Alice C. Tyler: A vision to change the world

In 1911, a girl named Alice was born to Swedish immigrants who settled on the banks of the Willamette River near Oregon City.

Alice C. Tyler, together with her husband Jack, focused their philanthropy on preserving the natural world that made such an impression on both of them from childhood.
Alice C. Tyler, together with her husband Jack, focused their philanthropy on preserving the natural world that made such an impression on both of them from childhood. Photo courtesy of Allyn Brown

Imagine life in her day. Her house didn’t have electricity or running water, yet she enjoyed an idyllic childhood fishing for abundant Willamette River salmon and swimming up to sternwheelers that churned up the river, waving at passengers.

Alice loved the outdoors. After she graduated from Oregon City High School, she did something we doubt few of her peers did and summited Mount Hood.

“These early experiences created a lifelong bond and interest in the environment,” says Allyn Brown, Alice’s nephew and a Trustee of the Alice C. Tyler Perpetual Trust, which offers grants that focus on preserving the environment, supporting at-risk children and advancing Waldorf education.

Alice moved to Los Angeles, but remained an Oregonian at heart. She married Jack Tyler, one of the two founders of Farmers Insurance. Jack also had a rugged childhood growing up in the South Dakota prairie next to the Dakota Sioux reservation.

Together, Alice and Jack focused their philanthropy on preserving the natural world that made such an impression on both of them from childhood. Alice’s legacy includes the Tyler Ecology Prize and the Alice C. Tyler Perpetual Trust, which has given more than $160,000 to Friends of Trees over the past eight years.

These investments have propelled Friends of Trees’ work—notably, bringing trees to many eastside Portland neighbors who can’t afford them. The Trust has also been a major supporter of planting trees along highways, including last summer along I-205 in Portland and last month along the Randy Pape Beltline in Eugene, both in partnership with the Oregon Department of Transportation. The dream of our “Living Highways” program is to beautify all of Oregon’s right-of-ways with trees, providing a first line of defense for pollution and emissions that cause respiratory health problems and accelerate climate change.

Eugene Living Highways
The Alice C. Tyler Perpetual Trust supported a large tree planting along the Randy Pape Beltline in Eugene. (Photo: Jennifer Killian)

For its dedication to urban and community forests, Friends of Trees is pleased to honor the Alice C. Tyler Perpetual Trust with a 2014 Community Partner Award.

“I can’t tell you how excited the Perpetual Trust is to be part of Friends of Trees,” said Anders Brown, a Trustee, upon accepting the award. “Alice Tyler had enormous faith in our ability to balance growth with environmental preservation. She really had a vision of how to improve the lives of everyone around us.”

The Trust joins two other recipients this year of the Community Partner Award: the Portland Timbers and the East Multnomah County Soil and Water Conservation District. These organizations were honored Wednesday, along with our Volunteer of the Year Don Crossley, at Friends of Trees Annual Leadership Awards Luncheon. You can view all of the photos from the event here.

Thanks to Alice’s nephew, Allyn Brown, for providing us with info and a picture for this post.