and for many years taught high school or junior high school
youth at All Saints Episcopal Church.
One
of her proudest accomplishments is the lovely flowering gardens
that surround her home. She walked briskly through the garden,
trimming a bush back here and cutting a bouquet of dahlias.
Her flowers have gained widespread fame. She gives them generously
to brighten hospital rooms, as well as for many auxiliary
events.
She
is alert and vigorous for her 70-odd years, and she looks
keenly at her blossoms and shrubs through bespectacled eyes.
Her checks are lined with smile marks, lasting proof that
she smiles readily. She wore a flowered dress, particularly
appropriate for her garden walk.
Ask
her a question about any flower - her favorite is iris - and
she gives you the horticulturist's viewpoint. Iris, she explained,
"bloom in May or June. They have to have sun, and you
need to divide them when they get too thick." With that,
the healthy gray-haired woman took one more look around her
immaculately kept gardens and strode quickly indoors.
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