Sally Wylde pictured on the left. Photo courtesy of Chickin Feed.
Yesterday evening Sally Wylde, a Decatur resident, founder of the Oakhurst Community Garden Project and an inspiring community leader, passed away. She was an amazing woman and had a huge influence on the Decatur community. Sally moved to Oakhurst in 1993 where she and her neighbor, Louise Jackson, invited school children to become caretakers of a garden they had formerly cut through every day after school. Shortly after, Sally and her husband, Britt Dean, acquired a nearby undeveloped half-acre lot and established the Oakhurst Community Garden Project.
As the Garden matured into an established grassroots nonprofit organization with Sally at its helm, the lot transformed into an urban oasis with vegetable and floral plots, a pond, art installations, beehives, animals, and restored native habitats. She inspired countless neighbors of all ages to become better caretakers of the earth, of one another, and of themselves.
In 2005 Sally retired as the executive director of the Garden and returned to her first calling as an artist. She began painting again and soon had works on display in galleries around town. She orchestrated a community-wide art project, bringing together an army of artist who created giant puppets in a spectacular array of colors, shapes and sizes to march in Decatur’s annual Earth Day parade.
Sally also began writing, playing the piano and taking part in an improvisational theater group. She volunteered with Decatur’s Farm to School initiative, bringing to that endeavor her passion for empowering children to take charge of their own health and connecting it to the health of the planet.
When Sally was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2008, she met the challenge with her characteristic courage and creativity. She co-created a performance art piece known as “The Lump Journey,” and continued to pursue love, life and beauty in the natural world even while going through chemotherapy, radiation, surgery and ultimately the aggressive spread of the cancer throughout her body.
Sally Wylde’s passing will be deeply felt by the community, but her energy and influence will continue to inspire for generations. For more information read Maureen Downey’s tribute to Sally in the AJC and visit Sally’s Caring Bridge page.
What can you say about a woman like that? She left everyone she encountered better for the experience.
Small correction: Sally created the garden with Louise Jackson, not Louis. She lives on Oakview across from 5th Avenue school and has some wonderful stories to tell about the 40 years she has lived in Decatur.
We will miss Sally in Decatur.
Thanks for spotting this Marshall. It is fixed now.
Peace to a Queen among ordinary men and women. Yet, Sally’s gift was to see the king and queen in us all. I, this community, this earth will miss you.